The ONE Method: The solution to all your problems in life | 60

So last week I shared with you what the solution to every single problem you have is, and today I get to tell you how you solve it. So that's the what, and this is the process. This is the how. So tune in if you have any problem to solve so that you know exactly what to do step by step after today. If you're new around here, I am Dr. Betsy Guerra, and I am a licensed psychotherapist, a speaker, and an author who has spent 26 years solving people's problems. So trust me, you, when I tell you that I know, know, know, know how to help you solve your problems, and that begins today. Okay, so today is a continuation of last week's podcast, but just in case you're not caught up, allow me to give you a brief summary. We all have problems, and we think there are financial problems, illness problems, issues with our children, relationship issues, resentment, unforgiveness, depression, anxiety, fears. We name our problems all these things, But those are just costumes, or like I called them last week, they're symptoms to the real and only problem. The only problem there is, is a gap created by separation. When you separate from God, when you separate from yourself, your highest self, which is one with God, you have this gap. It's like a crack. where now things can fall in through the crack, like that depression, the fear, the relationship issues, all the things that you're going through in your family, in your marriage, with your extended family, in your life. That's all in that gap. So if we bridge the gap, and that's the solution to your problem, it's to bridge the gap. It's to reunite, to become one with God, to reconnect with your source. And the source of abundance, justice, health, love, grace, self-worth, like the source of all good things that your heart desires. Like when you breach that gap, when you reconnect, you solve your problem. So we know that from last week's episode. But this week, we're like, okay, I learned that, but what do I do with that? How, Betsy? How do I breach that gap? That's what today is about. The way you breach the gap is through expansion, and expansion happens at the same time as reconnection. Last week we used the analogy of our lives as a circle. So if our life is a circle and God is a circle, then when we're one with God, you can only see one circle because there's a full overlap. But when we've separated, you could see the 2 circles. So reconnection, which is the solution to your problem, happens when you come back to oneness with God. So when you're— when the circles reconnect, when they get closer and closer to each other until they fully overlap. But we also learned last week that when we're separated, we shrink because we're disconnected from the Source of life, goodness, greatness. We're smaller compared to that big essence that is the circle of God. So when we separate, we shrink, and when we reconnect, we grow and we expand. So the way to come back to oneness is either by reconnecting with Source, with God, and like really like working on your spiritual life while also doing some personal development. Because if you— if reconnecting with God means that you get to be less judgmental, that you get to surrender that control, that you go from being self-centered to generous and self-denying and considering other people, if the thing that separates you is judgment gossip, um, self-loathing. Like, if, if those things that separate you are going to be taken care of, then in order to reunite, you need to do some personal development. Because there's a reason why you, you need control, and surrender is going to be really hard. So you need to do both. It's psycho-spiritual work. It's the psychology, like learning why you think, feel, act the way that you do, and then the spiritual work, which is God putting in the strength and the resilience and the grit to help you do the thing that you learned technically through personal development, right? That's why both are super, super important. So when you are reconnecting with God by spending time in silence, solitude, and stillness, by staying in prayer, by asking for Him to reveal to you what it is that you need to work on, and then you going out there and addressing that, always with God in the center, then you inevitably expand and reconnect, right? So when you're reconnecting, you are expanding, you're growing. That little circle that was shrunk, separated, will become bigger and fuller as it gets closer to God because it's then being fed by the vine, by the source. So you can address this problem by reconnecting spiritually first or by expanding psychologically first. So what is easier for you? Is it easy for you to sit in silence and be still and spend time with God in prayer and listen and, you know, let go of your thoughts? Or do you suffer from a little ADD and you just can't be still? I think, is it too hard to reconnect through stillness? Well, if that's not your strength, we're gonna get there because, girl or guy, you must learn about stillness. It's, it's, it's much cheaper. Actually, it's free than therapy and coaching. And it is the most transformative spiritual practice you'll ever experience. It's Amazing. It's like letting go of your human limited thoughts to make space and download divine infinite thoughts. It's like, what? It's pretty awesome. So we're gonna get there. But if that's not your forte, then we start with expansion. So 2 things you get to begin with, either reconnecting— if spirituality is your strength and silence is your power, superpower, then we begin with stillness and quietude. But if that ain't your cup of tea, then we begin with expansion. Maybe you love personal development, you read all the books, you, you know, you go to events and workshops and retreats and summits and conferences, or the Faith-Based Coaching Academy where you do both. No-brainer. I don't know what's taking you so long to go to talktobetsy.com and book a call with me. But anyway, I digress. You can start either or through spirituality or through psychology. Now, they both lead to the same outcome, which is oneness. If you if you're working on getting closer to God, and imagine those circles that are separated; they're getting closer to God. This the circle that's getting close is expanding as it moves closer because it's receiving the goodness and the greatness that is God, the source of everything. And if you begin with expansion, when— if you begin by doing the personal development work, you have a coach, or you're doing the, you know, you're reading books, and— or you're in FBCA, like, if you're doing this work, then you're expanding. And what happens is that In the measure that you expand, you attract. Like, you become like a magnet to come closer to God. So, and that's— I've talked about this many times in this podcast, but I'll repeat it in case you haven't heard it. When you ask God for a grace, and that grace is big, but the space where you have to hold that grace is the size of a drawer, And the grace is the size of a car, then you cannot fit that grace in the drawer. So you must expand to fit in the grace that is the size of a car. You must expand into the size of the garage. So when you expand, you become closer to God because you open up to His grace and His love and His greatness and the blessings. So if you're expanding, you're moving towards oneness. And if you're moving towards oneness, you're expanding. So they both work together. What feels easier or simpler or more approachable to you? You get to be honest with yourself. Is it to grow spiritually and reconnect with God? Or is it to do the personal development work to learn about those triggers and about those reactions and that anger that you have inside of you, or that depression, those anxious thoughts? You know, you're not walking by faith, you're walking by fear. If those are the things that separate you, then maybe starting in the personal development side will serve you. And ultimately, it'll still lead to the same outcome, which is oneness. Now, because the outcome we're looking for is oneness, we— I use the word ONE to explain the process through which we do the work to solve the cause of the problem, the separation. And ONE stands for the O, outsmarting your mind. The N, nourishing the spirit. And the E, experiencing, embodying faith. So the O in ONE is outsmarting the mind. And what that means, which is, it's actually the process through which I take my students for 2 months in the Faith-Based Coaching Academy. So this is no simple work. And those are like very deep, intense, like intentional— Workshops. 2 months. We're all in. Outsmarting your mind means that you understand your brain. You grasp why you think, feel, and act the way you do because you're learning psychology, you're learning theory, science-backed tools and, and, and wisdom that are gonna help you grasp and understand why it is That you and the people around you are the way you are, which is fascinating. That's what, like, got me to fall in love with psychology when I, when I learned it in school. And I remember being like, oh, that has a name? That happens to me? It happens to other people? It's just so exciting to see that, that, that all these concepts and terms and theories have been, like, packaged in a way that is simple and understandable. And I'm really good about simplifying complex things. So it's really fun for me to teach. So Outsmarting the Mind is the process through which you learn, you become equipped with— like, you know how when you call a therapist or a coach and you're like, I need to help my daughter because I don't know how to help her. I'm not a professional. I don't know how to help her. Well, my friend, in FBCA, you become a professional without having to go back to school because you receive PhD-level education in psychology. Let's go. So my students are mostly moms who come to me and they've said that, like, I didn't know how to help my kid that is going through this, or that, you know, we have an issue in our relationship, or is going through an addiction. Or today I just heard one say, like, you know, my son's girlfriend was cutting herself and I didn't know what to do with that. So I went to a therapist to see how I could use them. Become equipped. There are a lot of people assigned to you in your family, your children, your spouse, your ministry, your coworkers, your extended family, your friends. They all come to you because you're the person that they feel better after they speak to. But are you being equipped? Do you know how to outsmart their minds and yours? Are you supporting those people with wisdom? With competence, with conviction and confidence, or are you winging it? Now, because you are a person of faith and you have God in your heart, God uses anyone. And they say He doesn't call the equipped, He equips the called. So I'm sure you've still done a really good job because you have God inside of you, and many times He's the one guiding you to answer to the person in front of you. But what happens At any given moment when you're not fully connected and when the, the one speaking through you is your brain, not the Holy Spirit, that's a problem. The O in ONE is outsmart your mind. Learn the theory, learn the tools, science-backed, the skill set that are gonna allow you to show up for yourself and others in a competent Confident manner. The N in ONE stands for nourish your spirit. Now, nourishing your spirit is about connecting with the indwelling God. When we go to church, we keep hearing about, like, God as if God was outside of us. Like, we worship God, we talk to God, we see Him in the altar, the cross, the thing. God is inside of us. God is inside of you. God breathed the Holy Spirit into you. Like, it's— you have it inside. And if you, you know, in the Catholic faith, we believe in communion, in the sacrament of communion, the Eucharist, which means that the body of Christ is in that bread that we receive. It's not a representation. It's not a symbol. It is the body of Christ in our belief. So every time I go to take communion, I'm like, first of all, I'm super excited. I'm like giddy in line, like trying to contain myself. And then I'm like, you know, I receive the body of Christ and I kiss it and then I swallow it and I imagine Him like taking over me. So we also have a physical manifestation. revelation of the fact that God is not outside of us. He's within us. He is us. God is you. God is me. And that's what Father Richard Rohr wrote in the Universal Christ book. He wrote a book in which he said, Christ is not just the last name of Jesus. Christ is not just the one who was born in Bethlehem with Mary and Joseph as parents and who who died on the cross and resurrected. Christ is God's love for us. Christ is so much more than personifying. We personify Jesus instead of realizing Jesus is, for us human beings that are limited and need to understand things conceptually and literally, God sent us His only Son, gave us His only Son, His love. Was incarnated in the person of Jesus, but Jesus is not just a person. Jesus Christ is God's love for us. Jesus is the flower and the butterfly and the person and the friend and the little angel that God sent your way that showed you His love. So that's why we talk about being Christlike. It's because we have Him inside of us. So are we tapping into that or not? Are we connecting with that or not? Are we using it, letting it take over? One of my favorite prayers is, have your way with me, Jesus. Let's go. I'm yours. Like, have your way. Use me. In the Hallow— there was a Hallow Challenge during Lent, and Was it Mother Olga? I think was her name. Gosh, I can't remember her name. I'm sorry if I'm saying it wrong, but there was a there was a nun that spoke in the Halo Challenge for Lent, and she she had this prayer that was empty me, fill me, use me. Like empty me of all the things in my brain that are not serving me. Of all the habits and thoughts and beliefs that are not aligned with what You want me to think, Lord. Empty me, empty me from all of it. Empty me from my imperfections. Empty me from my humanity. Empty me. Fill me with Your love, Your grace, the connection, Your wisdom, Your ways. And then use me. Have Your way with me, Lord. Amen. So nourishing the spirit is, it's actually, I put it in this order, even though you can start either way, 'cause as I shared before, in the measure that you expand, you reconnect, you know, you get closer to God. And in the measure that you get closer to God, you expand. So you can start anywhere. Like, God meets you wherever you're at and speaks your language. But I put it in this order here because If we were to start with the mind, outsmarting the mind, with the psychology part, what I've done with many of my clients for 26 years is that we reprogram the mind, we reframe, we use all these tools, we expand in the process, definitely expand. We become emotionally intelligent. All these things happen. And then I'm like, okay, let's just throw that out the window. And now let's tap into something deeper. And that something deeper is what I call center or the spirit. You, you connect with the spirit. The outsmarting your mind is more of an ego work. An ego is like our personality, like the idea of ourselves that we created in our lifetime. That's like our person— that's what personality is. It's the identity that you adopted And based on the experiences that you had and what your parents told you and what everybody told you, you believed. And this is your personality, your ego, but it's created by you, which is why you can change it any day of the week. The spirit is permanent, eternal. It's the real deal. Like, the personality can change at any given moment. This is— this remains even after you die. After the flesh goes. So nourishing the spirit is about connecting to God. It's about like, you know, some people call it intuition, gut. I don't know, call it what you will. The idea is that this inner knowing, inspiration, creativity, light, joy, peace, that is you. that lives inside you that you may or may not have tapped into is available to all of us. That's why there should be no suffering. That's why there should be no problem, even if there are problems, because you don't have to believe them if you're operating from center. If you're operating from spirit, you know that— Wayne Dyer said it this way. Only that which never changes is real. That's a little confusing if you haven't done a lot of this work, so I'm going to say it in my own words. This is a Betsyism. Only that which never changes is permanent, is important, is significant. Only that which never changes is permanent, significant, important. Significant, important. Do your emotions change? All the time. You know, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? I don't remember. I don't know if I'm saying it right. But our emotions change all the time. Does your body change? Don't look at my wrinkles while I'm saying that, please. Does your— thinking change, or do you always think the same thing? All of that changes, and all of that is part of your personality. Do your habits change? You— all of these things change. Only that which never changes is significant and important: the spirit. Love. The love that resides inside of us, the wisdom, the knowledge, the knowing, the seed of consciousness that is within us, the Christ in us, the Holy Spirit in us, the one we're one with, that is what's permanent and significant and important. So nourishing that, tapping into that, reconnecting with that through prayer, through stillness. Meditation is my favorite way to access that. And in Christianity? There's something called centering prayer or silent prayer, which is meditation in which you include and incorporate God. You consent to His presence and action within you. So it's not just letting go of your thoughts, but rather, okay, let go of your thoughts so that you can welcome and download the infinite wisdom of God. So that's the second part. The second step to how you do this work to reconnect. And then the last part, I think, is the most important, which is the experience, the embodiment of faith. So you outsmarted the mind. That's what we do in the first 2 months of FBCA. We— psychology, psychology, psychology. We learn, we grow, we get excited about all these concepts and tools and ideas, and we're like, what? You feel so empowered. super equipped. Then we tap into the spiritual aspect of the program, and that's when you reconnect and, and you see things differently, and you start recognizing the presence of the Holy Spirit inside of you. Like, you know now what it looks like, what it feels like, what emotions it invokes. Like, you're like, ah, it's super exciting. And then as you're going through this, You focus on being the thing that you're learning. You get to embody it. You get to experience it. Because I don't think God and the Bible and all these things that we learn about in religion are meant to be studied like, oh, let me study the Bible and know it from front to back and be able to quote the verses, and let me be holier than thou. Okay, I mean, that's good, but are you oozing the Gospel? Is it like, is it coming out of your pores? Do people feel like, I want what she has, I want that joy, I want that peace, like, look at her, unstoppable, she's not moved, she's fierce? Like, are you being the thing that you're learning? Both in psychology and in spirituality? Are you being that? An example I use with my students is that of a kid who is in the arms of his mother. He's a baby, like a little baby, and mom is holding him. And then suddenly he sees a bird in the sky and he starts pointing at the bird and he's like, mm, mm, mm. He can't talk yet, or he's learning how to speak. And he's like, and he sees something magical moving across the heavens and the skies, and it's like colorful and beautiful. Like, wow, it's magical, this thing that is on the sky. Like, wow. And then the mom messes it up for him. Bird, bird, bird. And then she names the magical thing. So now it's not a magical thing, it's a bird. Oh, so then it's like, bird, bird. And next time the kid sees a different bird, it's a bird. An airplane, it's a bird. Like, you know, it's now— it went from being an experience of something magical to being a concept. And that's why we ought to be like kids, because kids experience, embody, enjoy the magic of God, the greatness of God, the blessings, the graces. Like, they're like, oh, fascinated and awed by it. But we adults, we have been wired and we've learned To name things so that we can understand them and to limit things. We make everything that's infinite finite. We limit everything. The heck, we go backwards. That's why personal development is more about unlearning than it is about learning something new. So, and that's why we ought to be like children. That's why the Kingdom of God is of these, these children, the little ones. Because they know how to experience. They experience the moment, the magic. They don't have to name it. So I feel that we as adults know a lot of concepts. I mean, I speak for myself. I know a lot of concepts. I can recite all the commandments and all the things that the Bible— some of the things that the Bible says and what it should be. And I have the spiritual part and I have the psychology part, so I can also tell you from a psychological perspective what it should be and how you should feel. and how you should think and what is right and what is wrong. What do I know, right? But I could tell you all those things, but am I experiencing those things? And by the way, that's the difference between a therapist and a coach. I am both. I, as a therapist, chose my career. I went to school and I learned all the things, looking beautiful, In a book. I learned in the book. I took a test. I did great. Oh, I'm a psychologist, PhD, certificate. I know so much. But then there's the experience of losing your daughter. And there's the experience of going through adversity in your marriage. And the experience of being broke and not knowing when you're gonna— how you're gonna make payroll. And there's the experience of life. that really helps you understand the concept that you read about. Now, like, I remember I used to see couples and families when I was a young therapist. I loved family and couples always. And I look back and I'm like, why did they listen to me? Like, I knew nothing. I mean, I knew— and again, God used me because God equips the chosen. But I look back, and I'm like, I had no idea what I was doing. Like, now that I'm a mom, and I've gone through life, and I have my own marriage, and my family, now I'm like, oh, I get it. So therapists chose their career and learned about it in books. But coaches are chosen. They're chosen by God, by life, by the experiences they've had, that now they feel compelled and inspired to share with humanity. And that's what I'm calling you to step into. You have experienced life, but now you get to be equipped. Now you get to quote unquote go back to school. You don't need to go back to school and get a whole degree. I got you in 4 months. But now you come and you put names and concepts and ideas and understanding to that so that you may share it more eloquently, more confidently, more calmly, competently, you get to now become equipped. So I was a therapist first. I consider myself a coach now because I've embodied and experienced the things that I once learned in books. So I personally hire only coaches. I don't care about your degree. I care about whether or not you have gotten to where I want to go to, and you've been able to accomplish the thing that I desire. to fulfill. And that is you. You, my friend, are a life coach. Yes, you are. And by the way, if you're in Florida, or in many other states, I'm assuming, you don't need to be a certified life coach to be a life coach. You already are. The way you coach your children, the way you coach your friends, the people who come to you for help, who tell you their entire lives and feel better afterwards, You are a life coach because you've experienced life, because you embody wisdom and peace and grace that other people are desperately seeking for. And it is your responsibility to show up for them. So ONE is the process through which we solve the problem of separation. We outsmart the mind and we become equipped with theories and science that help us understand why people think, feel, and act the way they do. We nourish the spirit and reconnect with the God within, with the Christ, the Holy Spirit inside of us that gives us that knowing, that wisdom, that guidance that, like, lets you know, yes, that's the decision because God speaks through peace. So you connect with that peace. You connect with that joy. So now this anxiety that was debilitating is suddenly released. Mm-hmm. And now this depression that was consuming you, and you were like, why, why am I feeling this way? It's gone. Now it's joy, all that's left. It's because you reconnected with Source, the Source of the peace that surpasses understanding and source of the joy that depends not on external circumstances. So if you, my friend, are ready to feel that peace, feel that joy— more than feel it, you're ready to be it for yourself and for those who are assigned to you— go to talktobetsy.com and book a call with me. Please allow me to support you in taking that next step to fulfilling your purpose, your mission, and to closing the gap, to, to solving the problem of separation in your life. Share this with someone you love and want to bless, and keep at it. Keep doing the work. Outsmart your mind, nourish your spirit, and experience That bird, the magic of it, as opposed to just learning about it. Love you. See you next week. That's it for today's episode. I loved, loved, loved spending this time with you, so thank you for joining me. If somebody came to mind while you were listening, bless them with this episode. Send it to them. And if you may, please subscribe And leave a review. Those are really helpful to help us spread the message. And if you want to grow in faith and wisdom, join me at faithandgrowth.com. Thank you for spending this time with me. Love you. Bye.