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If you grew up believing you were chosen, losing that belief doesn’t just hurt. It leaves you asking whether your life matters at all.

In this episode, I break down why “special” is a ranking, why leaving a high-control religion can trigger an existential crisis, and nine ways to build a life that means something on your own terms. I also share what changed for me when I stopped needing to be God’s chosen: I felt more human, less afraid of other people, and carried far less shame.

You are not special. You are specific. And that has always been enough.

In this episode:

• Why “special” is a ranking, and why it keeps you measuring yourself against everyone else
• What you actually lose when you leave a belief system: a meaning structure, not just a belief
• Existential crisis vs. depression, and when to reach out to a therapist
• Nine ways to build meaning after religion: grieve it, separate specialness from significance, build meaning from the ground up, get comfortable with ambiguity, find awe, find your people, join the human race, live specific, and practice creative expression
• The Awe Study, a therapeutic art exercise you can do this week
• How painting taught me to stop asking “is this good?” and start asking “is this mine?”

Try the Awe Study: Take a walk and gather 5 to 10 things that catch your eye. Arrange them on a page and write why you chose each one. Then answer the question underneath it: out of all the humans in the world, what is specific about you?

Go deeper: Step inside the Muse Library for tools and creative practices that help you build inner authority after religion: mormon-to-muse.kit.com/library

A note on mental health: If you’ve felt low most days for more than two weeks, your sleep or appetite has changed, you feel hopeless, or you’re having any thoughts of hurting yourself, please reach out to a therapist, ideally one who understands religious trauma. If you are in crisis, call or text 988 (US).

About Mormon to Muse: Mormon to Muse helps women rebuild identity, self-trust, and inner authority after leaving high-control religious backgrounds. I’m Kristin Martineau, a certified life coach and artist.

If this episode helped, like the video, subscribe to the channel, and share it with someone who needs it.

#MormonToMuse #FaithTransition #ReligiousTrauma #ExMormon #ExistentialCrisis #LeavingMormonism #SelfTrust

Join the MUSE Library: mormon-to-muse.kit.com/library
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About Kristin Martineau
I'm a certified life coach and artist. I help women rebuild identity, self-trust, and inner authority after leaving a high-control religious background. Mormon to Muse is where that work lives.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mormontomuse/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kristinmartineau6

#exmormon #exmormonwomen #selftrust #limitingbeliefs #leavingreligion #lifecoach #mormontomuse

Flow isn’t passive happiness. It’s deep immersion. It’s the state where time bends, self-consciousness softens, and you stop narrating yourself long enough to fully engage in what you’re doing.

And research shows it’s one of the healthiest states the human brain can enter. In this episode, we explore: What flow actually is (and what it isn’t)

The neuroscience of transient hypofrontality — when the inner critic quiets

Why flow improves focus, creativity, and emotional resilience

How high-demand religious conditioning can make immersion harder

Why women trained into self-surveillance often struggle to access flow How creativity becomes one of the safest gateways back High-demand systems don’t forbid flow — but when life is structured around obligation, moral performance, and external approval, it’s difficult to enter a state that requires autonomy and self-forgetting.

You cannot merge with the moment if you are busy monitoring yourself. If you’ve been craving deeper presence, this episode will help you understand why — and how to begin rebuilding your capacity for immersion.

Download the Reclaiming Flow Worksheet to assess where you are and begin intentionally creating the conditions for flow in your own life.

References:

https://medium.com/change-your-mind/3-habits-of-people-never-in-flow-states-180683cb8e36

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2008). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. Harper Perennial Modern Classics. Kotler, S. (2014).

The Rise of Superman: Decoding the Science of Ultimate Human Performance. New Harvest. https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-rise-of-superman-steven-kotler McGonigal, K. (2015).

The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It. Avery. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/314317/the-upside-of-stress-by-kelly-mcgonigal/ McGonigal discusses stress physiology, performance states, and neurochemistry related to focus and resilience in both her book and related lectures. Dietrich, A. (2004).

Neurocognitive mechanisms underlying the experience of flow. Consciousness and Cognition, 13(4), 746–761. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2004.07.002 Dietrich, A. (2008).

Psychiatry Research, 159(1–2), 122–128. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2007.02.006 (This 2008 paper expands on the hypofrontality hypothesis in the context of exercise and altered states.)

Get the Anxiety Soothing art prompts HERE

Distraction isn’t a personal failure. It’s a symptom.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we explore distraction not as a productivity problem—but as an attention and devotion problem. Especially for women who were raised in high-demand systems, distraction often develops as a survival strategy: a way to avoid discomfort, override intuition, and stay externally focused.

We talk about how modern digital life mimics the same patterns many of us learned in religion—limited choices, constant input, and subtle pressure to look outward instead of inward. And we gently reframe attention as something sacred, powerful, and reclaimable.

This episode isn’t about deleting apps or becoming more disciplined. It’s about noticing where your attention goes, what it protects you from feeling, and how to return to yourself without shame.

In This Episode, We Explore Why distraction is often a nervous-system response, not a lack of willpower

How high-demand religions train us to outsource attention and authority

The hidden cost of constant stimulation and emotional avoidance

Why “paying attention” is a form of devotion How creative expression helps restore presence and inner trust

What it means to gently return to yourself again and again Key Ideas

Attention is not neutral—it shapes your inner life

Distraction often protects us from emotions we were never taught how to feel You don’t need more discipline; you need more permission

Awareness, not shame, is the doorway back to yourself

References

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291125005212?utm_source=chatgpt.com

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8622754/?utm_source=chatgpt.com#sec6-ijerph-18-12257

Upstream by Mary Oliver (Penguin Press, 2016)

If you're somewhere in your forties and it feels like everything is coming apart at the same time — your faith, your body, your sense of who you are — you're not broken. You're in the midlife trifecta: faith transition, perimenopause, and kids leaving home, all colliding at once.

In this episode, we'll talk about why this season hits women raised in high-control religion harder than most. You were handed a ready-made identity and never got the messy developmental years where you learn to trust yourself.

What's inside: Why "faith crisis" is the wrong term, and what's actually in crisis

How to grieve the life you thought you'd have — and why skipping it backfires

Why you don't need to figure out "who you are" right now Hormones are valid: your feelings are real, even when they're chemical The case for not burning the house down until you've lived outside for a while

Finding your "feral cats" — the women already surviving out here

Free class — Intuition Hour: How to Find Yourself Again June 25th at 11am. I'll teach a step-by-step framework for rebuilding trust with yourself. This isn't about following me. It's about learning to hear you. Click to register now before you forget.  It's your one wild and precious life.  No time to waste. 

How to Tell the Difference Between Leaving and Deconstructing Faith |

 Episode Summary: Leaving a high-demand religion and deconstructing your faith are not the same thing. In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we’ll explore the crucial difference between the two—and why understanding it matters for your healing and growth.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode: The difference between leaving religion and deconstructing faith

Why leaving can still leave you tied to old beliefs and patterns

How deconstruction helps you rebuild trust in yourself and your inner authority

The emotional impact of each path and what it means for your relationships

Practical ways to notice if you’re still carrying chains from your old belief system

Why This Matters: Many ex-Mormons (and people from other high-demand religions) struggle because they’ve walked away physically but are still living under the same mental and emotional framework. Deconstructing allows you to not only leave but also take apart the beliefs that no longer serve you—and begin building something new.

 Resources & Links:

🎙 Listen to more episodes of Mormon to Muse: Apple Podcasts

📺 Watch Therapeutic Art Prompts: YouTube Channel

📩 Get weekly therapeutic art prompts: Sunday Muse Email

📸 Join the conversation: Instagram @mormontomuse

Leaving the Mormon church, faith deconstruction, religious trauma recovery, ex-Mormon podcast, healing after religion, therapeutic art for faith transition, Mormon to Muse.

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

In this episode, we’re exploring one of the most powerful tools in coaching and personal growth: The Model. Developed by Brooke Castillo, The Model helps you see how your thoughts create your feelings, drive your actions, and shape your results.

If you’re navigating a faith transition—especially after leaving Mormonism—The Model can help you untangle inherited beliefs, process your emotions, and begin choosing your life on purpose. I’ll walk you through the five simple components:

C – Circumstance

T – Thought

F – Feeling

A – Action

R – Result

You'll learn how to apply this framework to your healing journey, your identity reconstruction, and even your creativity.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What The Model is and how it works
• Why thoughts are powerful—but optional How this tool pairs beautifully with therapeutic art and self-expression
• How it helps you break free from old conditioning and religious guilt
• How to start using the Model to create change in your life

The Model Resources & Links:

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Mormon to Muse Watch on YouTube: @mormontomuse

Get the weekly Sunday Muse email + art prompts: 

https://www.mormontomuse.com/monday-muse-opt-in-86fbfcf3-573a-4a4c-978f-07f128d08264

Join here Follow on Instagram: @mormontomuse

 #PostMormonHealing #FaithTransition #TherapeuticArt #TheModel #BrookeCastillo #ThoughtWork #ReligiousDeconstruction #MormonToMuse #LifeAfterMormonism #ArtForHealing #ExMormonPodcast #SelfCoachingModel #CoachingToolsForFaithTransition

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

In Episode 8 of Mormon to Muse, we explore the essential steps to self-discovery for women navigating life after Mormonism. Leaving a high-demand religion can leave you feeling lost or disconnected from your true self.

This episode is your roadmap to reconnecting with your values, desires, and authentic identity.

We’ll walk through 8 clear, practical steps to help you:

Get curious about who you really are

Recognize old patterns and beliefs

Clarify what matters most to you now

Take small, courageous steps toward reinvention

Whether you’re newly out of the church or years into your journey, these steps will help you move from confusion to clarity.

Key Topics Covered: What self-discovery really means after religious deconstruction The difference between self-discovery and “creating a new self” 8 actionable steps for reconnecting with yourself How to deal with fear, doubt, and feeling “lost” 

Why Listen: If you’ve ever asked yourself, “Who am I without Mormonism?”—this episode will give you permission, tools, and hope to start answering that question.

Instagram: @mormontomuse 

Website & Email List: Sunday Muse Sign-up

 steps to self-discovery, self-discovery after Mormonism, ex-Mormon healing, faith deconstruction, reclaiming your identity, post-Mormon podcast, therapeutic art for healing, spiritual trauma recovery, creative self-discovery.

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

#SelfDiscovery #FaithDeconstruction #ExMormon #PostMormonHealing #SpiritualTrauma #TherapeuticArt #MormonToMuse #WomenEmpowerment #RebuildYourLife

Arrested Development — 5 Ways Post-Mormons Are Like Teenagers Podcast: Mormon to Muse with Kristin Martineau

Leaving Mormonism can feel like waking up in your own teenage rebellion—only this time, you're an adult. In this episode, I break down five ways post-Mormons are like teenagers and explore why emotional, spiritual, and developmental growth often gets paused in high-demand religions.

We’ll talk about:

Why leaving Mormonism often triggers a “second adolescence”

The impact of obedience culture on emotional maturity

How to reclaim autonomy, self-trust, and critical thinking

The role of art and creativity in reparenting yourself

How to move from stunted to sovereign

If you’ve ever wondered why you feel like you're just now figuring out who you are—this one's for you.

Subscribe, rate, and share with someone who’s healing after high-demand religion.

Want the therapeutic art activity that goes with this episode? Join Sunday Muse

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

Have you ever caught yourself thinking, “It’s too late for me”? Too late to change careers, to create art, to follow that dream you tucked away years ago?

In this episode, Kristin shares a deeply honest conversation about regret, renewal, and the beauty of starting over — no matter your age or stage of life.

We’ll explore what it means to grieve the woman you could have been while still believing in the woman you’re becoming.

You’ll learn why time isn’t your enemy, how creative expression can reawaken lost parts of yourself, and why it’s never too late to begin again.

Because every season of life holds its own kind of creative power — and sometimes, the second act is where the real magic happens. 🌱

In this episode, you’ll learn: Why the feeling of “too late” is a myth rooted in cultural conditioning

How to process grief for missed opportunities without shame

Ways to reconnect with your creativity after years of silence

The healing power of starting small — even when it feels pointless

How art, reflection, and mindfulness help you rewrite your story

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

What happens when the rules you grew up with continue running your life long after you’ve left the system that taught them? In today’s episode, we’re talking about internalized constraint—the invisible expectations, fears, obligations, and “shoulds” that live inside your nervous system and shape your choices without you even realizing it.

Whether you grew up in Mormonism or any high-demand environment, you learned to be “good” in ways that required self-abandonment: don’t question, don’t feel too much, don’t want too much, don’t upset anyone, don’t take up too much space. Over time, those external rules become internal scripts. This episode helps you identify those scripts, understand how they form, and most importantly, learn how to dismantle them so you can make decisions from a place of inner authority rather than fear, guilt, or conditioning.

In this episode, you’ll learn: What “internalized constraint” actually means and why it’s not your fault How your upbringing trained your nervous system to override your intuition

The difference between internalized constraint and an internal locus of control

Why you still feel guilty or anxious even after leaving the church

How to recognize the internal cage vs. your authentic inner voice

Small, practical shifts that help you reclaim your agency

How creative expression helps loosen old conditioning and create internal spaciousness

Why this matters: You can leave the system but still have the system living inside you. Your healing isn’t about proving anything to anyone—it’s about learning to trust yourself again. And the good news? The moment you start paying attention to your feelings, your body, and your creativity, that internal cage begins to open.

 ➡️ Download my free “Anxiety-Soothing Art Exercises” HERE

They’re gentle, beginner-friendly, and designed specifically for nervous system regulation.

Creating a better life after Mormonism doesn’t mean building the opposite life. It doesn’t mean dismantling every discomfort, rejecting everything you were taught, or proving that leaving was “worth it.”

In this episode, we slow that idea way down. We talk about what a better life actually means — and how to tell the difference between: fear and preference conditioning and genuine choice work that needs to be done and things you’re allowed to leave alone If you’ve ever wondered whether you’re still “doing it wrong” because some things are still uncomfortable after leaving the church, this episode is for you.

In this episode, we explore: Why opposite isn’t the same as free How Mormonism

Why not every discomfort needs to be dismantled

What the result of your thought patterns reveals about healing vs. acceptance

How to tell if a choice is truly yours — or just inherited

Signs you may be swapping one authority for another

What creating a better life after Mormonism really looks like: expanded choice, not performative freedom

A grounding takeaway: A better life isn’t one where nothing feels uncomfortable.

It’s one where discomfort doesn’t automatically mean something is wrong — and where peace doesn’t need to be justified.

I’m currently offering a limited number of free Creative Healing Mini Sessions. These are short, one-on-one conversations where we focus on one area of your life that feels confusing, stuck, or overworked — and clarify whether there’s actually work to do there, or whether you’re allowed to stop trying to fix it.

This is not therapy. It’s not a commitment to ongoing coaching. It’s about clarity and self-trust. Because I want these sessions to feel grounded and well-held, spots are limited and booking will close once they’re filled. For those who attend a session, I’m also gifting (you only pay for shipping) a limited number of Creative Healing art kits to support integration after our conversation (available while supplies last).

👉 Learn more and book your session HERE

You’re trying. You’re doing the things. So why do you still feel stuck? In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we unpack three hidden reasons you might not be making progress—and how the Self-Coaching Model can help you shift your mindset and create real change. Whether you're trying to heal after leaving Mormonism or simply reinvent your life in midlife, this episode will show you how to stop spinning your wheels and start moving forward with clarity and intention.

What We Cover: Why trying to change your circumstances isn’t enough The mistake of taking action without shifting your thoughts and feelings first What it means when you don’t actually believe the thought you’re trying to practice How to use the Self-Coaching Model (C, T, F, A, R) to diagnose and solve your stuck points Why healing and growth require internal shifts, not just external effort

Want the Related Therapeutic Art Prompt? Sunday Muse email: 👉 Join here

Follow Kristin on Instagram: @mormontomuse

#PostMormonHealing #LifeAfterMormonism #TherapeuticArt #SelfCoachingModel #EmotionalHealing #FaithTransition #ExMormon #CreativeHealing #MormonToMuse #MindsetShift

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

Generational pain is real. Many of us carry not only our own struggles but also the unhealed wounds of our mothers, grandmothers, and the women who came before us. They were taught to endure, to stay small, to sacrifice themselves, and often to silence their own needs. Without realizing it, we inherit those patterns. But the truth is: the suffering doesn’t have to continue through us. We have the power to say the line ends here.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, I explore what it means to break the legacy of suffering and create something new.

Together we’ll look at: How generational pain is passed down—silence, shame, and submission.

What it looks like to honor the women before us while refusing to repeat their suffering.

How creativity, voice, and courage can help us heal and rewrite the future.

Practical steps you can take to consciously choose what gets carried forward and what stops with you.

 👉 Join my Sunday Muse newsletter for more inspiration: Subscribe here

For many women, spirituality was never meant to make us smaller—but that’s often what it did. In high-demand religious systems, spirituality is frequently defined by obedience, self-suppression, and service to the institution.

Authority is external. Worthiness is conditional. Expansion beyond assigned roles is quietly discouraged. In this episode, we explore how feminine spirituality operates differently—and why so many women feel spiritually disconnected not because they are broken, but because they were conditioned to abandon themselves.

This conversation is about remembering what was taken offline. In this episode, we explore: Why traditional, patriarchal spirituality rewards self-erasure in women rather than self-connection

How “obedience” and “humility” became substitutes for intuition and inner authority The difference between masculine-coded spirituality (control, hierarchy, endurance) and feminine spirituality (integration, expansion, embodiment)

Why women often feel spiritually depleted when they try to thrive inside systems that require their diminishment How reclaiming intuition, creativity, and emotional truth is a spiritual act—not a selfish one

What it means to practice permission-less spirituality after leaving a controlling belief system

This episode is especially for women who:

Feel spiritually numb, angry, or disconnected after leaving a high-control religion

Were taught to distrust their inner voice in favor of external authority

Sense that their growth required breaking rules they were told were “divine”

Are longing for a spirituality that feels alive, embodied, and honest

A reframe to hold onto: For women, spirituality is not about disappearing. It is about becoming whole. Expansion is not rebellion against the sacred. It is the sacred.

If you want to try a more feminine, creative approach to spirituality download these three art prompts that will help you slow down and get in touch with yourself.  

Episode 4: 9 Questions to Ask Yourself After Leaving Mormonism Mormon to Muse Podcast with Kristin Martineau Leaving Mormonism often means leaving behind a decision-making framework that relied on external authority—leaders, scriptures, promptings, and rules. But what happens when that structure is gone? How do you learn to trust yourself again?

In this episode, I share 9 powerful questions that can help you rebuild self-trust and make confident, authentic decisions on your own terms. These questions are designed to reconnect you with your inner wisdom, clarify your values, and support your growth as a whole, autonomous person. Whether you're navigating relationships, career choices, parenting, or spirituality, these questions offer a grounded way to make aligned decisions—without guilt or fear.

Get the free printable prompt + join the Sunday Muse email

Follow me on Instagram @MormontoMuse

or YouTube

#exmormon #faithtransition #deconstruction #rebuildingtrust #selftrust #decisionmaking #mormontomuse #religioustrauma #therapeuticart #postmormon #healingjourney #creativehealing #lifecoachforwomen

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

You know you don't have to do what everyone else wants anymore. So why is it still so hard to figure out what you want?

If you left the Mormon church and you're still second-guessing every decision, still scanning for the "right" answer, still feeling like a stranger in your own life — this episode is for you. Here's the thing I see more than anything else in women who leave: you're trying to find yourself using the same map that buried you in the first place. You want to get somewhere new, but you're still navigating with the old tools.

In this episode I'm handing you a new map. Not one that tells you where to go — one that helps you get wherever you decide to go.

I get into:

• Why your intuition isn't gone — it's buried — and what that actually means
• What intuition really is (it's a skill, not a mystical gift, and not the Holy Ghost)
• How conditioning taught you to outsource your own authority, suppress your feelings, and measure yourself by performance
• The number one mistake I see: trying to access your intuition through the old frameworks you were handed
• Why feelings make a terrible tool for measuring objective truth — and what they're actually for
• How the church taught you that good feeling = true and bad feeling = wrong, and why that broke your relationship with your own knowing
• Why a bad feeling is information, never a verdict on your character
• The MUSE map I built from the roadblocks I see most in women rebuilding after the church

This isn't about trading one rulebook for another. It's about learning to hear yourself — maybe for the first time — and trusting yourself enough to decide what comes next.

Don't miss Intuition Hour: How to Get to Know Yourself. I'm teaching this class live this Thursday June 25th 11:00 am MST. Save your spot HERE.

You'll learn exactly how to get in touch with your own intuition so you can live a confident, fun, big life that's authentic to you.  

Rediscovering Your Own Taste After Mormonism

When my oldest moved out, I turned the empty basement room into a retreat just for me. I painted it purple. It ended up dark, moody, feminine, and a little sexy. That was the opposite of the light, bright, minimalist house upstairs. So I had to ask whether I'd ever actually chosen the rest of my home, or whether I'd just decorated to the expected standard.

In this episode I look at how high-control religion shapes your aesthetic, and why your taste is one of the fastest places to rebuild your identity.

In this episode:

• Why I'd never decorated a space for myself before. I married at 19 and never lived on my own.
• The approved Mormon aesthetic, from temple pictures and the Proclamation to the Greg Olsen painting and the vinyl lettering. It was never about beauty. It was about evidence.
• The rainbow Jesus painting I hung after one of my kids came out, and why it felt so risky
• How aesthetic choices become moral choices in a high-control system: "Is this appropriate?" replaces "Do I like this?"
• Identity foreclosure: Erikson's model of adolescent exploration, and Marcia's term for committing to an identity without ever exploring
• Why your taste often circles back to what you loved at 14, 15, and 16
• Why clothing and decor are the low-stakes, everyday practice ground for rebuilding self-trust

Practical tips for rebuilding your taste:

1. Listen to the question you're asking. Is it "Is this appropriate?" and "Is this too much?" Or is it "Do I like it?"
2. Go back to before the foreclosure point. What you loved as a teenager is often your last real data point.
3. Find your version of the unmonitored room. A Pinterest board works. It requires no commitment and no money.
4. Treat it as creative practice, because it is.

Resources mentioned:

• Erikson, E. H. (1968). Identity: Youth and Crisis. Norton.
• Marcia, J. E. (1966). Development and validation of ego-identity status. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 3(5), 551–558.

Start your own reclamation: Book a free Reclamation Call HERE

You've said it a hundred times. About what you want, who you are now, what comes next. I don't know. And it feels true — honest, even. But what if "I don't know" isn't always a fact? What if sometimes it's a thought your brain is using to keep you safe, small, and exactly where you are?

In this episode Kristin breaks down why "I don't know" has such a hold on women who've left the Mormon church — and how to tell the difference between the kind that's actually freedom and the kind that's keeping you stuck. Plus the one question that cuts through the fog every time.

In this episode: Why Mormonism trained you to skip "I don't know" entirely — and what that costs you after you leave The self-coaching model and why "I don't know" is a thought, not a fact

Why your lower brain loves this thought and what it's actually protecting you from

The difference between "I don't know what God is" and "I don't know what I want" — and why that distinction matters more than you think

The Byron Katie framework for figuring out whose business your uncertainty actually belongs to The one question that replaces "I don't know" and actually moves you forward

Resources mentioned: Episode 5— How to Know the Truth: Rebuilding Your Sense of Reality After the Mormon Church

After Mormonism Book a free Reclamation Session with Kristin — 45 minutes, real coaching, one clear next step → Schedule here

This podcast is not therapy and Kristin is not a therapist. If you are in a hard season and need clinical support, please reach out to a mental health professional. You deserve that care. Keep finding your way back.

Get your FREE tickets to the Energy Healing Conference October 18th in Sandy Utah.  I'll be there all day at my vendor booth and I'll be speaking also at 5 pm.  Come say hello!

If you want to come to my class be sure to purchase the art kit ($10) ahead of time to guarantee your spot! 

Confidence is not something you’re born with or without—it’s something you create.

In this episode, we explore what true confidence is, what blocks it, and how to start building it from the inside out. Growing up in a high-demand system like Mormonism often means confidence gets tangled up with perfectionism, obedience, and external approval. Many of us were taught to distrust our own inner knowing, leaving us uncertain of our worth or abilities.

But confidence isn’t about being flawless or always right—it’s about trusting yourself to figure things out along the way. In this conversation, you’ll learn:

The difference between real confidence and false confidence.

How cultural and religious messages can undermine self-trust.

Why self-doubt and confidence can exist side by side—and how to choose which one to nurture.

The role of feelings in creating confidence (and why it’s a practice, not a personality trait).

Get your free Sunday Muse reflections in your inbox each week: HERE

Connect with me on Instagram: @MormontoMuse

We are taught to praise quiet endurance, self-sacrifice, and endless productivity in women — and taught to fear untamed laughter, chaotic play, and uninhibited delight. In high-control religious cultures, fun isn't just discouraged. It's treated as spiritually dangerous.

In this episode, we unpack why joy feels like a threat: the good girl conditioning that keeps women hyper-vigilant, the temple covenant against "loud laughter," the compulsion to perform happiness on social media, and the rigid expectations that quietly ruin every unstructured moment. We'll look at what Brené Brown calls "foreboding joy" — the vulnerability of fully feeling delight without bracing for the fallout — and what the science actually says about play as a nervous system necessity, not a luxury.

You'll leave with three practical shifts to start reclaiming fun: how to schedule play as a boundary instead of a task, how to practice unposted joy, and how to identify what actually brings you alive instead of what you think should.

You don't have to earn fun. It was yours to begin with.

Get a free therapeutic art prompt delivered to your email every week. CLICK HERE to join Sunday Muse.  

Have you ever noticed how scrolling, watching, or even listening to “inspiring” content can leave you feeling tired — not fulfilled?

In this episode, Kristin Martineau explores the energetic difference between creating and consuming — and why creating, even in small ways, restores our sense of presence, purpose, and self-connection. We talk about why humans are wired to create, why women in particular feel called to express and make meaning, and how creativity becomes a radical act of healing after living in systems that discouraged individuality or expression. If you’ve been feeling overstimulated, disconnected, or creatively blocked, this episode will help you slow down, tune in, and rediscover the power of making something that’s yours.

In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

Why consuming (even “good” content) can leave you drained instead of inspired

The biological and emotional benefits of creative expression

Why women are especially driven to create — and how it helps us reclaim energy, identity, and voice How to shift from passive consumption to active creation in small, simple ways

How art, journaling, and presence can reconnect you with your inner muse.

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

 Get the anxiety reducing art prompts HERE

When you’ve spent years under spiritual surveillance — constantly monitored for worthiness, obedience, and purity — your nervous system learns to stay on high alert. Even when you leave that system, your body doesn’t automatically feel safe. Freedom can actually feel threatening.

In this episode, we explore what anxiety really is: not a moral failure or a lack of faith, but a natural response from a body that’s been trained to survive under pressure. You’ll learn how to distinguish between real danger and emotional stretching, how to gently observe your anxiety without becoming it, and how art can help calm an overactive nervous system.

In This Episode:

• How living under constant scrutiny wires your body for hyper-vigilance

• The difference between fear (a signal of danger) and anxiety (a signal of growth)

• How observation itself begins to change your emotional experience

• Simple ways to use art as a nervous system regulator

Links & Resources:

• Download your free Anxiety-Reducing Art Prompts PDF

• Sign up for Sunday Muse to receive weekly creative healing prompts

• Follow me on Instagram: @mormontomuse 

• Listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts: Mormon to Muse

 The Gift of Fear, Gavin Debecker

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/pathological-relationships/201003/the-gift-fearthe-curse-anxiety

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/anxiety/the-causes-of-anxiety

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

Come visit me at the Energy Healing Conference! Tickets are regularly $30, but I have a limited number to give away for free! CLICK HERE to claim them before someone else does!

Don't miss free the therapeutic art prompt that goes with this episode! Join Sunday Muse here.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we’re talking about desire — that quiet pulse beneath duty, expectation, and fear. If you grew up in a system that taught you to distrust your longings or call them selfish, you’re not alone. Many of us learned to silence the very parts of ourselves that lead us toward joy, creativity, and growth.

But what if desire isn’t dangerous? What if it’s a sacred form of guidance — your inner compass pointing you back to what makes you feel alive?

Join me as we explore: Why high-demand systems condition women to fear their desires How suppressing longing leads to disconnection, resentment, and self-doubt

The difference between impulsive wanting and soulful desire

How creativity and art-making help you reconnect with what you truly want

Simple ways to start listening to your longings again — without shame or guilt

You’ll leave this episode with a deeper understanding of how desire can be a spiritual practice — one that honors your body, your emotions, and your becoming.

Resources: https://www.simplypsychology.org/suppression-as-a-defense-mechanism.htm 

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

What if being wrong could actually be a gift? Most of us were raised to avoid mistakes at all costs, but in this episode I want to flip that script. Being wrong has been one of the most powerful teachers in my own life—helping me grow, deepen relationships, and even discover that I am an artist (thank goodness I was wrong about that!).

What You’ll Learn in This Episode Why our brains resist being wrong and why it feels so uncomfortable Nine reasons I’ve learned to actually love being wrong

Stories of the biggest things I’ve been wrong about—and how they changed me How perfectionism keeps us stuck in fear of mistakes

Reflection questions to help you reframe your own “wrong turns”

Release control and perfectionism See mistakes as opportunities

Practice compassion and flexibility in your creative life

Reflection Questions When was the last time being wrong turned into something unexpectedly good for you?

How does perfectionism keep you from experimenting, in art or in life?

What assumptions or beliefs about yourself might be worth re-examining? How could being wrong actually deepen your relationships or increase compassion?

Listen & Subscribe If this episode resonated with you, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the next one.

And if you’d like to dive deeper into using art as a tool for healing and self-discovery, join my Sunday Muse newsletter HERE

Disclaimer: I’m not a therapist.These exercises are not art therapy, but they have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of the women I work with.

#BeingWrong #HealingThroughArt #MormonToMuse #Perfectionism 

Resentment gets a bad reputation.

Most of us have been taught that resentment is something to suppress, overcome, or repent of. Especially if you were raised in a high-demand religious culture, resentment is often framed as a character flaw—evidence that you’re selfish, ungrateful, or lacking humility.

But resentment is not the problem. Resentment is information. It’s your internal signal that something in your life is out of alignment—usually that your boundaries are being crossed, your needs are not being honored, or you’re participating in something that violates your values.

In this episode, I explore how resentment actually functions as a form of inner guidance, and why learning to listen to it can help you reclaim your sense of agency and self-trust. If you’ve spent years prioritizing other people’s expectations over your own instincts, resentment may be one of the first signals that your inner compass is trying to wake up. And instead of trying to eliminate that feeling, the real work is learning to understand what it’s trying to tell you.

In this episode we explore:

• Why resentment is often misunderstood as a moral failure

• How resentment functions as useful emotional information

• The connection between resentment, boundaries, and self-respect

• Why women raised in high-control systems are often discouraged from listening to resentment

• How ignoring resentment disconnects you from your intuition

• The difference between reacting from resentment and learning from it

Resentment isn’t the end of the story. It’s the beginning of paying attention. When you learn how to listen to it instead of suppress it, resentment can become one of the most powerful signals guiding you back to your own authority.

You don't have a talent problem. You have a permission problem. If you've ever felt drawn to paint, dance, write, or make something — and then talked yourself out of it because it felt ridiculous for "someone like you" — this episode is about why that happens, what it's actually costing you, and how to stop waiting for permission that isn't coming.

Drawing on Julia Cameron's concept of the "shadow artist" from The Artist's Way, Kristin breaks down the difference between people who are stuck circling a creative life and people who are actually living one — and it isn't talent.

What You'll Hear

• What a shadow artist actually is: someone caught between the dream of action and the fear of failure, feeling a vague discontent or restlessness they can't quite name
• Why "I'm just not talented" is a story, not a fact — and why Kristin says drawing (and most creative skill) is learned, not inherited
• The five signs you're a shadow artist: consuming instead of creating, surrounding yourself with art without claiming it, being quietly (or not-so-quietly) critical of people who do the thing, feeling restless despite an objectively fine life, and having a long list of practical reasons why now isn't the time
• Why Kristin called herself "an art lover" instead of an artist for a long time — and what that phrase was really protecting her from
• A story from Kristin's first drawing class at the community college, and what happened when she walked in scared instead of waiting to feel ready
• How martyrdom gets rewarded in Mormon culture specifically — and why "look what I gave up for my family/the gospel" is a sophisticated excuse, not a virtue
• Steven Pressfield's idea of the "unlived life" — and why unexpressed desire doesn't disappear, it resurfaces as resentment, jealousy, and irritability
• Why you should "have the audacity of a mediocre white man" and stop waiting for permission or credentials before you start

Key Takeaways

• Talent is not the gate. Showing up repeatedly and tolerating the discomfort of being a beginner is the entire difference between you and the person whose art you admire.
• The urge to create doesn't fade with neglect. It goes underground and comes out sideways — as restlessness, irritability, or a hum of dissatisfaction you can't explain.
• Waiting until you're not scared is waiting forever. Fear is a passenger on this trip, not a stop sign.
• Martyrdom (for family, for the church, for anyone) is often just a well-dressed excuse for staying small — and no one is handing out a reward for it.

Your unlived desire is not going anywhere. It goes underground and comes back out as resentment, as restlessness, as that low hum of something's missing that you can't quite name.

Therapy treats. Coaching builds. If you left Mormonism or another high-control religion, knowing which one you need is the first decision, and evaluating the person you hire is the second. This episode gives you a clear test for the first and a practical checklist for the second.

You will learn how to tell clinical pain from identity disorientation, how to find a qualified therapist or coach, and the red flags that signal a practitioner is rebuilding the authority structure you just left. Run the same check on me.

In This Episode

• The core difference: therapy is licensed clinical care for diagnosing and treating mental health conditions; coaching is a forward-facing process for people who are functional and ready to build
• Why coaching is an unregulated industry and what that means for your search
• Why leaving a religious system makes this choice harder, when guilt, shame, and anxiety were treated as moral failures instead of psychological experiences
• The two kinds of pain that get tangled together: clinical symptoms and identity disorientation
• The test: Are you trying to understand why you feel broken, or are you trying to build what comes next?
• Reasons to seek a therapist, and reasons to seek a coach
• How to find a good therapist: specialty filters, credentials, consultation calls, and how to avoid waiting weeks for a second try
• How to find a good coach: real training, a specific niche, clear scope, and no guarantee language
• Red flags for both roles, organized by scope violations, manipulation and dependency, competence gaps, ideological overreach, and practical issues
• The one pattern that matters most: a practitioner who recreates the authority structure you left, with better marketing or a licensure badge
• Where I stand: what I do, what I do not do, and why art-making is part of the work

If You Need a Therapist, Start Here

Seek a therapist first if you are dealing with panic attacks, dissociation, intrusive thoughts, months of insomnia, grief that is stopping you from working or parenting, or suicidal ideation. If any of that is true right now, get clinical help right away. Consider a therapist who specializes in religious trauma or high-control group recovery.

Work With Me

I am a certified life coach. I am not a therapist. I do not diagnose, and I do not treat trauma. If a client discloses something clinical, I say so and I refer out.

What I do is work with the thought patterns underneath identity collapse. You outsourced your internal authority years ago and nothing has replaced it. Coaching is how you build that replacement, by learning to generate your own conclusions and trust them, not by adopting a new authority to obey. Art-making is part of the process because it draws a response from you outside of language and outside the doctrine-trained part of your brain that looks for the correct answer. No art experience is required.

Book your free Reclamation Call: [insert booking link]

It is a 45-minute conversation about where you are and whether coaching is your next move.

You didn't leave because you wanted to sin. You left because you saw things you couldn't unsee, and you followed your integrity out. This episode is about the price of that: being misunderstood by the people who used to know you best, and what to do about it.

What This Episode Covers

Kristin's husband recently saw extended family for the first time in a while. His text afterward: "they are afraid of me." Nothing about him had fundamentally changed — a tattoo, some facial hair, a different drink order. What changed is that he no longer fits their worldview, and that's enough for a "family-focused" religion to quietly write someone off.

This episode breaks down why that happens and five ways to stop letting it run your life.

Five Ways to Navigate Being Misunderstood

1. It's not about you, it's about them. The labels — lazy, deceived, never had a testimony — aren't an assessment of you. They're a release valve that lets believing members avoid examining their own foundation. Your leaving threatens a worldview built on decades of labor, money, and identity. It's easier to decide something is wrong with you than to ask whether something is wrong with the system.

2. What other people think of you is none of your business. This isn't generic self-help. Exmormon women were raised in a system where worthiness was measured by visibility — temple recommend interviews, callings, how the ward perceived you. Being well-regarded was treated as proof you were living correctly. Untangling your identity from other people's opinions means something different when that's your starting point. This also isn't a license to ignore all feedback — feedback on your actions is useful. Someone's private verdict about your character is not.

3. Stop auditioning. You don't owe anyone a performance of your outcome — good or bad. You can't be present in a hard season if you're managing how it looks. You can't enjoy a good one if you're performing for an audience. The church trained you to audition for your worthiness. You're allowed to opt out of the trial entirely. Replace "how will this look to others" with "what do I actually want here."

4. Find the people who don't label you. A friend's group of Mormon friends dropped her the moment she started wearing pants to church. That's the ceiling on belonging in a system built on conformity — step out of line once and you're out. Finding people who love you without requiring proof of anything is one of the real, unexpected rewards on the other side.

5. Allow the grief. You're allowed to miss the relationship you used to have, even while knowing you made the right call. The people you love may never see what you see, or feel the freedom you've found. That's a real loss. It doesn't undo the decision.

Key Takeaway

You are not required to win back a verdict from people who were never actually weighing the evidence. Their judgment is self-preservation, not truth. Stop trying to prove you're happy. Find the people who don't need you to be anyone other than who you are — then go live your life.

If you were raised to believe contention is of the devil, anger probably feels like proof that you're doing something wrong. It isn't. In this episode, Kristin explains what anger actually does, why women are shamed out of feeling it, and how to separate anger from aggression. She walks you through a five-step practice for turning anger into action, so you can stop abandoning yourself to keep the peace.

In this episode

• Why anger isn't a spiritual failure, and what it is instead
• The difference between anger and aggression
• Why "being offended is a choice" is gaslighting
• What suppressed anger turns into: snapping, passive aggression, resentment, depression
• A practice for accessing your anger and turning it into action
• How to set a real boundary (and why it isn't a demand on someone else)

Key takeaways

• Anger exists to protect. It guards your body, time, values, people, and sense of fairness. It shows you where you're being hurt and where you're giving up too much of yourself.
• Anger and aggression are not the same thing. Aggression includes yelling, threats, and slamming doors, but also the silent treatment, sarcasm, and withholding affection. It happens when you aren't allowed to be honest about what made you angry.
• Suppressed anger doesn't disappear. It leaks out as snapping at your kids, passive aggression, resentment, depression, or self-directed blame.
• Women are taught the problem is their anger, not the boundary that was crossed. That framing keeps you from detecting where your limits are.
• "Being offended is a choice" shifts blame to the victim. It takes a systemic problem and blames the person harmed by it.

The practice: turning anger into action

1. Feel it in the body. Notice where it lives. Don't rush past it or argue with it. Take a break if you need one.
2. Notice if you're angry about being angry. That means you're resisting anger, not processing it.
3. Find out why you're angry. Free write and ask: what line was crossed? Over time you'll see that many triggers trace back to the same underlying issue.
4. Speak it. Dealing with it silently means abandoning yourself and letting others cross your boundaries.
5. Set a boundary. A boundary is about what you will do, not what someone else is allowed to do. "If you yell at me, I will leave the house" is a boundary. "You aren't allowed to yell at me" is not.

Angry at the church, at the people who kept you quiet, at yourself for staying so long? That is information, not a flaw. Now it needs direction.

Download 5 Things Every Post-Mormon Woman Should Do and start rebuilding self-trust with a clear plan.

A woman posted on an LDS forum that her garments were so uncomfortable, she'd stopped wearing them — and then asked permission. Is this okay? Am I sinning? That question is the entry point into this episode: a close look at how Mormonism trains women to defer their own authority to outside approval, how that shows up far beyond garments or sexuality, and what it actually takes to reclaim full ownership of your own body, voice, and life.

Kristin unpacks infantilization as a system — not a single rule, but an infrastructure that teaches women to check in before acting on their own desire, comfort, ambition, or anger. She shares her own experience starting pole dancing and painting as embodiment practices, walks through the difference between compliance and ownership when your choices look the same from the outside, and offers a concrete way to tell the difference between old conditioned fear and real danger.

What's Covered

• The forum story: a woman asking strangers for permission to trust her own body, and what that reveals about paternalistic control
• Infantilization as an infrastructure, not a single moment — how it shows up in sexuality, ambition, anger, physical strength, intellectual authority, voice in conflict, solitude, rest, and rage at injustice
• Why sexuality in Mormonism is routed through male permission, and what it means for a woman to own her sexuality as hers first
• Kristin's experience starting pole dancing as an embodiment practice with no audience and no justification required
• Reclaiming womanhood as a four-part practice: noticing where you give away authority, separating compliance from ownership, expecting discomfort without mistaking it for danger, and dropping the need to justify your own desire
• A real test for telling old conditioned fear apart from an actual danger signal
• How Kristin and her husband had to rebuild their marriage from choice instead of obligation after leaving the church
• Painting and dance as embodiment practices — why physical, repeated, unsupervised creative expression rebuilds self-trust in a way thinking alone can't.

If you recognize that habit of checking outside yourself before you trust your own answer — that's exactly the work I do with women one-on-one.

I offer a free Reclamation Call: one conversation, just you and me, where we look at where you're still deferring your authority and what it would actually take to reclaim it. No pitch, no pressure — just a real look at where you are and what's next.

You can book yours at the link in the show notes. You don't need the forum. You don't need permission. You just need one honest conversation to start.

Doubt has a bad reputation. We’re taught to resolve it quickly. To replace it with certainty. To override it with belief, obedience, or confidence. But doubt is not the enemy of creativity. It is the beginning of it.

In this episode, we explore why doubt is not a weakness—but a generative psychological state that makes creativity, intuition, and personal authority possible.

Drawing on philosophy, psychology, and personal experience, I argue that the ability to sustain doubt—rather than rush to eliminate it—is one of the most important skills you can develop, especially if you were raised in a high-demand religious or ideological system. Because creativity does not emerge from certainty. It emerges from uncertainty. From the willingness to sit in the space where you don’t yet know.

In This Episode, We Explore

Why doubt is a generative state—not a dangerous one

Doubt opens cognitive flexibility.

It interrupts automatic patterns and creates space for new perception, new meaning, and new possibility.

Why high-demand systems discourage doubt

Many religious and authoritarian systems frame doubt as a moral failure rather than a natural cognitive process.

This conditions people to distrust their own perception and outsource authority to external sources.

The difference between resolving doubt and sustaining it

“If we can acquire an attitude of suspended conclusion and sustain states of doubt, we open ourselves to more creative and generative possibilities.” — John Dewey,

A Next Step: Learning to Listen to Your Intuition If this episode resonated with you, I created a free workshop called: You’re Not Disconnected — You Were Conditioned: How Women Lose (and Regain) Their Intuition In this workshop, you’ll learn: Why your intuition isn’t gone—it’s buried How conditioning disconnects you from your inner authority

A simple therapeutic art exercise to help you reconnect with your intuitive voice

This is not about becoming someone new. It’s about returning to who you were before you were taught not to trust yourself.

You can register for free HERE

Do your best to make it live! I'll be giving away one of my therapeutic art kits to one person on the call.  

Feel calmer in 5 minutes.  Click HERE to download free anxiety calming art prompt.  

Want to be the first to know when an in person class opens? Sign up HERE so you won't miss it!

There’s a belief that surfaces during times of collective crisis: now is not the time for creativity.

That when the world feels unstable, violent, or overwhelming, art is indulgent—or even irresponsible.

In this episode, I gently challenge that idea.

We explore why creating during chaos isn’t a luxury or a distraction, but a deeply human, regulating act. One that helps us process grief, stay present in our bodies, and remember our capacity for meaning when the world feels unrecognizable.

You’ll hear reflections on:

• Why creativity has historically persisted during war, disaster, and upheaval

• The difference between escapism and regulation

• Maslow’s hierarchy of needs—and where creativity actually belongs

• Anthropologist Ellen Dissanayake’s argument that art is a biological human need, not a reward for having life “figured out”

• Why making something small, imperfect, and present-focused can be an act of resistance and care

This conversation isn’t about productivity, positivity, or “coping better.” It’s about staying human when the world makes that difficult.

Setting goals is supposed to feel empowering—but for many of us, it quietly turns into pressure, self-judgment, and nervous-system overload.

In this episode, we explore why goals so often create overwhelm (especially for women who were raised in high-demand systems), and how to approach goal-setting in a way that actually supports your life instead of bracing against it.

This isn’t about lowering your standards or giving up on growth.

It’s about designing goals your body can say yes to.

In this episode, we talk about: Why overwhelm isn’t a motivation problem—it’s a design problem

How holding too many goals at once scatters your energy

Why choosing one meaningful focus can be regulating, not restrictive

How high-pressure improvement culture trains us to override our own signals

A gentler way to relate to goals that allows for adjustment without shame

You’ll hear why it’s okay to reroute, change your mind, and let go of goals that no longer fit—without deciding that something has gone wrong.

A question to sit with: If I chose just one focus for this season, what would actually support my life—not just prove something about me?

Free Anxiety-Reducing Art Exercise If overwhelm lives more in your body than your thoughts, I created a free therapeutic art exercise designed to calm your nervous system and help you reconnect with clarity—no art experience required. 👉 Download the free anxiety-reducing art exercise here: https://www.mormontomuse.com/anxietyart

Want support applying this to your own life? If this episode stirred something and you’d like a calm, supportive space to explore it more deeply, you’re invited to book a free Creative Healing Session with me.

These sessions are not therapy and not sales calls. They’re gentle, one-on-one conversations with optional art-making to help you: slow down listen to your internal signals and reconnect with a sense of direction—without pressure or fixing

👉 Book your free Creative Healing Session HERE

Leaving or deconstructing a faith system doesn’t just change what you believe—it changes how you relate to the people you love. Whether it’s family who remain devout, a spouse who doesn’t understand your journey, or friendships that once revolved around shared beliefs, relationships can feel like the hardest part of faith transition.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, I explore why relationships are impacted so deeply when your faith changes—and how you can navigate that shift with more clarity and self-trust. Drawing on life coaching tools and my own experience, I’ll help you see that while you can’t control others’ thoughts or feelings, you can create empowering relationships by redefining connection on your own terms.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

Why relationships often feel unstable after a faith transition

How the Self-Coaching Model can help you take ownership of your thoughts and expectations T

he concept of “manuals” and how they create hidden pressure in relationships

How to set healthy boundaries without cutting yourself off from love

Why unconditional love starts with your relationship to yourself

Listen if you’re wondering:

Why does it feel like my relationships are falling apart after leaving my religion?

How do I navigate family tension when I no longer believe?

Is it possible to feel connected without pretending to be someone I’m not?

Resources & Links Mentioned in This Episode:

Subscribe to the Sunday Muse email for weekly art prompts and reflections

YouTube

Follow me on Instagram

Listen to more episodes of Mormon to Muse on Apple Podcasts

Disclaimer: While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

Most people pursue healing, awakening, or personal transformation because they believe it will make them feel better. That eventually, if they do enough work, they’ll reach some stable emotional state where doubt, grief, anger, and uncertainty no longer touch them. This episode challenges that assumption.

Awakening doesn’t remove pain. It removes the psychological structures that kept certain pain out of reach. It’s less like becoming a flower opening to the morning sun, and more like realizing the walls of the room you’ve lived in your whole life were painted to look like windows. Nothing outside has changed, but your relationship to reality—and yourself—can never be the same.

Drawing on the concept of “50/50,” taught by master coach Brooke Castillo, this episode explores the truth that no amount of healing eliminates the full spectrum of human emotion. Life will always include grief, anger, fear, uncertainty, and loss. Awakening doesn’t exempt you from these experiences. It initiates you into them more fully.

If you were raised in a high-control or high-demand system, the emotional pain you experienced may have been muted, misattributed, or spiritually bypassed. You may have felt low-grade anxiety, emotional flatness, or a quiet sense that something was off—but lacked the language or permission to trust those signals. Awakening removes that anesthesia. It brings grief to the surface: grief for the certainty you lost, the parts of yourself you abandoned, and the relationships that may never feel the same again.

But the purpose of awakening is not emotional comfort. It’s psychological integrity. When you stop outsourcing authority, you stop negotiating with your own perception. You stop fragmenting yourself to maintain belonging. You begin to experience a different kind of stability—not the stability of certainty, but the stability of self-trust.

In this episode, you’ll learn: Why healing and awakening don’t eliminate emotional pain

The difference between muted pain inside a high-control system and conscious pain outside of it

Why destabilization is often a sign of growth, not regression

How awakening removes internal conflict, even if it increases emotional intensity

Why awakening often leads to increased creativity and personal agency

The difference between stability and resilience—and why resilience is the real goal

Awakening doesn’t make your life easier. It makes your life yours. If you’re in the disorienting space where old beliefs no longer hold and new clarity hasn’t fully formed, this episode will help you understand why that experience is not evidence that something has gone wrong—but evidence that something is changing. You are not failing. You are feeling. And there is a way to move through this transition with greater clarity and self-trust.

Free Workshop Invitation If this episode resonated with you, I invite you to join my free live workshop: You’re Not Disconnected — You Were Conditioned: How Women Lose (and Regain) Their Intuition In this workshop, you’ll learn why you stopped trusting yourself and how to begin reconnecting with your internal knowing—so you can make decisions with clarity and confidence.

In this episode, we explore one of the most important—and misunderstood—stories in the feminine archive: Bluebeard.

This tale isn’t about morbid curiosity or a woman “disobeying.” It’s about awakening. About reclaiming the instinct to know what you know. About refusing to live in a house of secrets and silence. Bluebeard is the archetype of any system—religious, cultural, or relational—that says: “Don’t look. Don’t question. Don’t open that door.” But when a woman opens the hidden room, she isn’t betraying anyone. She’s returning to herself.

We talk about: Why the “forbidden room” is always the room of truth

How high-demand systems cultivate fear of inner knowing

Why awakening is never passive—it requires seeing what’s actually there

What this story shows us about feminine intelligence, boundaries, and freedom

This is a must-listen if you were taught that obedience is safety, that questioning is dangerous, or that following your intuition makes you ungrateful or rebellious.

Bluebeard is the patron saint of every woman who has ever whispered, “Something feels wrong,” and then opened the door anyway.

If leaving a high-demand system has left your nervous system on constant alert—or if waking up to your own truth feels both empowering and terrifying—these simple art exercises will help. They’re gentle, grounding, and made for moments when your body says “this is too much.”

👉 Download the free Anxiety-Soothing Art Prompts https://mormontomuse.mykajabi.com/anxietyart

Listen + Share If this episode resonates, please share it with a friend who’s rebuilding her inner world. And if you love the show, leaving a rating and review helps other women find this work.

References:

Zipes, Jack. The Origins of Fairy Tales: From the Middle Ages to the Present. Princeton University Press, 2012

Zipes, Jack. Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion. Routledge, 1983

Zipes, Jack. The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood. Routledge, 1993

Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D., Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype (New York: Ballantine Books, 1992)

If you were raised Mormon, you were taught to outsource your authority, your boundaries, and your worth to everyone around you. This episode isn't about making good art — it's about using creativity as a rehearsal space for trusting yourself.

Kristin shares her own experience coming out of the church with a voracious, almost obsessive need to create — painting until 2am, forgetting to eat, unable to get enough of what the practice was doing for her. Looking back, she's identified exactly what that hunger was: creativity isn't the reward for finding yourself. It's how you build who you are.

In this episode, Kristin breaks down ten ways a creative practice — painting, writing, or whatever medium calls to you — rebuilds the internal skills that high-control religion strips away.

In This Episode

1. Releasing the need for control Why art refuses to let you force an outcome, and how that uncertainty becomes practice for staying present instead of white-knuckling toward a predetermined result.

2. Creating boundaries around your time Claiming hours that belong to no one but you — and why the people around you may resist that shift before they adjust to it.

3. Trying new things The case for novel experience as a nervous-system reset, and why the unfamiliar class or the unfamiliar hobby matters more than whether you're "good" at it.

4. Tolerating being bad at something Breaking the link between performance and permission to feel okay — including Kristin's ongoing war with painting flowers.

5. Flow state What it feels like to exist without self-surveillance after years of monitoring your own righteousness, and a simple way to start practicing it today.

6. Commitment — without the binary Why turning creative practice into a checklist recreates the same pass/fail system you're trying to leave, and what happens when you commit to yourself without the threat of punishment.

7. Risk taking Using low-stakes creative choices to practice the sensation of "I don't know what will happen and I'm doing it anyway" — without any real-world consequence attached.

8. Taking up physical space Claiming a table, a corner, a room as an act of quiet rebellion against the belief that your space belongs to everyone but you.

9. Being in the process — there's no "arriving" Unlearning the idea that everything must build toward exaltation, perfection, or a finish line.

10. Play Reconnecting to your body and your curiosity as sources of delight, and replacing "what ought I to be doing" with "what feels joyful right now."

Key Takeaway

None of these ten things are really about becoming a better artist. Creative practice is a rehearsal for trusting yourself — for recognizing impulse, tolerating imperfection, and taking up space. The boundary you set today in the studio is the boundary you'll already know how to set tomorrow, everywhere else.

Nobody prepared me for the fact that leaving the church might be the hardest thing I ever did — not because I made a mistake, but because of how completely my identity was woven into it.

In this episode, I name what so many women in faith transition feel but struggle to articulate: the grief of leaving isn't weakness, and it isn't a sign you got it wrong. It's one of the oldest, most documented human experiences there is — and it has a name.

In this episode: I dig into why faith transition grief hits differently than other kinds of loss — and why that makes it so hard to explain to the people still inside. I introduce the psychological concept of ambiguous loss: grief without a clean object, where no one died and nothing was taken, and yet everything is gone. I talk about why leaving the church isn't just changing your mind — it's losing your social ecosystem, your identity structure, your theology, your envisioned future, your past, and the current version of yourself all at once.

From there, I draw on two unlikely companions across history: St. John of the Cross and his concept of the Dark Night of the Soul, and the Buddhist teaching of anatta, or non-self. Five hundred years apart, two completely different traditions — and both say the same thing: this dissolution isn't the end of you. It's what transformation actually feels like from the inside. I also get into the biology of the chrysalis — what actually happens when a caterpillar becomes a butterfly — and why that story is a far more honest map of faith transition than anything the church ever gave us. And I talk about what not to do with this grief (hint: don't try to solve it), what actually helps, and why your body needs somewhere to put what your mind can't hold yet.

Links & Resources 🎨 The Reclamation Sketchbook — A free 7-day guided art prompt journal designed to help you start listening to yourself again. Not about making beautiful things. About letting your hands say what your mind isn't ready to yet. 

Hi friends,

Get my Anxiety Soothing Art if you need a small ritual to bring peace. 

This week on the podcast, we’re talking about rituals—the ones we inherited, the ones we outgrew, and the ones we’re allowed to create now.

If you grew up in Mormonism, your life was full of ritual. Prayer, family home evening, blessings, temple ceremonies, holidays with strict meaning attached. There was a rhythm to everything, even if that rhythm came with pressure, perfectionism, and emotional suppression.

Leaving the church often means losing that rhythm. Not just the beliefs—but the structure that held your days and seasons. And suddenly there’s this space. This quiet. This sense of floating. This question: What do I anchor myself to now? Here’s the truth I want you to hear: Ritual never belonged to the Church. Ritual belongs to you. Ritual is older than religion. It’s human. It’s creative. It’s nervous-system regulation wrapped in meaning-making. It’s what our ancestors used to mark time, soothe themselves, and feel connected to their lives.

You get to reclaim that now. You get to decide what opens your mornings. What closes your evenings. What your holidays look like. What your family gathers around. What moments you choose to call sacred—in the truest, most honest sense of the word. You don’t need permission. You don’t need a calling. You don’t need a handbook.

Your rituals can be tiny: Lighting a candle. Taking one deep breath before dinner. Writing down three things you accomplished that day. A weekly walk. A monthly art night. A December tradition that feels like home to you. Ritual is simply attention repeated. It’s presence practiced. It’s choosing what matters to you now—and letting that guide your rhythm. This is part of becoming. This is part of healing your nervous system after years of external structure. This is part of learning to trust yourself again. This is you building a life that fits.

Get my Anxiety Soothing Art if you need a small ritual to bring peace. 

Download the 7 Day Reclamation Sketchbook

There is a feeling you know very well. You felt it in sacrament meeting, reading scripture, bearing your testimony. It was warm. It was certain. It felt like coming home to something true. And you were told — explicitly, repeatedly, from the time you were small — that feeling was proof. That it was the Holy Ghost confirming the church was true. Then you found out the church wasn't true. And the crisis wasn't just about your beliefs. It was about your feelings.

Because if that feeling — the one you had trusted your entire life — if that feeling was wrong, how do you trust anything you feel ever again? That is the question this episode is built to answer. And the answer is not what you expect. That feeling wasn't wrong. It was misread. Those are two very different things — and the difference between them is going to change how you understand every feeling you've had and every feeling you're going to have.

This episode is the full primer: what feelings actually are, what that confirming feeling was really telling you, what the church specifically did to your emotional life, what it means to be embodied and why Mormon women were conditioned to leave their bodies, and how to actually process a feeling all the way through. Not manage it. Not perform it. Actually feel it. This is the thing nobody taught you. It starts here.

In this episode: What that warm confirming feeling was actually telling you — and why it was real even if the claims it was recruited to confirm were not Why the church's confirmation framework depended on feelings as proof — and what that required of your emotional sophistication

What feelings actually are: the biology, the body, and why the 90-second emotional wave matters The difference between a feeling, a thought, and a story — and what it costs you to collapse them

Feelings as a compass, not a camera: what your feelings can and cannot tell you, and the one question that helps you read them accurately The specific mechanisms Mormonism used to distort your relationship with your feelings — prescribed emotions, spiritual bypassing, performed certainty, and the internal gatekeeper that keeps running long after you leave

The particular emotional burden placed on Mormon women — and how being responsible for everyone else's emotional climate meant abandoning your own What embodiment actually means, why Mormon women were specifically conditioned to leave their bodies, and what it costs you when you try to process feelings without one

The difference between experiencing a feeling and actually moving through it — and the tell that reveals whether you've been feeling or just managing A five-step process for processing a feeling from the body up Why emotional literacy is the foundation of self-trust, and why creative practice is one of the most direct paths there.

References: Jill Bolte Taylor, My Stroke of Insight — the 90-second emotional wave Jill Bolte Taylor TED Talk: "My Stroke of Insight" The CTFAR self-coaching model (Brooke Castillo

Resistance Isn't a Stop Sign — It's a Map

This week I'm breaking down Resistance — the concept Stephen Pressfield writes about in The War of Art — and why it ambushes you right at the exact moment you're closest to the thing you actually want. I'll walk through where Resistance really comes from, how to tell it apart from real intuition (this part matters especially if you grew up being taught your feelings were a moral compass), and what it actually takes to move through it — not by white-knuckling your way past it, but by understanding the game your own brain is playing.

What You'll Learn:

• The difference between the surface reasons you avoid your work (fear, perfectionism, distraction, self-medicating with food/shopping/scrolling, manufactured drama) and the real reason underneath all of them
• Why Resistance is proportional to how much something matters to your growth — not to how physically risky it actually is
• Why the loudest Resistance shows up right before the things closest to your calling
• Five ways to tell Resistance apart from your intuition: timing, content vs. noise, direction, physical signature, and whether it holds up under scrutiny
• Why this is a distinct challenge for women raised in high-control religion, where doubt was pathologized and your own emotional signals were used as the mechanism of control
• The Amateur vs. Professional framework — and why "turning pro" is about your relationship to the work, not your skill level
• A track-record practice for rebuilding trust in your own signal over time

Key Takeaway: Resistance isn't proof you should stop. It's proof you're close to something real. The work isn't waiting for it to quiet down — it won't. The work is learning to stop believing what it tells you, and showing up anyway.

Mormonism didn't just teach you to feel shame. It built a system where being human was the problem — and the church was the only solution.

In this episode, Kristin breaks down exactly how that system works: how ordinary human experiences like doubt, desire, anger, and ambition get reframed as spiritual failure, how the shame it creates is designed to be chronic and self-replenishing, and why the loop follows you even after you leave. This is not abstract. This is the specific architecture of how you were managed — and why understanding it matters for how you show up in your life right now.

In this episode: The difference between guilt and shame — and why it changes everything

How high-control religion pathologizes normal human experience to create dependency

Why suppressing sexuality (and desire, and anger) makes the problem worse, not better

How the shame loop gets internalized so you no longer need the church to run it

Why creativity reaches shame where talking alone sometimes can't

Where to start when shame is something you're actively working through

Book a free 45-minute mini session with Kristin → HERE

Real coaching on what's hardest for you right now, plus a short therapeutic art practice — so you can feel this work for yourself. Book first and get a therapeutic art kit (a $55 value) shipped free.

Faith deconstruction isn't a clean process. You're rebuilding a self while still going to work, parenting, managing a marriage and a household. There's no roadmap for it — you're improvising for the first time in a life that used to hand you all the answers. In this episode, I'm walking through the things I got wrong along the way. Not to give you one more thing to get right, but so you can spot the patterns faster than I did.

What I cover: Not being able to sit with uncertainty. After decades inside a system that had all the answers, uncertainty feels intolerable. I talk about the pull to replace one authority with another — wellness culture, politics, self-help, even coaching — and why developing a tolerance for not knowing is what actually makes you free.

Making decisions from reaction. Anger is what gets you out the door. It's not where you want to make your future decisions from. I unpack the difference between total rejection of the old system and actually deciding for yourself what you think — because doing the opposite of what you were told is still letting the old system set the terms.

All-or-nothing thinking. Mormonism trains this hard — good or bad, worthy or unworthy, no in between. I talk about how that binary doesn't disappear when you leave, it just switches teams. The nuance is harder to hold, but a self built on binary categories is just as brittle as the one you left.

Not telling my family sooner. I sat on this for years, partly to protect them and partly to protect myself. I get honest about what that silence actually communicated, and why there's no universal right timeline here — just your own judgment about your specific people.

Assuming my kids' experience matched mine. I projected my own reckoning onto my three kids, who each had a completely different relationship to the church depending on their age when we left. I talk about what I missed and why staying curious about their experience mattered more than narrating mine to them.

Staying in my head. The information binge — podcasts, documentaries, historical records — is a necessary stage, but it can also become a way to avoid the grief underneath it. I talk about what finally got me out of my head and into my body, including how painting became part of my process.

Expecting a linear timeline. Healing isn't a straight line, it's a spiral. I still get hit with grief or anger I don't expect. I talk about why that's normal and not a sign you're doing it wrong.

Closing thought: Nothing is wrong with you. Things haven't gone wrong. Setting out on this journey at all is the brave part — the mess is just what it looks like from the inside.

Download the Reclamation Sketchbook HERE

"I'm just not creative." "I could never do that." "I'm not the kind of person who finishes things." You've said one of these — or something close to it — so many times it stopped sounding like an opinion. It started sounding like a fact. It isn't one.

In this episode, Kristin breaks down the difference between a circumstance (provable, measurable, true regardless of who's looking) and a limiting belief (a thought you've repeated until it felt like biology). She explains why your brain keeps finding evidence to confirm what you already believe about yourself, why this pattern runs especially deep for anyone raised in a high-control religious structure, and exactly how to start testing the beliefs that are quietly running your life.

In this episode: What separates a fact from a belief — and why your brain can't tell the difference on its own

Why growing up in a high-demand religious system trains you to accept assigned identities instead of testing them

Four questions to figure out whether a belief is truly yours, or something you inherited

A real coaching example: how one client dismantled "I never finish anything" by finding the evidence she'd been ignoring The one-word shift ("yet") that gets you out of black-and-white thinking

Why separating the belief from your identity — "I've been telling myself I'm not creative" vs. "I'm not creative" — changes what's possible One small experiment to try this week that gives your brain new evidence to work with

Are You a Perfectionist? Here's Why That's Not the Compliment You Think It Is

Perfectionism gets worn like a badge of honor. I used to wear mine that way too. But underneath the polished exterior, perfectionism isn't a high standard — it's an impossible one.

In this episode, I break down what perfectionism actually is, why your brain defaults to it, and the practical antidote I use to get my own imperfect work out into the world.

I talk about the myth of "perfect" itself — how even our own definitions of it are nebulous, how one person's perfect manuscript is another person's rough draft.

I get into how Mormon culture trains this particular flavor of perfectionism from childhood, where testimony meetings only make room for certainty and struggle is only allowed in past tense. And I talk about how the wider culture backs this up — rewarding the finished book, not the drafts; the overnight success, not the seven invisible years before it.

I share what perfectionism actually looked like in my daily life — the schedule I built for myself with a checklist so long that missing one item gave me permission to abandon the whole day.

I walk through the small, sneaky ways perfectionism shows up for most of us: buying the supplies and never starting, quitting a new skill the second it gets hard, treating rest as something to be earned instead of allowed.

Then I get into what actually works. I talk about Brooke Castillo's concept of B- work — the idea that done imperfectly beats undone every time — and why creative practice is the best low-stakes place to build the muscle of showing up messy.

I share why I've had to get comfortable being cringe, why the loudest critics are rarely the people who've actually walked the path themselves, and a practical exercise for taking the sting out of other people's judgment.

If this episode resonates, I made something for you. My Reclamation Sketchbook is a free 7-day guided art journal — one creative prompt a day, no experience or talent required. It's the easiest place I know to practice doing something imperfectly on purpose.

Articles Referenced in this episode: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-discomfort-zone/202408/overcoming-perfectionism

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4562912/

What if the system that claimed to be making you good was actually the thing standing in the way?

In this episode we go deep on one of the most important distinctions for women rebuilding after Mormonism — the difference between unconditional positive regard and worthiness culture. Not as abstract concepts, but as two completely different operating systems for how a human being understands their own value. And what it actually costs to spend your formative years in the wrong one.

We talk about the temple recommend, the worthiness interview, the tithing settlement, the conditional eternal family — not to relitigate the church, but to name precisely what those structures did to your nervous system and why the wiring doesn't leave just because the institution does.

We also go somewhere most deconstruction content doesn't — into the legitimate fear underneath it all. If the threat of unworthiness was what was keeping me good, who am I without it? That question deserves a real answer. This episode gives one.

And we end where it always ends for me — at the canvas. With the dishes in the sink. With the first time I listened to myself instead of the ledger, and what I found out when I did.

IN THIS EPISODE

• What unconditional positive regard actually is — and what it isn't
• Where the internal editor comes from and why it feels like your own voice
• The specific structures of Mormon worthiness culture and what they produce in a person
• Why the wiring outlasts the institution
• The difference between genuine self-development and self-punishment dressed as self-improvement
• Why the threat of unworthiness doesn't make people good — it makes them careful
• What happens to moral development when the external structure falls away
• The Steinbeck quote that reframes everything
• What UPR for yourself actually looks like in a real life — including dirty dishes and a paintbrush

RESOURCES MENTIONED

• The Reclamation Sketchbook — free guided creative resource for women rebuilding after faith transition
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck — the source of the quote that closes the episode
• Carl Rogers, On Becoming a Person — if you want to go deeper on unconditional positive regard

Correction - In this episode I misstated the price of Steven Hassan's, Recovery After Mormonism Workshop. It's not $500 it's $99 which is a phenomenal price! You can buy the course HERE.  

Leaving Mormonism—or any high-demand religion—often means realizing that what felt “normal” was actually coercive control. In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we’re talking about waking up to those dynamics using Stephen Hassan’s BITE Model as our guide. The BITE Model is a framework for identifying authoritarian control in cults and high-control groups. It breaks manipulation into four clear categories: Behavior Control Information Control Thought Control Emotional Control By examining each piece, you can start to recognize the systems you were part of—not as personal failure, but as designed to keep you compliant.

This conversation is for you if: You’re deconstructing Mormonism or any rigid belief system You want to understand why leaving feels so hard You’re working to rebuild self-trust and personal authority You suspect the group you left might have used coercive or manipulative tactics In this episode, we cover: What the BITE Model is and why it’s so helpful for ex-Mormons How Mormonism exerts control over behavior (dress codes, obedience culture, time demands) How information is tightly managed (approved sources, anti-Mormon labeling, correlated curriculum) How thought control shows up (thought-stopping, black-and-white thinking, prophetic authority) How emotional control keeps people in line (fear, guilt, shame, love-bombing) Signs you’re waking up to these forms of control in your own life Why naming these patterns is a key step in reclaiming your freedom

Want weekly art prompts and reflections to help you heal after high-demand religion? Get the Sunday Muse Email.

You can find me on here on YouTube

Follow on Instagram @MormontoMuse

Steven Hassan website and more information about he BITE model: https://freedomofmind.com/

Episode 11: Why You Are Emotionally Stunted 

In this episode, I explore how emotional suppression—especially in high-demand systems like Mormonism and American culture—leaves many of us emotionally stunted, disconnected from ourselves, and stuck in cycles we don’t understand.

We revisit the Self-Coaching Model (CTFAR) and focus on the often-overlooked middle step: feelings. You’ll learn why feelings matter, how they drive everything we do (or don’t do), and what goes wrong when we resist, react to, avoid, or spiritualize our emotions.

This is part one of a two-part series that will help you build emotional literacy, reclaim emotional agency, and get back in the driver’s seat of your own life.

What We Cover: Why feelings—not circumstances—create your experience

How American culture and Mormonism both discourage emotional honesty

What happens when you resist, react to, or avoid your feelings

The spiritualization of emotion in high-demand religion Why reclaiming your full emotional range is essential to healing

CLICK HERE to sign up for Sunday Muse. You'll get a weekly email with a free therapeutic art prompt to take this work to a deeper level.  

Find me on Instagram and YouTube

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

Audacity Over Permission Why Waiting Isn’t Wisdom—and Showing Up Changes Everything.

We’re often taught that patience is a virtue. That waiting is wise. That if we just prepare a little more, heal a little more, learn a little more—then we’ll be ready to speak, create, lead, or take up space.

But for many women—especially those raised in high-demand or patriarchal systems—waiting isn’t neutral.

It’s conditioning. In this episode, we talk about audacity: not arrogance, not recklessness—but the willingness to show up without permission, certainty, or guarantees.

Using the character of Aaron Burr from Hamilton as a lens, we explore how “I’m willing to wait for it” can sound wise while quietly keeping us stuck. Burr believes he’s special. He believes his moment will come. He believes that restraint is strategy. But waiting doesn’t create authority. Showing up does.

In this episode, we explore: How “good reasons” for waiting often mask fear, socialization, and self-distrust The difference between humility and self-erasure ,Why lived experience is a legitimate source of authority How social movements, creative work, and personal change are rarely led by people who felt “ready”

We also talk about how many men are culturally rewarded for confidence without competence—while women are trained to require proof, permission, and polish before daring to act. The cost of that imbalance isn’t just personal—it’s collective.

Audacity isn’t: Knowing exactly what you’re doing Being fearless Having credentials, titles, or approval Audacity is: Speaking from lived experience, creating before you feel qualified, letting yourself be seen while still figuring it out, refusing to wait for a system that was never designed to invite you in If you’ve been telling yourself you’re “not ready yet,” this episode is an invitation to question that story—and to consider what might happen if you stopped waiting for the perfect moment and started responding to what this moment is asking of you.

There's a particular kind of silence that happens after everything collapses and before anything new has taken shape. You're not who you were. You're not yet who you're becoming. And nobody around you quite understands what that space actually feels like to live in.

This episode is for you if you're in that gap. Kristin talks about what it really means to be in the in-between — why it's disorienting, why it's not a crisis even when it feels like one, and why most of the advice you're getting right now isn't landing. (Hint: it's not you. It's that the advice assumes a baseline of self-trust that was systematically trained out of you.)

In this episode: Why faith deconstruction can feel like getting blindsided in the middle of the ocean — and what that actually means for your timeline The cruel irony at the center of this season: the thing you need most is the thing that was taken from you

Why more information, more podcasts, more journaling isn't the thing that builds self-trust — and what actually does

What Kristin's own "hunkered down" year really looked like (it wasn't a breakdown — it was a becoming) Why this process isn't linear, and why that's okay

An introduction to the MUSE Method — the framework Kristin built for exactly this journey

The MUSE Method Beta is open. Six weeks. Small group. Structured path through the gap.

Begins April 20th. Investment: $497 (beta pricing — significantly reduced from future rates). Every participant receives Kristin's therapeutic art kit — black paper sketchbook, sparkly watercolors, white pen, and her 52-card creative prompt deck — mailed to your door. This cohort is small by design. Applications are first come, first served. → Apply HERE

When you leave a high-demand religion like Mormonism, one of the biggest challenges isn’t just rethinking your beliefs—it’s learning how to think again without relying on external authority.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, I share a four-part framework that’s helped me rebuild critical thinking as a spiritual and creative practice: Logos (logic), Ethos (credibility), Pathos (emotion), and Duos (paradox).

We’ll explore how each of these shows up in everyday decisions—and in your art. Because the truth is, how you approach a blank canvas often mirrors how you approach your own inner life.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What each of the four modes means and how they work together
• How high-demand religion often distorts or suppresses these ways of thinking
• Why Duos—the ability to hold two truths at once—is especially vital for post-Mormons How you can apply each part of this framework not just to life, but to your creative process

We’ll also discuss how:

• Logos shows up as structure, planning, and composition in your artwork
• Ethos guides your authentic voice and creative integrity
• Pathos emerges through color, emotion, and intuitive expression Duos invites you to hold tension in your art without needing to resolve it

Want to go deeper? This episode is paired with a therapeutic art prompt called “The Four Voices Within”—available now in this week’s Sunday Muse email.

Sign up HERE for Sunday Muse

Let’s connect:

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Instagram @MormontoMuse

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with. 

#criticalthinking #exmormon #deconstruction #mormontomuse #faithtransition #therapeuticart #artheals #creativehealing #postmormon #logosethospathosduos #religioustrauma #artastherapy #lifecoachingforwomen

 Have you ever noticed how leaders—religious, political, or otherwise—use “us vs. them” language to stir emotions, create loyalty, and shut down critical thinking? In this episode of Mormon to Muse, I break down how this kind of rhetoric works, why it’s so effective, and the impact it has on individuals raised inside high-demand systems.

I share examples from Mormon leaders, extremist religious figures, and even both major U.S. political parties to show just how universal this tactic is. You’ll see how the same phrases that once felt “faith-affirming” are actually manipulative tools designed to create fear, division, and unquestioned loyalty.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• Why “us vs. them” language is emotionally powerful but logically empty

• How political and religious leaders use this tactic to control narratives

• The psychological impact of always viewing outsiders as dangerous or wrong

• Why recognizing these patterns is a critical step in reclaiming your own voice and agency

  🎧 Listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts 

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Articles referenced in this episode:

Psychology Today  The Psychology of Us vs Them

Web MD What is the Us vs Them Mentality? 

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

Change is inevitable, but moving forward with grace, courage, and creativity is a skill we can all develop.

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, I explore why change feels so uncomfortable, how our brains resist it, and how we can use both mindset tools and the creative process to embrace new seasons of life.

You’ll learn: The biological and cultural reasons we resist change—even when we want it.

How predictability and control keep us stuck.

Mindset shifts that can help you cope with transitions and see them as opportunities.

The surprising ways art can teach us to release perfectionism and welcome growth.

Whether you’re navigating faith transitions, relationships, career shifts, or simply the unpredictability of everyday life, this episode will give you fresh insight and practical tools for moving forward with more confidence.

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Sunday Muse 

I spent years experiencing my own aliveness as a problem to manage. I was a mother of young kids, restless out of my mind, bored without intellectual stimulation — and certain something was wrong with me for wanting more than playdates and toddler story time.

My husband was off chasing his dreams through medical school and residency while I sat home feeling guilty about mine. In this episode I name what was actually happening: I had a perfectly healthy life force inside me, and I'd been taught to read it as a threat to my goodness. That life force has a name. Eros — not just sexual energy, though it includes that, but the whole engine of aliveness.

The pull toward beauty, creation, adventure, connection, the urge to make something for no reason at all. I walk through what eros actually is (with help from Esther Perel and Jennifer Finlayson-Fife), what it feels like when it's flowing versus when it's pushed down, why it lives in the body, and the specific ways I learned to nurture it again — honoring small wants, refusing to ask permission, protecting the empty space where desire can finally surface. If you've been going through the motions and calling it peace, this one is for you.

I'm teaching a free class on June 25th at 11am on listening to your intuition — the call of eros — with easy creative exercises to help you reconnect with it. Register HERE

It wasn't until I was in my thirties that I really understood what consent meant. I knew the word. I could have given you a definition. But the actual lived understanding of it — what it means to check in with yourself before you agree to something, to treat your own yes and no as information worth collecting — that didn't come until much later.

This episode is about that. About every place the church engineered my body's compliance and called it a choice. About the performed yes that followed me out of the institution long after I stopped believing.

Here's what I walk through in this episode: Why I didn't understand consent until my thirties — and why that had nothing to do with intelligence and everything to do with a system that needed me not to understand it

The difference between the absence of consent and the performance of it — and why the performance is the more dangerous thing

Every place the church required my body to perform the yes: baptism at eight, confirmation, callings, sustaining church officers, temple covenants, confession, and the sexual consent education that was never given

Why "it's not the church's job to teach sex ed" falls apart when the church had extensive opinions about my hemline, my desire, and my worthiness

How the absence of sexual consent education left women without the language to name what was happening to their bodies — and how that silence became shame, and how that shame walked them into a bishop's office to confess what was done to them

The Dallin Oaks quote that states the policy out loud: it is wrong to criticize leaders of the church even if the criticism is true — and what that does to a woman's ability to trust her own accurate perception of reality

How a lifetime of physical compliance trains the nervous system to override interior experience

The practical work of reclaiming consent: the pause, the body check, the small daily practice of letting my yes mean yes and my no mean no

What I want you to walk away with: You did not agree to as much as you were told you agreed to.

The covenants that have been used to hold you accountable were not made under the conditions that make real covenants possible.

The shame you have been carrying about your body may be built entirely on a foundation that was never real.

Physical action is not consent. Say it again if you need to. 

Get the free Prompts to calm anxiety

When you've spent years—or decades—being told what is right, what is true, and what is best for you, trusting yourself again can feel disorienting. Many women raised in high-demand religious systems were taught that external authority is more trustworthy than their own internal wisdom. So when they leave, they’re left asking: What do I actually believe? What do I want? And how do I know if my intuition is something I can trust?

In this episode, we talk about the process of rebuilding self-trust after religious conditioning. We look at why intuition can feel confusing, how emotional suppression plays into it, and why it’s common to fear making the “wrong” choice once there’s no longer a clear rulebook to follow.

You’ll learn how to relate to your intuition in a grounded, steady way—without needing it to be perfect or magical. Inside this episode: How high-demand systems train you to defer to authority Why intuition often goes offline when your nervous system doesn’t feel safe

The fear of getting it wrong, disappointing others, or making a choice you can’t undo Why intuition is quiet and subtle—not dramatic or urgent How to begin repairing the relationship with your inner voice through small, consistent acts of self-honoring

The difference between intuition and anxiety (and how to tell them apart) What it means to let yourself experiment without self-punishment Trusting your intuition isn’t about always knowing the answer. It’s about building a relationship with yourself that can tolerate uncertainty and still move forward. This is how personal authority is reclaimed—gently, slowly, one self-honoring decision at a time.

Mentioned in this episode: Download the free therapeutic art exercises to help soothe anxiety and reconnect with your inner wisdom: https://www.mormontomuse.com/anxiety-art

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There's a particular kind of longing that shows up even when my life is good. Nothing is wrong. Nothing is happening. And still — something feels missing. A low hum of restlessness, the sense that I forgot something, that there's supposed to be more. This is the human void, and every healthy person carries it. Even small children.

In this episode, I walk through how different traditions have tried to explain that empty place inside us — and what happens when we stop trying to fill it. Buddhism names it dukkha, the dissatisfaction that shadows even good experiences because we know they won't last, and asks us to observe it without resistance. Camus called it the Absurd: the collision between our hunger for meaning and a universe that stays silent. His answer wasn't despair or invented comfort, but absurd freedom — living defiantly, fully, and authentically anyway.

Mormonism offered its own framing: the void as homesickness for heavenly parents, a memory of wholeness we can't quite recall. Comforting, in a way — it gives the feeling a direction and a meaning. But that's not how I experienced it. For me, the void registered as something is wrong with me. I'm not repenting enough. I don't have the spirit. I'm probably the only one who feels this way. The emptiness became evidence of personal failure, and the failure became shame.

The coaching lens reframes all of it. The void is the lower brain doing its survival job — scanning for threat, reading emotional discomfort as danger, driving us toward the candy aisle, the phone, the drink, the busyness, anything to make the bad feeling stop. But here's the misfire: in modern life, feeling bad is almost never a survival emergency. The feeling itself was never dangerous. What hurts us and the people around us is what we do to escape it.

So how do we solve the void? We don't. I make the case that the relief isn't in fixing the emptiness but in understanding it's universal, normal, maybe even purposeful — the engine that pushes us to grow, make, and reach. I close with the practices that help me: naming the void, stopping the search for the thing that will finally fix me, releasing the people I love from the impossible job of filling it, getting comfortable with ambiguity, and paying attention to the ordinary moments when — singing along to a light show in a language that isn't mine, watching my kids light up at a boatful of monkeys, lying in a quiet house with everyone home and safe — everything, right now, is okay.

I was taught the missing feeling meant something had gone wrong. It never did. It just meant I was alive.

In this episode:

• What the human void is and why every healthy person has one
• How Buddhism (dukkha), Camus (the Absurd), and Mormon doctrine each explain the empty place inside us
• Why the void often registered as shame inside a high-control religious framework
• The lower brain's survival wiring and why it misreads emotional discomfort as danger
• Why the feeling itself is never the threat — the escape behaviors are
• Practical ways to live in response to the void instead of burying it
• The role of presence and ordinary moments of "everything is okay right now"

A note: this episode discusses the universal experience of emptiness and restlessness, which is distinct from clinical depression or other conditions that deserve professional support. If the emptiness you feel is persistent, heavy, or interfering with your life, please reach out to a qualified professional.

Welcome to Mormon to Muse, the podcast for post-Mormon women ready to heal, reconnect with themselves, and create a life that feels truly their own.

In Episode 7, we’re exploring barriers to self-discovery—the hidden obstacles that can keep you stuck, disconnected, and unsure of who you really are. Leaving Mormonism (or any high-demand religion) can feel like stepping into the unknown. Even after you reject old beliefs, you might find yourself repeating old patterns or struggling to know what you really want.

Today we’ll look at why that happens—and what you can do about it. In this episode, you'll learn:

The most common barriers to self-discovery for post-Mormon women (including fear, people-pleasing, and black-and-white thinking)

Why high-control systems discourage self-exploration

How to recognize when you’re avoiding your own desires, feelings, or needs

Fear of disappointing others often keeps us small.  

You deserve permission to change your mind and redefine your life on your own terms.

Related Episodes Episode 1: My Story – Leaving Mormonism and Finding Healing Through Art

Episode 6: Waking Up to Control – The BITE Model

Connect with Mormon to Muse If you’re ready to go deeper into healing after Mormonism, subscribe to the Sunday Muse newsletter for weekly therapeutic art prompts and reflections.

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While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

Sign up for Mormon to Muse - I'll send a therapeutic art activity right to your inbox for free every week.  It's an easy way to get started on your creative healing journey.  

Episode Title: Navigating Fowler’s Stages of Faith in a Mormon Faith Crisis Episode Summary: In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we’ll explore James Fowler’s Stages of Faith Development and how they apply to the unique journey of a Mormon faith crisis. Whether you’re questioning your beliefs, leaving the LDS Church, or rebuilding your spirituality outside of Mormonism, understanding these faith stages can bring clarity, validation, and hope. I’ll breaks down each stage in relatable, down-to-earth language and share insights on how these stages show up in the experience of former Mormons.

 If you’ve ever wondered why faith deconstruction feels like starting over, or why it’s so hard to talk about your evolving beliefs with faithful family and friends, this episode is for you.

 What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

An overview of Fowler’s 6 Stages of Faith Development

How each stage relates to the Mormon faith journey

Why a faith crisis is actually a sign of spiritual growth

The challenges of moving beyond Stage 3 (Synthetic-Conventional Faith) in a high-demand religion

Key Topics Covered: Mormon faith crisis Fowler’s stages of faith explained Leaving the LDS Church Faith deconstruction and reconstruction Stages of spiritual development Post-Mormon healing Religious trauma and faith transition Creative expression for healing Identity after Mormonism

Stages of Faith - James Fowler

Navigating Mormon Faith Crisis - Thomas McConkie

The Sin of Certainty - Peter Enns

Falling Upward - Richard Rohr

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

There's a particular kind of exhaustion that has nothing to do with your schedule. It's the exhaustion of spending years showing up, giving, serving — as a version of yourself you never quite chose. In this episode we name what so many women coming out of high-control religious systems experience but rarely have words for: identity disorientation.

The moment you realize you've been so good at being everything for everyone else that you've completely lost track of who you actually are. We talk about why it happened — not as a failing but as the predictable result of a system built around your usefulness — the specific grief of not knowing what's missing, and what coming back to yourself actually looks like. Including why creative practice might be one of the most direct routes home.

If you've ever felt like a stranger in your own life, this one is for you. Grab the free Reclamation Sketchbook — a 7-day guided art experience for women coming home to themselves: Get the sketchbook HERE

What if the frustration, self-doubt, and awkwardness you feel when learning something new isn’t a sign you’re failing—but proof that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be?

In this episode of Mormon to Muse, we explore The Four Stages of Learning and how this framework can help you understand your creative process, your healing journey, and your identity rebuilding after leaving a high-demand system like Mormonism. Whether you’re learning how to paint, how to feel your emotions, how to trust yourself, or how to live without external authority telling you what’s “right,” these stages explain why growth often feels uncomfortable—and why that discomfort is necessary.

In This Episode, We Explore: What the Four Stages of Learning are and how they show up in everyday life

Why unconscious incompetence can feel deceptively safe Why the second stage—conscious incompetence—is the hardest and most tempting place to quit How perfectionism and comparison keep us stuck

Why mastery is not a permanent destination but a moving relationship with growth How learning art mirrors emotional healing and identity reconstruction

The Four Stages of Learning: Uninformed Optimism – You don’t know what you don’t know

Informed Pessimism – You see the gap, and it feels uncomfortable

Informed Optimism  – You can do it, but it takes effort and attention

Mastery/Integration – The skill becomes integrated and embodied

This episode reframes frustration as information, not evidence that you’re “behind” or “not cut out for this.”

Why This Matters After Leaving Mormonism: Many women leave the church believing that if something is meant for them, it should feel easy or immediately clear. But learning—especially emotional and creative learning—doesn’t work that way. Understanding these stages helps you: Stop interpreting discomfort as disqualification Build self-trust instead of outsourcing authority Stay with yourself during the messy middle of growth.

In this very first episode, I’m sharing a piece of my own story — how I navigated a painful faith transition and how art became a lifeline through the uncertainty, grief, and rebuilding that followed. Leaving the belief system I was raised in wasn’t just about walking away; it was about losing a whole framework for identity, community, and meaning. It was disorienting, heartbreaking... and ultimately, freeing. Through creativity — starting with simple watercolor paintings — I found a way to process emotions that words couldn’t touch.

Art helped me reclaim my voice, rebuild my sense of self, and reconnect with a deeper, wiser part of me that religion had silenced.

In this episode, you'll hear:

A little about my upbringing and faith journey

The unexpected role creativity played in my healing

Why making art (even imperfectly) is such a powerful tool for navigating transition.

What you can expect from this podcast going forward

Whether you're deep in your own deconstruction or just starting to ask questions, I hope this story reminds you that healing isn’t linear — but it is possible. Thanks for being here. I’m so glad we’re doing this together. Sign up for Monday Muse to get a free creative healing exercise sent to your inbox every week. You can find me on instagram at Mormon to Muse and on YouTube

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

We don't usually realize it, but most of us are carrying an unwritten rulebook about how the people around us should behave so that we can feel okay. Brooke Castillo calls it a manual, and in this episode I unpack why it has such a fierce grip on those of us who grew up Mormon — where the manuals weren't unwritten at all. They were handed to us, assigned to God, and wired straight into whether we believed we were good women, good wives, good mothers.

I talk about why other people's behavior doesn't actually create our feelings, where that idea holds up and where it absolutely does not. And I make the case that taking one hundred percent responsibility for your own needs isn't lonely or isolating — it's the thing that finally makes real intimacy possible.

When you stop grading the people you love against a rulebook they never agreed to, you get to actually see them, and they get to actually show up. If this episode names something you've been carrying, my free intuition webinar on June 25th at 11am is the next step. It's about reclaiming the inner knowing the manual taught you to override. Register through the link below.

Register here for the free Intuition Class

Regret doesn't only live in the church. It shows up in relationships, in choices we can't take back, in years we wish we'd spent differently. If you've ever thought "I should have figured this out sooner" or "look at all the years I wasted," this episode is for you.

Kristin breaks down five shifts in perspective that dismantle regret at the root — not by rewriting the past, but by changing your relationship to it. This is the difference between staying anchored to who you were and stepping fully into who you're becoming.

What You'll Learn

1. There is no upside to beating yourself up. Self-punishment feels like accountability. It isn't. It's a drain on the exact energy you need to build your new life. Shame kept you in line inside the church — it has no job to do out here.

2. It was supposed to happen. Not because of fate or prophecy. Because it did. Arguing with what already happened is a fight you lose every time. The question isn't "what should I have done" — it's "what do I choose now."

3. Let go of the imaginary past. The version of your life where you left sooner, knew better, did it all right — that version doesn't exist. It never did. You're grieving a fantasy, not a real alternative.

4. Your past decisions were made with past tools. You cannot judge the choices you made with the awareness you only have now. You didn't have this clarity then. You couldn't have. That's not an excuse — it's the truth.

5. Grief is the antidote to regret. Regret keeps you spinning in your head, trying to solve something that's already over. Grief drops you into your body and lets you actually metabolize the loss — of time, identity, relationships, the person you thought you were. That's how it moves through you instead of staying stuck in you.

Key Takeaway

You are not required to keep punishing a version of yourself who was doing the best she could with what she had. Self-compassion isn't letting yourself off the hook — it's the only thing that actually frees you to take responsibility, make amends, and build forward.

What do you do with your conscience when the institution that claimed to own it is gone? This episode is about one of the most disorienting parts of leaving — not the grief, not the social fallout, but the quiet, unsettling question underneath all of it: who decides what's right now?

Many women leave and find themselves in one of two places: doing all the things they were told not to do (without asking whether they actually want to), or frozen — too afraid to make any move in case it's wrong. Both patterns have the same root.

Neither one is actually freedom. In this episode, Kristin unpacks the difference between rules and values — because a lot of what Mormonism called morality had nothing to do with morality. And she offers five places to look when you're trying to find out what you actually value, not what you were handed.

In this episode: Why leaving the church doesn't automatically put you in the driver's seat of your own moral life The difference between compliance and character — and why the church confused them How to use resentment, admiration, anger, and joy as values signals

What values-construction actually looks like in real decisions (money, ritual, marriage, parenting) Why your goodness was always yours — the church just convinced you it wasn't

Resources + next steps: Ready to do this work in community? The MUSE Method is a six-week small group experience for women who are done unraveling and ready to build. We start April 20th. Keep finding your way back. APPLY HERE

Leaving a high-control system doesn’t automatically make you self-directed. Many women walk away from Mormonism expecting freedom—but instead find themselves stuck in indecision, self-doubt, and confusion.

Why? Because obedience isn’t just a belief. It’s a skill that was trained. And self-leadership is a skill most of us were never taught.

In this episode, we break down: How obedience conditions you to defer, suppress, and seek certainty

The hidden cost of external authority (decision paralysis, approval addiction, emotional disconnection)

What inner authority actually is—and what it’s not

The core skills required to rebuild self-trust

Why creative expression is one of the most powerful tools for reclaiming your inner voice

This isn’t about rebellion. It’s about learning how to lead yourself. If you’re ready to reconnect with your intuition and start living self-directed, download the free Reclamation Sketchbook

CLICK HERE to get on the interest list for in person classes in Utah.  You'll be the first to get all the details when a class opens.  

We’re told self-care is the answer — but what if it makes you feel irritated, resistant, or worse? In this episode, I talk about why I hate self-care sometimes — and why that doesn’t mean something is wrong with me.

For many women, especially those raised in high-control or performance-based systems, self-care becomes another obligation. Another way to self-monitor. Another quiet demand to feel better, faster. When self-care turns into something you should do — instead of something that actually supports you — your nervous system pushes back.

That resistance isn’t laziness or ingratitude. It’s information. This episode isn’t about finding the perfect self-care routine. It’s about reclaiming care that doesn’t require self-abandonment, positivity, or fixing yourself.

In This Episode, We Explore: Why self-care can feel annoying, heavy, or fake How “should-based” self-care becomes control in disguise

Why your body may resist things that are supposed to help

How obligation turns care into performance

What real, supportive self-care actually feels like

Key Insight If self-care feels like pressure, it’s no longer care. True care doesn’t ask you to override yourself — it asks you to listen.

Come see me at the Energy Healing Conference Oct 18 in Sandy Utah. Get your FREE TICKET HERE!

Stress is one of those words that instantly makes our shoulders tighten. But what if not all stress is bad? In this episode, we unpack the complicated relationship we have with stress — from the kind that pushes us to grow, to the kind that wears us down — and explore how creativity can be a powerful tool for restoring balance.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• Good Stress vs. Bad Stress
  How to tell the difference between the stress that fuels growth and the stress that drains your body and mind.

• The Role of Rest
  Why rest isn’t just a luxury — it’s the key factor that determines whether stress strengthens you or harms you.

• Why Americans Are So Stressed
  A look at cultural pressures, overwork, and societal norms that keep us stuck in cycles of chronic stress.

• The Science of Art & Stress Relief
  What’s happening in your brain when you make art, and why creativity naturally soothes your nervous system.

• Harnessing Good Stress
  Practical ways to lean into healthy stress for growth and resilience, while keeping it from tipping into overwhelm.

Sources:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0282789

https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/21/8/1077

​​https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3671693

https://our.utah.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2022/09/Christensen_J.pdf

https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/14/6/701

https://bmcpsychiatry.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12888-023-05091-2 

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with.

UPDATE-  In this episode I talk about the idea of creating beauty from pain.  I meant to mention that this idea comes from Susan Cain's book Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Makes Us Whole. 

If you want to build a life that feels aligned, meaningful, and free—you have to be willing to feel everything. In this follow-up to Episode 11 (Why You Are Emotionally Stunted), we dive into the how. How do you actually feel your feelings instead of resisting, reacting, avoiding, or spiritualizing them? What do you do with pain that won’t go away? And why is being emotionally willing the ultimate superpower in creating the life you truly want?

Rooted in the Self-Coaching Model (CTFAR), this episode teaches you how to allow emotion without being consumed by it—and how to stop letting your feelings quietly run the show from the background.

 In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

Why feeling your feelings is the key to long-term change

How emotional resistance drains your energy and keeps you stuck

What it really means to "allow" an emotion (and what it doesn't)

How spiritualizing pain can block healing What to do with emotions that seem to never go away Why discomfort is the price of living authentically—and why it’s worth it 

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Subscribe on YouTube: @mormontomuse1 Follow Kristin on Instagram: @mormontomuse

 #FeelYourFeelings #PostMormonHealing #SelfCoachingModel #TherapeuticArt #EmotionalWillingness #FaithTransition #CreativeHealing #MormonToMuse #ReligiousDeconstruction #EmotionalResilience

While this isn’t art therapy, and I’m not a licensed therapist, these creative exercises have been powerful tools for healing in my own life and in the lives of women I work with

Leaving a high-demand system like Mormonism often leaves us with an unexpected residue — a deep, body-level sense of scarcity. Scarcity of time. Scarcity of worth. Scarcity of permission. Scarcity of possibility.

In today’s episode, we explore what it means to practice abundance as an act of rebellion. We look at how Claude Monet — yes, the Monet of water lilies and gardens — refused to let grief, loss, or tradition confine him. Instead, he expanded. He painted obsessively, repetitively, and on a scale that defied every expectation of what a “proper” painting should be. His art became a declaration of abundance: “I will not stay small. I will not be limited. I will create more.” After leaving the church, many of us feel “too late,” “too behind,” or “too broken” to begin again. But abundance isn’t about money or perfection — it’s about choosing expansion over contraction. It’s about reclaiming the parts of you that were muted, doubted, or dismissed. It’s about refusing to let your pain be the final author of your life.

In this episode, you’ll learn: Why scarcity wiring runs so deep after a high-control environment

How to identify when “I’m not enough” is actually conditioning talking

What Monet can teach us about devotion, repetition, and creative expansion

How abundance becomes an internal stance, not an external circumstance

Why embracing beauty, pleasure, and creativity is rebellious for women raised in patriarchy

The small, daily shifts that open you to receiving more — more joy, more possibility, more self-trust

We also talk about the surprising truth: abundance isn’t something you wait to feel. It’s something you practice your way into. Just like Monet did.

If anxiety or old conditioning still pulls you into fear or scarcity, download my free Anxiety-Reducing Art Exercises — three simple creative practices to help your body soften and your mind reconnect with possibility. These practices are the first step toward the abundant, spacious life waiting for you.

Why managing your emotions matters more than any rule you enforce-  Most parenting advice focuses on what your kids should do. Obey. Choose wisely. Make good decisions. Stay on the “right” path. But what if the real work of parenting isn’t managing your children — it’s managing yourself?

In this episode, I explore why emotional regulation is the most important parenting skill you can develop. Not better scripts. Not tighter rules. Not more control. Your nervous system. Especially for those of us raised in high-demand religious systems, parenting can feel loaded with eternal consequences. Every choice your child makes can feel symbolic. Permanent. Dangerous. We weren’t just taught to keep our kids safe — we were taught to keep them worthy. That creates anxiety. And anxious parenting almost always becomes controlling parenting.

We talk about: Why authoritarian parenting is often about the parent trying to feel better

The difference between safety issues and preference issues

How Mormon culture amplifies fear around “mistakes”

Examples of things labeled as moral failures that are actually developmentally normal

Why your child’s discomfort is not an emergency

The gardener vs. carpenter metaphor — and why you cannot force growth I also unpack this powerful question every parent can use: Is this a safety issue?

Because when it’s not about safety, it’s usually about our discomfort. And when we try to control our children so we can feel calmer, we accidentally teach them that our emotional stability depends on their compliance. Parenting isn’t carpentry. You’re not carving a fixed shape out of wood. It’s gardening. You create conditions. You tend. You water. You prune when necessary. But you don’t force the seed to become something it’s not.

If you were raised in a system that equated obedience with worthiness, this episode will help you separate fear from love — and control from true guidance. Your child does not need a perfectly calm parent. But they do need one who can tolerate discomfort without turning it into control.

Download the free Anxiety Soothing Art Prompts HERE

Episode 51: The Sinfulness of Selfhood: Why Differentiation Feels Dangerous After Mormonism

There is a word the church uses for a woman who trusts her own mind over the institution. The word is proud. There is a word for a woman who grows in a direction the people around her didn't agree to. The word is deceived. There is a word for a woman who becomes too much of a self — who wants too specifically, thinks too independently, needs too little from the structure. The word is lost.

This episode is about what they were actually describing. And why the guilt you feel about becoming yourself has a source — and that source is not the truth about who you are.

In this episode: Why differentiation is normal, healthy human development — and why Mormonism theologized against it

The Correlation Program: how the church standardized not just doctrine but selfhood, and what it cost women specifically

What differentiation actually is — and why it is not rebellion, selfishness, or rejection of the people you love

The internal work that has to happen before the relational work can: finding your own voice underneath everything you were told to be

Why the people who love you sometimes can't tolerate your growth — and the two distinct things that are happening when they pull away

The pressure/yield/disinvest model from Jennifer Finlayson-Fife and how it maps onto your closest relationships

Why Karl and I — both out of the church, both committed to each other — still had to learn to hold space for each other's growth

The over-correction trap: how early differentiation can become its own kind of fusion

The loneliness that comes with genuine individuation — and why it means something is forming, not breaking

Why becoming yourself is the most loving thing you can do for the people around you

Resources mentioned: Murray Bowen — differentiation of self theory

Jennifer Finlayson-Fife — pressure/yield/disinvest model

Combating Cult Mind Control — Steven Hassan

Are you just beginning to ask who you actually are underneath everything you were told to be? The Reclamation Sketchbook is a free 7-day guided art journal designed to help you start hearing yourself again — no art experience needed, no right way to do it. Just you, a page, and the first small steps back to yourself.

→ Get the free Reclamation Sketchbook