Focus on the Family

Narrator (Male): Well, hi, I'm Dr. Danny Huerta, and when a teen is struggling with anxiety, the stress often brings sleepless nights and being pulled apart as parents. But many couples have walked this road and found deeper unity along the way. In fearless faith, I share common places where anxiety begins, while young adults like Caroline share how they've grown with faith, patience, and community support. You'll also hear practical ways to care for your teen while strengthening your marriage. Listen at navigatingteenanxiety.com.

Narrator (Female): This program is sponsored by Focus on the Family, a listener-supported ministry helping families thrive in Christ.

John Fuller: This is John Fuller, and please remember to let us know how you're listening to these programs on a podcast, app or website.

Narrator (Female): All right, nearly 2 a.m. You got this. You can finish any science project before it's due. Already tucked the kids into bed. Who is I supposed to call? No, I just need to finish this. Oh, and I've got the kids' lunches tomorrow. This house needs to be cleaned. Did I eat today? There's just so much to do, and I am nowhere near done, and I just wish I could do more.

John Fuller: Well, we all get caught up in the busyness of life, don't we? And you probably feel with some frequency, like you're running on empty. Today's Focus on the Family with Jim Daly is for you as we explore important rhythms that will help you have a more healthy, more meaningful life. Thanks for joining us. I'm John Fuller.

Jim Daly: John, do you ever get caught in that exchange with somebody where they say, how are you doing? Oh, I'm so busy. You just go into this whole litany of 14 things you got to do.

John Fuller: And then they respond like, oh, you're busy. Well, let me tell you how busy I am.

Jim Daly: Yes.

John Fuller: Yeah, absolutely.

Jim Daly: I'm guilty of that. You know, usually I'm pretty busy. And boy, you want to know about it? I'll tell you. You know, I'm flying here, I'm going there, and you know, we wear it like a badge of honor, but our guest today is going to challenge that and say, are you sure that's healthy?

I think I'm at the point of saying, amen. I don't think that's the way we should go. And the problem, of course, is that that lifestyle is unsustainable. I don't think it's what the Lord wanted for us when he talks about bringing life to the full. And what does that mean? And we're going to explore that today.

John Fuller: Yeah, and Deborah Fileta has been with us a number of times. She's always very popular as a guest. She's an author, speaker, a counselor, and she writes and speaks about marriage and relationships, and today we'll hear about a book that really is so deep and rich, Jim. I don't know how much of it we'll be able to cover today and next time, but it's called Soul Care, Find Life-Giving Rhythms, Live Restored, Avoid Burnout, and Discover Unspeakable Joy. And we've got details about Deborah and the book at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

John Fuller: Deborah, welcome back to Focus. It's so good to have you.

Deborah Fileta: It's good to be back with you both.

Jim Daly: It's so fun. Well, we kind of set it up there. Maybe you can bounce off of that, this idea of busyness and the badge of honor. I think the American culture really raises that to a high standard, don't we? Maybe too high. We kind of put it out there for people to see how busy we are so you can tell us how good we are.

Deborah Fileta: Yeah, I think we tend to value the amount of things that we have going on rather than the quality of the things that we have going on. It's not about the quantity, it's about doing what God has called us to do. And I think you're right when you said it's not sustainable.

And that's the bottom line here. You know, as a licensed counselor, I see so many people coming into my office, high capacity, ministry, executive pastor, senior pastors, people who are burnt out.

Jim Daly: Let's explore that a little bit, that burnout feeling. I'm not even sure, I think I have been there, but again, not being trained in that way to really understand it. I'm not sure that many of us as lay people can know if we're on the edge of burnout. What are some of the descriptors for a person who's on the burnout glide path?

Deborah Fileta: Yeah. Well, let me start by asking a question. The first question I would ask is, how full do you feel? If zero is I feel totally depleted in life and 10 is I feel filled. What number would you give yourself? I think that's a really important question to ask. And then you want to start looking for symptoms of burnout, which are things like excessive fatigue, even after you've had a good night's rest. But I think one of the telltale symptoms is you start feeling apathy towards the things that you used to love doing. The things you used to be excited about.

The things you used to be excited about, you know, I'm so looking forward to going to work and helping people. And now I'm like, I don't really feel like doing this anymore. I'm tired. You start feeling a little bit resentful, a little bit bitter, a little bit jaded. Honestly, it can also come with physical symptoms as far as headaches, muscle aches, and pains, and all the different things that you don't know what to attribute it to, but it's causing you to feel depleted. And you want to be on the lookout for those kind of things.

Jim Daly: Yeah, it's important because it's part of Soul Care, the title of your book. Let's talk about that, the title Soul Care.

Jim Daly: You know, we've got self-care and we've got other things like that. So what is the differentiator with Soul Care? As Christians, we love that.

Deborah Fileta: You know, we love the soul. Yeah, I know. You're right. You're right. I think Christians tend to be a little bit scared of the word self-care.

Deborah Fileta: Because of the focus on self. And here's the thing about it. The way that culture defines self-care is superficial. It's not enough to get a manicure, pedicure, take a warm bath, if you're not getting to the roots of the things that are draining you, as well as the roots of the things that are going to fill you up. So even culture's definition of self-care isn't enough for us as Christians. We have to dig a little bit deeper.

And Soul Care is birthed out of the six rhythms that Jesus himself practiced to fill up during his time here on Earth. And if Jesus himself understood that he had human capacity, and he had to honor that human capacity, though he was fully God, he was fully man. How much more do we have to have the humility to say, I have a human capacity and I need to honor that.

Jim Daly: Yeah, and we're going to get to that because that's the core of the book, right? The things that we can see that Jesus concentrated on to keep himself in a good place and how we can live in that way. And that's why people need to stick with us because we're going to talk about those six core areas.

Before we get there though, Jesus said in Mark 12 about loving, you know, the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. We understand that one. Loving your neighbor as yourself. We don't spend a lot of time thinking about that because on the one hand, we think loving ourselves is almost feels anti-Christian to do that. What do you see in the healthy clinical sense of what the Lord was expressing there? What do we do in a healthy way to love ourselves and then loving our neighbor?

Deborah Fileta: Well, I think the healthiest people are the ones who are the most filled up. You know, empty people have a hard time focusing on others.

Deborah Fileta: And I think sometimes we're so afraid to be selfish that we self-neglect.

Jim Daly: And where that is a badge of honor.

Deborah Fileta: Yeah. Exactly. And self-neglect leads us to self-sabotage because we're empty. And you know the irony in all that, when I self-neglect, when I neglect my needs and I neglect what's going on inside of me, I feel so burnt out and empty that the only person I can think of is myself.

Deborah Fileta: You know, when you're at your lowest point in life, you're not thinking of others. You're just thinking about how bad you feel.

Jim Daly: It's almost like you can't think of others. That's your point.

Deborah Fileta: Exactly. Exactly. It becomes this vortex of selfishness in a different way. But I think the balance of that is learning to honor and address our needs and how we can stay filled up so that we can continue to pour out in the way that God has called us. My dad used to always tell me growing up that human beings are like a well, and if you don't keep filling up your well, you're eventually going to run dry, and you're not going to have anything to offer the people in need.

And I, I see this as a message specifically for the caregivers out there, those of us, the counselors, the pastors, those in healthcare, teachers, ministers, who are constantly pouring out. We have to be even more intentional about making sure that we're filled.

Jim Daly: Yeah, that's so good. In fact, in the book, you had a story of a pastor, senior pastor, who did experience burnout. Describe and of course, you've changed his name, and I get all that to protect him. But describe his situation and what, what was the remedy?

Deborah Fileta: You know, he was at the height of ministry. He had this thriving church that was growing in an unexpected way, but he was on the verge of burnout. When he came in to see me, he was done with ministry. He was feeling so bad emotionally and physically, so exhausted.

And here's what it comes down to. Before you can start practicing healthy rhythms, you have to get to the root of why you don't practice them to begin with. If you don't get to the root of your underlying belief system and why you tend to neglect yourself to begin with, you're just going to repeat the same patterns with time. So I had to sit with him and really start to dig, why do you neglect yourself? Why are you burnt out?

This man grew up in a family where his stepfather was so strict. He was such a perfectionist. And if you messed up, it was over for you. There was physical abuse, emotional abuse. So he learned to just put his needs on the back burner and focus on doing the right thing in the right way for his father and not rocking the boat in any way.

Jim Daly: To avoid punishment.

Deborah Fileta: To avoid punishment.

Jim Daly: Wow.

Deborah Fileta: So here he was, years later, doing the same thing in ministry, seeing what everybody else needed, trying to be perfect, not rocking the boat, not focused on his needs until he got to a place of complete depletion.

Jim Daly: Yeah, that's so amazing. You know, Deborah, so often, you know, we are an organization based on marriage and parenting, and of course Dr. Dobson's background was a PhD in child development. And sometimes these things are so subtle.

Jim Daly: It doesn't sound subtle when you unfold it for your client.

Deborah Fileta: Right.

Jim Daly: But then it just hits you. How do we understand how those subtleties of our childhood and the things we experience end up becoming this huge weight in our lives? How do we even start to think about the behaviors that we're acting out and where, where they're connected?

Deborah Fileta: Yeah. Well, the first question to ask yourself is, what's the belief system here? Why am I doing more than I should? Why do I always say yes? Why do I take more on my plate? We might find that underneath the surface, there's a belief system that thinks, if I don't do it, nobody else will. Or, I have to be the one to do this so that I have value in my life. I want to feel valued. I want to feel affirmed.

Jim Daly: Affirmation.

Deborah Fileta: There's a belief system that we carry. And oftentimes it's rooted in our trauma rather than in God's truth, who says that we are already loved, we are already valuable, we are already enough because of Jesus. And when we function out of the belief system of trauma, we find ourselves engaging in unhealthy patterns.

Jim Daly: Wow. I mean, that, that's something for us to take inventory of, you know, in our lives. What motivates us? Why are we behaving the way we are?

Jim Daly: Especially for those of us that are Christian because we should be the healthiest people on the face of this Earth emotionally.

Deborah Fileta: I know. Can you imagine?

Jim Daly: And often we're not.

Deborah Fileta: I know. Can you imagine if the church took on the call to get healthy? How that could overflow into our world.

Jim Daly: Yeah, that is so good. All right, you open that door on the six principles that you've learned that Jesus demonstrated for us and we'll get through all of them. Let's start with nourish. What does it mean to be nourished?

Deborah Fileta: That was a unique place to start for me, because I think the world helps us focus on our physical well-being, probably to a fault. But in church, we often neglect our physical well-being. But how can we go to Judea and Samaria and the ends of the Earth when we're sick and tired and depleted, right? Our physical health, our temple, is such an important part of having healthy rhythms. And Jesus himself stopped to take care of his body.

The Bible says he was wearied with his journey, and so he would stop. It talks about him making time to eat and drink and making sure his disciples were nourishing their bodies. Coming from a Middle Eastern family and thinking of Jesus saying to the disciples, come and eat. Was a really refreshing look at him because he actually cared about the state of their body because he knew that that was the path and the avenue to being able to do everything that God had called them to do.

John Fuller: This is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller. Our guest today is Deborah Fileta, and you can find out more about her book, Soul Care, when you get in touch with us. Our number is 800, the letter A in the word family, or stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

Jim Daly: Deborah, you mentioned your, your heritage, Egyptian, and I remember going to someone's home, Peter, who grew up in Lebanon. And, oh my goodness. I mean, coming over for, you know, in the states, we say, hey, you want to come over for dinner? They spent four days getting ready to do this meal for us.

Deborah Fileta: I believe it.

Jim Daly: And the homemade hummus and the breads and the, you know, dates and the kitchen was fully decked out. Every counter had heaps of food. I'm going, Peter, my goodness, you could feed 100 people.

Guest (Male): This is what we do. We want to make sure you have enough.

Deborah Fileta: You want to make sure you're nourished.

Jim Daly: I was like, enough? I mean, but it was amazing. And I, I think for those of us that do the drive-through mostly, whatever that might be, you know, pick up the already cooked chicken and at Costco and get it to the table. Describe for us that culture of a meal. I mean, it's different. We don't, we don't possess that understanding of what it means to sit and eat together, the way the Lord did with his disciples. It's a gathering, it's something special.

Deborah Fileta: Well, first of all, it was a life-giving meal because of the people that were there, but also because of the types of foods that were being eaten. I mean, we've really strayed from that in modern America 2024, the things that we're eating today are mostly processed and unhealthy, rather than whole foods that nourish us. They might be foods that fill us, but they're not foods that nourish us. And you know, interestingly enough, we work against God when we're not taking care of our bodies.

Whether it be not eating good foods, whether it be not drinking enough water. I had an experience where I was out on a ministry trip and I was dehydrated and I started having heart palpitations and, you know, right away you're like, this is spiritual warfare. It might not be a demon. It might be that you're just dehydrated. You know, sometimes our blood sugar is low, we're not eating healthy foods and then we blame the enemy for it, rather than seeing our role in the process of having a healthy body.

Jim Daly: Well, I want to shout out to your husband, who's a doctor. You called him, right? Honey, you need to pray for me, this is spiritual warfare. He said how much water have you had?

Deborah Fileta: Exactly. What's going on? How much water have you had?

Jim Daly: Start with the basics.

Deborah Fileta: Start with the basics. And how often do we neglect the basics in the caring of our souls?

Jim Daly: Yeah. So that's the nourishment side of it, the physical nourishment of what we need to do as believers and followers of Christ because he again demonstrated that as you said through the scripture. The next one is rest. This is probably one of the more difficult ones, going back to our initial conversation about being busy as a badge of honor, to really be able to rest. And, you know, we think of Jesus is on 24/7, you know, people were infirm and seeking him out by the hundreds, sometimes the thousands. And it seems to give us the impression that he was always available, just push the buzzer and I'll open the door. That's not really what happened.

Deborah Fileta: No, I think we give ourselves the impression that he was busy and always going and always pouring out. But when you look at scripture, and the most beautiful part of writing this book was looking at Jesus through the lens of soul care. He was so good at it. And things that you notice that you would have never noticed before, had you not been looking for those things. Jesus was really good at pulling away and taking breaks. He was really good at responding to his body's exhaustion.

I'm tired. I'm wearied with my journey. What am I going to do? I'm not going to push through. I'm going to rest. I'm going to honor my capacity. My favorite verse was when Jesus took a nap. He climbed on the boat after a long day of ministry, and instead of just pushing through and doing more. You'd think he'd tell himself, I only have three years, right? He started his ministry at 30, we know he was crucified at 33. You'd think he'd say, I only got three years, I got to push through.

Jim Daly: I'm not going to sleep.

Deborah Fileta: Yeah, I'm not going to sleep. He went on the boat, climbed down into the hull and took a nap.

John Fuller: Now there's an element of trusting God in that. I mean, Jesus modeled that for us, but it's really hard to consider rest as somehow related to trusting God and acting in faith. How do I do that when I stop?

Deborah Fileta: I was working with a client recently who said, I feel guilty when I stop to rest and take naps. So we really had to dig, what is the underlying belief system that's causing you to feel guilty? And she said, I don't feel valued when I'm not doing something. I feel like I have to be the one to do, do, do, do, do. And I challenged her, isn't there a sliver of pride in that, thinking that it's on us to do, rather than when I close my eyes and rest, I serve a God who is bigger than me, and he's able to take the little that I can give him and multiply it. It's actually on him, not on me.

And I think sometimes when we have a hard time resting, there's a little bit of pride underneath that, rather than trusting the Lord.

Jim Daly: You know, so often, Deborah, and I've seen this personally, a friend of mine, who he had never shared this before, but as a seven-year-old boy, he was molested by a neighbor. And, you know, as an adult, he was type A, high achiever, and it was so courageous of him because at one point he told me, he goes, you're the first human being I've ever said this to. But I think I wake up every day trying to feel clean. And the only way I feel like I can get clean is if I work harder.

Deborah Fileta: Trying to prove himself.

Jim Daly: Isn't that interesting? And it gets back to the point we made earlier, these connections that happened to us and then how it translates into our actions. Many years later, perhaps, this struggle to feel clean and have to get rid of what was ugly and to work my way through that. I mean, what a tumultuous, torturous.

Deborah Fileta: I know.

Jim Daly: Place to be in.

Deborah Fileta: It's funny because sometimes we look at the success or the good behavior as a positive thing, but if it's not rooted in healthy beliefs, it'll always lead us down an unhealthy path, which ends up in burnout, which ends up in us being in a place where our light is no longer shining.

Jim Daly: Yeah. When it comes to this idea of rest, I feel pretty good about this, honestly, and I, you know, I'm trying to be objective with my self-assessment. But you mentioned the book, you know, try to live your life at 85%.

Deborah Fileta: Doesn't sound like something an Olympic coach would tell you, right?

Jim Daly: Yeah, but I like that. I, I feel like that's what I try to do.

Deborah Fileta: I'm glad to hear that.

Jim Daly: And I think it's always good when you get reinforcement from an expert. But I, you know, I don't, I think Jean would often say, you're kind of type B in certain ways. I can be type A in other ways, but.

Jim Daly: You know, I try to live a type B because I think it's healthy. You leave some capacity. And I don't always do it perfectly, but the point is, I think generally, I actually strive to do that.

Deborah Fileta: Well, if you think of our emotional energy like a budget, we all know that living at 100% max of your budget is unhealthy. I wouldn't tell you, spend every penny of your paycheck, because what happens when unexpected needs arise? You can't save for the future when you're living at max capacity. Our emotional energy is very similar, and we have to honor that and make sure we have margin.

One thing that was really neat when I was processing and writing Soul Care, I often tell my clients the 85% concept. We want to go far, not just fast. So we want to live at 85%, make sure you have extra space. When I thought about the concept of the Sabbath, there's one day of rest out of seven. When you calculate that out in percentage, guess what it comes out to?

Jim Daly: It'd be about 15 to 18%.

Deborah Fileta: 85%.

Jim Daly: Okay, the opposite of that.

Deborah Fileta: The opposite. 15 to 18% rest, 85% work. So it's that concept that I think there's something really spiritual underneath the surface because God understands the way our bodies work and what our bodies need.

Jim Daly: Oh, I think it's so perfect. You experienced a season in your life where you battled with insomnia. I think that's called growing older.

Deborah Fileta: I know. I know.

Jim Daly: Man, I mean, so many of us over that maybe 40 line, you start sleeping a little more restlessly. It's like for my pattern, it's real good sleep at the beginning and then 3 o'clock in the morning, I kind of get a little more restless, start thinking about some things I need to do. And that can, I can struggle with that. But speak to that moment in your own life with insomnia and what that signal was for you.

Deborah Fileta: Well, one of the things that I challenge people to take seriously in Soul Care is the rhythms of sleep that they have. I think we get into a pattern of, well, nobody sleeps well and this is just part of life, but we don't realize when we're not sleeping well, we're not functioning well either. We're not making good choices. Our judgment is depleted when we're tired. Our response is slower when we're tired. So for me, understanding that insomnia was a signal, like what's going on here? Is my chemicals off? Is this hormonal? Is this anxiety? Is there something that I need to adjust underneath the surface, rather than just ignoring it, pushing through, covering it up, actually figuring out what is this telling my body and what do I need to do differently to respond?

Jim Daly: You know, you're seeing people that have come to that conclusion in your practice as a counselor. What percentage of people broadly do you think are in that spot where they're going, okay, this might require some help. I know that's not a scientific question because it's hard to guess. But I, I would think it'd be on the smaller end.

Deborah Fileta: I think it's on the smaller end.

Jim Daly: 10 to 15% that are going, okay, I need to do something.

Deborah Fileta: I think the more likely response is to push through.

Jim Daly: And that's the unfortunate thing.

Deborah Fileta: And just pile it on and then 20 years later, you have a real massive problem.

Deborah Fileta: I would say maybe even two years later. Okay. Yeah, absolutely.

Jim Daly: So, so I'm thinking of somebody, as you raised that good question, Jim, I'm thinking Deborah of somebody that I know, he's late 20s and he goes to sleep around 11 at night and gets up at 2 or 3 in the morning. That's it. He sleeps three or four hours a night.

Jim Daly: And and I thought that's a little unusual and he seems to have accepted that. He, he goes running at 3 in the morning just to deal with that. So what do you, what would your guess be in terms of how I can help him see, maybe this isn't normal?

Deborah Fileta: Yeah. Well, I, I would challenge him that this is a signal of something going on underneath the surface. Because we are supposed to have healthy rhythms of sleep. We were made for healthy rhythms of sleep. We were created the circadian rhythm of day and night. And so rather than just think this is how I am, we need to start investigating and figure out first step, seeing a doctor. Second step, seeing a counselor and trying to get to the root of what some of this might be, whether it's physical or whether it's psychological and emotional and something that needs to be addressed.

Jim Daly: Yeah, this kind of goes back to your first one of your first observations, why am I this way? Why am I letting this happen?

Deborah Fileta: Right.

Jim Daly: Yeah, and it could be first step might be pray and ask the Lord to reveal to you what's happening there. And I think that's a good place to end, Deborah. Jesus's modeling. We're going to come back next time and explore some of the other attributes that you've highlighted. But ending I think on the the high note of God's creation and what he wants from us and what he modeled for us. Jesus did model emotional health and well-being. What are those snippets that you could close here at the end and encourage people to think about as they live their day-to-day life and want to honor God and how they do that?

Deborah Fileta: I would say the best way that we can continue to pour out in the way that God has called us to in the most effective way is to make sure that we remain filled because our level of effectiveness is directly correlated to our level of fullness.

John Fuller: Such great insights today from our guest, Deborah Fileta, as she talked about her book, Soul Care, Find Life-Giving Rhythms, Live Restored, Avoid Burnout, and Discover Unspeakable Joy. Those are some challenging benchmarks, Jim, for all of us, living a restored life and avoiding burnout, experiencing unspeakable joy.

Jim Daly: I'm thinking, where do you sign up?

John Fuller: There may be someone listening right now who says that sounds impossible, and it is without the power of God working in our lives. I love Deborah's advice to live like Jesus and follow his example. Sounds pretty simple. We won't do it perfectly, of course, but that's why we need his truth and love and grace and forgiveness each and every day. Soul Care is an excellent resource that can help you grow in your faith. That's the point. Get a copy today, make a monthly pledge of any amount to the ministry and we'll put this book into your hands, or send a one-time gift, whatever you can afford.

John Fuller: Yeah, and another resource we have for you is our counseling team, and if you or a member of your family need to talk with someone about an issue that you're facing, we'll be happy to set up a free phone consultation for you. Call us, 800, the letter A in the word family, 800-232-6459, or donate and get Deborah's book, and connect with a counselor at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

Jim Daly: John, let me remind everyone why giving to this ministry is so critical. Your financial support is the fuel. I often mention that, that we need for everything we do. Programs like this one, our counseling team, resources like Deborah's book and so much more. And here's the thing. Nielsen ratings, we buy that book so we know how many people generally are listening to us. And when we look against that large audience, thank you, Lord, that so many people, literally millions are listening. But only about 1% of the people who listen actually support the ministry financially through the broadcast and podcast. So we really need to see if we can just move that up one notch. 2% of folks might give. And even $10 a month will make a huge difference from a number of people. So if you can, $10 a month.

John Fuller: Can you build into people's lives that way?

John Fuller: Yeah, donate today and become a friend of the family. We'd love to hear from you. Our number's 800, A family, or visit focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller, inviting you back as we continue the conversation with Deborah Fileta, and once again, help you and your family thrive in Christ.