Beloved psychology professor Erin Ambrose joins Mark and Rex for part 2 of their discussion on sex and Christian culture.
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<h2>TRANSCRIPT</h2>
0:01
Welcome to Jessup think I’m your host Mark Moore and your co host Rex Gurney. And Rex. This is part two of sex and Christian culture. Right. And we have an expert guests with them, right? We’ve brought in an expert, Dr. Erin Ambrose, who’s in our psychology department. And it was it was such a good conversation. It really was slides. So we hope you enjoy it. And we hope you, you gain the knowledge that she that she has to offer that can help us in this really important topic.
0:37
We’re excited. I am excited for this episode. So this is part two. And I’m really excited because we have a special guest, right?
0:44
We figured we needed an expert after, after our last podcast. Exactly. We were looking around and we realized we had one in our midst. That’s right.
0:51
So we’re really glad to welcome Erin Ambrose. Hey, I’m so glad to be here. Yeah. So and you’re part of our psychology department.
0:58
I teach psychology here. And then I also have a private practice. So nice, both sides of psychology that academia and also their how to practice
1:06
and actually put it into practice. That’s great. And how long have you been Jessa 12 years? Oh, nice. Beer. So we got we got a good crew here. We got a crew. That’s almost all in the decade of being here and longer racks. So like you started as an adjunct and then worked my way in. We’ve done the same journey.
1:28
Yeah, sorry. Yes, I drink too. But this time, we’re way back in San Jose, when we were just on the quarter system, actually. And oh, wow, I almost didn’t last pass my last my first sajak. But then here I am, like 16 years. laters. Right. There you go there and a lot. Right. Yeah,
1:42
going, right. I have a way of like, drawing us in one class at a time.
1:50
Exactly, exactly. We’re really excited to have you on because last last episode, we did kind of part one, and we touted sex and Christian culture. And we really kind of looking at, there seems to be maybe two extremes happening within Christian culture. So you kind of have the purity movement of like, 80s 90s into the early 2000s. And we even talked about how that could be characterized, somewhat characterized as the sexual prosperity gospel was kind of like if you wade into all this, then when you get married, dubs will descend from the hip, and like almost any iteration of the prosperity gospel, there are issues. Right? Yeah, exactly. A lot of probably that happened. Oh, my goodness, yes. And then there seems to be on the other side, kind of maybe a reaction against that to kind of a kind of a disregard of the sexual biblical ethic, like, Oh, that is, you know, seen as prudish or seen as, and we’re talking within Christian culture, too. I mean, right. Right, both of those within Christian culture. Right. Right.
2:55
And so we’re trying to figure out how, you know, with those, you know, with that happening, how we can possibly reframe the conversation.
3:04
And we certainly need to write because neither of those things work. Oh, yeah. They I can tell you from the therapeutic PR side. They don’t work. Right.
3:15
Yeah, they really don’t. And and I think that is the heart behind this is how do we start to because we it’s a topic we need to talk about. We need to talk about more. But we also need to talk about it in a way that’s going to be helpful. Be great practice goals. Yeah, just just heaping on more guilt or shame, doesn’t help or yelling louder. Yelling louder. I
3:37
talked about that last time. Or disregarding it or just ignoring it. Boy. Yeah. I think I mentioned this last time I had kind of, you know, avoided the elephant in the room for years in my Christian perspective class, and finally started feeling really guilty about that. It’s like, one of the most important things we’re going to talk about here actually, like my Christian perspective, and your lives, like right now, is the thing that we’re not talking about. Right. And so I’ve just been searching for different ways to talk about it. Different ways to frame the conversation. Sometimes it’s like throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks. Yeah. And honestly, you know, I’m still in process with finding more things to throw at the wall.
4:20
Sure. Well, I can tell you this, though. You tell students about you’re going to talk about sex, and everybody shows up that day, right? Yeah, there you go. 100% attendance. Yeah. I was giving a quiz this morning. And when I mentioned I was going to be finishing that and then coming here and talking about sex. Everybody looked up everybody stopped paying for a broadcast. I did I did I did a little commercial. I did.
4:43
I did. That’s great. Yeah, it is interesting how they’re, you know, eyes will go from whatever they’re doing on the paper. What did you What did she just say she’s gonna do later go talk right? When I think Yeah, and that one reason why wouldn’t the heavy on Erin is that from appealing to That kind of expertise and kind of the both from academia to, to therapy. And also I heard you do a chapel, chapel message here, Jessup, and it has stuck with me. So if anyone listened, I listened. So I appreciate that. And because I thought it was such a good way to frame this conversation, and you kind of talked about how we connect with others, right? And use read heart and body. Right, right. Yeah, I
5:27
talk about it, as keeping our body in alignment, right, our head is on top, and then our heart and then you know, like the rest of our body. And what can happen, if we get out of alignment is it’s really hard to get us back in alignment. You know, I liken it to if your car tires are out of alignment, they don’t just on their own, right, your car’s gonna pull to the left or whatever. And it’s just going to keep doing that until I mean, you have to take maybe some price specific measures to correct that.
5:58
That’s the problem with my 93 Honda is gonna fix itself, if I keep driving it long enough. It won’t shake at 50 miles. Like that goes on this is something’s wrong with the car. It’s gonna just
6:11
go away. Well, I mean, absolutely. And we start then if our if our cars out of alignment, we start driving it according to it’s out of alignment. Right? Right. We start like I, I’ve done this myself, where if my car is pulling to the left all the time, then I mute when I’m driving. I’m constantly pulling it to the right,
6:29
right, since I think we’re supposed to be talking about sex, but we’re starting to talk about mechanics right now. We’re avoiding the subject. Listen, listen, listen,
6:41
listen up. This, this makes sense. So if we are driving our car, specifically pushing it to the right, because it’s wanting to pull to the left, we end up moving everything out of out of whack, right? And the same thing can happen. Yeah, when we get our body out of alignment or attachments out of alignment, then the same thing can happen in, in my experience, as a therapist, I have never seen a couple break up because the relationship was going too slow. Never, never ever in my over 20 years of their eyes, right? Have I seen a couple go? We just can’t we just it’s just we’re just going too slow. Right. But I have seen, it’s just taken it through slow. Never. But I have seen numerous people devastated by relationships when they break up, because they went too fast. Or they went out of alignment. Yeah, right. We need to if we’re going to have safe relationships really connect with our head first. Mm hmm.
7:41
And of course, that’s not the cultural message that we get not so this is right, deeply countercultural.
7:46
Right. And not only is it is it biblical, but it’s also our brain chemicals, which I can get into a little bit too, but but you know, if we connect with our head, that means getting to know someone, their value systems, their beliefs, their their thoughts on on life, and, and what’s important in life. It’s, it’s that whether or not somebody can be compatible in their goals, and in their values, that’s really what we need to do first, right and, and that happens kind of organically, when we get to know people, you know, if you’re hanging out with someone, you’re gonna, you’ll and they are maybe spending more or not spending or, you know, they have an interest. And so you learn about someone just as you get to know, you are learning about those things, the values, the things in their head. If if you’re you know, moving towards a dating relationship, and you have that head connection first, and there’s a lot of respect there I respect with this, I respect their values, I can connect with them, doesn’t mean you have to all have the same hobbies, but you can respect each other in there, then you can safely move towards safely slowly move towards the heart.
8:54
And it’s interesting when we sort of, you know, objectify sex, which we kind of do, we also end up objectifying people. Absolutely. That totally works against everything we’re supposed to, you know, find in a relationship,
9:08
right? If we, if our head is safe, and our beliefs are the person is we can respect each other, we can slowly move to the heart, which is the emotions, how does this person hear my emotions? Are they able to connect with me on an emotional level, and that takes time to do to, if our emotions are safe, if our heart is safe, then later we can move towards again, if this is a dating relationship later, we can move towards considering how our bodies will connect. But again, that’s countercultural, you know, and this hookup culture anyway, it’s, you know, you’re attractive. Okay, cool, right? And that’s all there is to it. And there’s a connection with the body first. But the problem is, there’s lots of problems but but one of the problems with that is what happens in our brains, you know, yeah, our neuro chemicals in the way that God designed us. It’s fascinating when when we are attracted to someone what happens in our in our neuro chemicals,
10:08
dozer pill we can take to avoid complications. Problem solved right there. Well, it’s interesting because there happened where there have been studies done on rats, but i’m gonna i’m not gonna go towards that. Like, we’re not gonna go down that road
10:31
probably a market for the other pill to to like make that happen to we can make money
10:39
exactly like
10:39
I said, and there’s been lots of studies on like, you know, anyway, let’s talk about humans. Okay. sidetracking darn it, darn it. Let’s get back Rex’s fault this time. So when we first are attracted to someone, meet someone, they’re new, they’re kind of mysterious. Dopamine is a neurochemical that gets really revved up in our brain with novelty. So we meet someone and we’re attracted to them. We have this rush of dopamine, which helps us become infatuated. It’s part it’s the infatuation brugg in our Yeah, it does lots of things. But that’s one of the things that it does. It gives us our focused attention when we are first starting to connect with someone and meet someone increased energy loss of appetite, all sorts of things that go with like falling in love or being infatuated with someone that’s dopamine what’s going on in your brain. But we can be fooled by that by thinking it’s love when it actually is just really novelty and dopamine it’s not necessarily love. It’s what it’s what first gets us wanting to be around someone that greeting
11:45
card industry. No, this
11:46
is a hallmark would not like what I’m going to be talking about homeowner channel wouldn’t like it. Yeah, exactly. So dopamine explains kind of that loves struck feeling that right get when they first meet, which is good,
12:01
right? Because we don’t have it, we probably wouldn’t connect with people.
12:04
No, no, again, God, God created this brain that we’ve got, right. But again, he also gave us a thinking brain. Which means we can’t just be like, dragged around by our brain. We should also be using our prefrontal cortex, the decision making part of our brain to help us which is why we go slow. That first part like said connecting with the head first. Yeah, right. Like, like, how does this person’s values line up with mine?
12:31
One is this is this a brain chemical thing too? Because I kind of jotted down some notes that it seems like to connect with someone intellectually first takes longer than to connect with them bodily. Oh, for sure. And it seems like that even brain chemical wise, it maybe takes longer to create those pathways maybe in Right, yeah. So the taking it slow taking it is also a body thing as well. Right. Right.
13:03
And interesting. Like I said, dopamine gets revved up with novelty. So when people are first starting to date, and they want to spend time together, and they have all this lovestruck feelings of I can’t, I can’t stop thinking about them. And all the novelty would diminish with time a little bit does, it does, like 12 to 18 months, actually. So if a relationship is going to last and really should last, we need something more than just dopamine doing that. Right. Right. But again, in this hookup culture, that’s not really what people are paying attention to. Right? Yeah. But But then the body with touch that has a whole other element that we need to pay attention to if we want to be safe in our relationships, because not only is dopamine going on when when we are attracted to someone and first like kindling a relationship. With touch, we have oxytocin and we end with sexual touch, specifically, sex, intercourse, there is vasopressin so so we have a couple different other chemicals that are also released during during touch and during sex, which are bonding chemicals. So those chemicals are meant to help us stay attached to who we are.
14:18
And that also explains a lot of the wreckage that the hookup culture leaves so much wreckage,
14:23
that’s exactly right, so much wreckage. So we need our thinking brain to help our heart slow down. We also need our thinking brain to not have us connecting physically all over the place, which is going to cause all that bonding that we you know it another thing with oxytocin is it helps us feel safe. Well, if you haven’t already connected with someone, intellectually to know that they’re safe, your body wants to feel safe with the person you’ve been sexual with. Yeah, that is the way our brain works the way God created our brains to work, but of course It’s a false enough, but it’s a false sense of safety, right? Which is, again, why we need that thinking brain, and we need to slow down and use the intellectual part of our brain first,
15:09
before the body, right? And then when you find out that person isn’t safe, yeah, just but then
15:13
there’s already all this connection, you know, something I, I’ve heard many years ago, and it really held on to it that, and I’ve seen it true in my practice, and just in my, my life with people I know, sex before marriage can do one of two things. It can take a good relationship and make it much more challenging. Because sex is powerful. Right? So once you introduce that, in a relationship where there hasn’t been the commitment, it’s like, all the energy goes towards either wanting sex or trying to stop it. Yeah. Right. And so it takes what is the naturally progressing relationship, and now, like, takes it off course out of alignment, right. And so there’s a lot more complications in trying to get that relationship in a healthy way. So it can take a good relationship and make it much harder, or it can take a bad relationship and make it last longer. Right, because of that bond. Right? So I mean, it’s just, it’s just not great. And, you know, God talks about that. And, unfortunately, and kind of our current culture, everybody wants to think that was something from back in the day, right? Instead of now,
16:24
right? But, you know, God knew that was doing something for the Puritans. Right. And I love CS Lewis highlights that a lot. He uses that word a lot. In screwtape letters, he has screwtape use that word Puritan, he’s like, remember that word like that can. And he also loose is another thing in and through the through the voice right through the voice of screwtape. But he’s helping Wormwood has the tempter has his nephew. He’s helping him understand the patient better. And he says, humans forget that they are amphibious, that their spirit and body right, and what’s your body does affects their spirit, right? And so, you know, he’s kind of helping woman like, don’t worry about necessarily messing with the spirit side, mess with the body side. And that’s going to and I always stuck with me, because so true. I mean, this this issue, and I think sex and the issue of sex, highlights it more than maybe any of the other issues, that we are both body and spirit. We’re not just spirit, partially inhabiting a body. And we’re not just body. But we’re both. And so what our body does affects our spirit. And
17:34
I think we’ve been really fed that lie that they’re not connected, right? So do what you’re right. It doesn’t matter. Yeah. And oh, my goodness, it’s so matters. It’s so matters. It matters. It matters. It matters, it matters, it matters, we’re connected, we are one system, body, mind, soul, spirit, we are one system, and you can’t really mess with one without the rest.
17:52
So question that I have Erin that would help me and maybe trying to communicate or use this information. You know, when I talk about this with students, and, folks, I know, one thing we talked about last time is the fact that culturally, people are entering into marriage later. So the average age of a male 28, average age of female 27, something like that. And I totally see this in my own kids. I mean, yeah, totally. And, and it may be a little different in some conservative Christian circles, but still even in in, you know, Christian circles that that’s and there’s some reasons for that. But of course, this means that there’s a lot of time between the time that you know, your first release sexually over the potential for being sexually active, and then marriage. And so how can this knowledge maybe I’m trying to find something else to throw at the wall and say that will stick here? How can this knowledge help? You know, in that lengthy time that I’m saying it’s easy? Right, if I never said that, right. I understand that. And we all know that. But I’m just I’m just some what in this might. I don’t know even how to say this, make it easier and understanding. It’s not easy, but at least make it easy. You’re right, you know, because we don’t want to abandon the traditional Christian sexual ethic, right? But we are in other cultural realities here that and it’s not just, you know, the media, you know, trumpet sex, so we’re captive to that. That is true, but but you know, just the way people live their lives now is different with all the economic drivers and all sorts of things. And so you think
19:42
knowledge is power. And so if people do understand, this is what happens in my brain when my body is engaged in no physical connection in any way, right? Because even I mean, it starts with even kissing dopamine gets revved With with like kissing an oxytocin get wrapped up with like kissing. So it’s not I mean, and I’m not saying I’m not I don’t want to go down that whole road about how much touches too much touch. But I’m not gonna do that too far right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, free camp for all time. Yeah, right? No. But I do think knowledge is power. And so if someone can understand this is what’s happening in my brain This is what’s happening in my neurochemicals, and it’s affecting the way that I feel about myself. And it will impact the way I feel about myself and others. Yeah, moving forward. That it’s not we aren’t dissected from our soul. Our body is not dissected from our soul. If somebody can understand that, that may give them at least pause. Yeah, right, which is what I’m hoping for just just to give someone pause, at least recognize what’s going on inside of you. Right, you know, and we think this is maybe going to be a weird analogy, but you think, you know, years ago, smoking was, was supposed to be sexy and right. And so all you know, you saw it on in movie.
21:05
Ad the other day, it was like going on Instagram, and it was like history photographed, right. And it was a from the like, 40s. And it was advertising cigarettes for pregnant women. And it was like the best cigarette for pregnant women. Like that was the person who was pregnant in the thing. And I’m like, Oh, yeah, but our knowledge
21:24
that our knowledge has changed right now we know oh, my goodness, this is what it does to your body. Right? It’s terrible. So I think it’s the same thing here, right? If we can just give people some knowledge to give them pause, you know, people are going to make their make their choices, right? But give them pause, at least they can understand this is what’s happening in my body and my brain and my soul, when I choose to be, you know, physically connected to another person. Right. Okay. Again, they’re gonna make their own choice. Right.
21:54
And I think one thing we noticed in the last episode, and is that just giving someone a Thou shalt not? Doesn’t, doesn’t give them enough pause. Now, and move on why,
22:06
right? We can explain this is what happens in your brain. This is what’s happening in your body. This is, this is what might happen. If this continues, and this is what will happen if this continues, right? Because you can’t tell your brain chemicals. Okay, well, I don’t want you to release. Yeah, I mean, right? don’t connect to this person, right? We’re just gonna relax, but don’t connect, right. But what you can do is use your brain like when if somebody is starting to get in that obsessive thought, because in addition to dopamine, we and we also have low levels of serotonin. When when there’s this kind of attraction happening. Yeah. Which is kind of kind of makes that obsessive thing go on when somebody so we can’t tell. You can’t tell your brain, which I love. The fact that God created our minds is why we can use our minds to control our minds, right? We can’t Yeah, we can tell our brains No, stop. No, I’m not gonna do that. Right. We have the ability to do that we have even though maybe, maybe physically, there’s this attraction, maybe physically, there’s this draw, we still can use our brain to say no,
23:11
right? We’re not slaves to our physicality necessarily, right? Or free moral age. Exactly. Exactly. So with knowledge, I think we have a little bit more to them. Okay.
23:22
Yeah. And I think that is scamming we, and we talked a little bit about last episode that focusing on the Why is going to be so, so much more important, right? Because just telling someone something is wrong. doesn’t doesn’t help. And it doesn’t cause anyone to be like, I mean, there’s maybe a 1% who are like, Oh, it’s wrong, I won’t do it. Yeah. And it seems that the other 99% of us. Yeah, exactly. Right, that it’s and I think the Why does help and, and I think that is a good analogy, actually, with the smoking because once you start learning, like, Hey, this is this is not good for my body. And and I think the why also gets to what people are actually looking for, like the fact even maybe in hookup culture, we’re looking to connect with someone, right? We want intimacy,
24:07
and we’re meant for it. Yeah, I mean, it’s not a bad thing to want, it’s a great thing to want it is how God created me.
24:15
We talked a little bit last time about how we’ve changed kind of a sexual ethic of commitment to a sexual ethic of consent, and how that just really skews the conversation. And somehow i think that you know, commitment needs to be framed as a good thing. And and if that is something that that is good and a moral good, then maybe I will use this new knowledge that I have about the chemicals in my brain and how this sort of happens in service of something that is good,
24:51
right? Yeah, it were meant to connect right? This this is not us at war with our brains, right. This is us. The brain and understanding what our brain does, to our best good and to the best good of our, of our future, you know, spouse, maybe, right. But I, again, I think we need, we need more knowledge. You know, you mentioned earlier the the kind of to like, you know, sex is bad don’t do it or sex is good. Everybody doesn’t doesn’t matter, right? And if or if sex is bad before marriage, then it’s amazing after marriage, so you just have to wait, right? Everything, everything’s gonna be perfect. Again, not so much. Right? We I think, again, knowledge is key. And what I’ve discovered over, you know, a lot of years of working with couples is most couples don’t know enough about their own sexual response cycle. And they don’t know anything about their their spouse’s sexual response cycle, right. So when we’re not doing a great job in the church, about helping people understand what what God meant, when He created us as two separate genders, right, and how those two beautiful differences can come together in a great experience, sexually in a committed relationship. But we’re not giving people the tools or the knowledge about that, right. And so it doesn’t always just, you know, after the wedding line, everything is great for from here on out, you know, again, if people don’t have knowledge, and I think, I think the church, maybe in response to how the world has kind of hijacked sex has just instead moved away entirely. Instead of recognizing Wait, this is something that God created, we need to equip people with, why and how and how it works even.
26:41
So I don’t say I’m a youth pastor, and I have, you know, a bunch of 1516 year old. And I’m trying to communicate this to them in some way. What would be the best way for me to do that? What this are you talking about? The chemical, you know, the the head, heart body sort of issues and how the chemicals that are released when these actions happen, do have implications? how can how can I communicate this in more layman’s language? If you’re talking to a 15 year old, up to a 15 year old that anything
27:35
15 year olds maybe a little bit more credit. I think that if I say, you know, explain to a 15 year old there, there are neuro chemicals, there are chemicals that flood your brain at different times during depending on the things that you do the actions that you do. And with this action comes this chemical and with this chemical comes this action.
27:57
I think they could understand that.
27:59
Yeah. Good. I like that approach. I think I think we do need to to give 1516 year olds more more credit for their ability to be able to, to understand things. I mean, I think in a lot of areas, I think specifically in the church, we’ve we’ve not talked about it or when we have we’ve kind of kept it on a surface level. And we haven’t gotten to details. And it’s almost like we’re afraid to talk about the specifics. But we have to realize like they’re getting specifics elsewhere. Right, exactly. They have
28:33
they’re getting the specifics wrong. Right. Right. They’re getting a miss information. Yeah. Right. So sex is depicted in culture very differently than what it what it can be and what it should be right. And something that that happens frequently is, especially, you know, now with the just influx of pornography everywhere, right? pornography is is specifically created with male sex in mind and not female sex in mind in terms of like the sexual response cycle, right? And so men, even even committed Christian men get into marriage with this understanding that sex is going to look like what pornography depicts. And that is so inaccurate, right? Because it does not take in the other half of the equation, which is the woman’s sexual response cycle. Right. Right, which is just kind of ignored and and, you know, fabricated in pornography. And so again, I think it’s so important for people just to get like actual knowledge, like real knowledge is power, right? Just power. Knowledge is power. Understood?
29:42
Yeah, really is. And I think what’s interesting is, even within culture, I think culture kind of has two paradoxical kind of comments happening at the same time. They say, sex is great. Like, do whatever you want. pornography is great. You should watch it and learn But then also I think you hear in culture, like, hey, what what is going on with how we’re using sex and how we’re abusing each other with it? Right. So there’s a recognition that man that that sex isn’t jerky, you know that it can be damaging. And then even pornography can be damaging in there. I mean, there’s, I think there’s more of it, because it’s more out there, not just drag the can, is Yeah. And I think there are cultures recognizing that recognizing like, hey, it can be and so we need to, and even hearing secular psychologists, and I’m talking about the fact that our, you know, eight 910 11 year old boys are watching hours and hours of pornography, right? It’s probably not good for our culture. Right. Right. Yeah.
30:44
So yeah, you’re absolutely right. There’s a lot of secular psychologists, who would recognize that pornography has impeded a person’s ability to have a healthy sex life later, what what our brain does with pornography, it wires in a certain way. And so I unfortunately, I’ve worked with couples where the they’re not able to have a healthy sex life, because the one of the people have been typically the male have been, you know, so connected physically with pornography, that they can no longer find pleasure in I mean, just doesn’t work. You know, they got busy oddly, doesn’t work anymore. Because of the connection of the neural pathways. Right. Right. So again, I mean, that’s not that has nothing to do with whether or not someone has faith or not. It’s just like, outside of morality, right. But again, as we said, before, you know, our bodies and our brains and our souls, we are all intertwined to the way God created us. So you don’t have to be a Christian to to have the experience of the way God designed your body to be. Right. Right, there does so true. And psychologists are recognizing that that the body doesn’t work well, when this happens. sexual response doesn’t work well, when we do it in ways that are basically anti christian. Right, even though they’re not Christian psychologists. Right.
32:10
And they’re, yeah, recognize that. And I think, maybe this been a great conversation for me. And I think a good place to land is I want to go back to the car analogy wasn’t a distract me because I have a real affinity for this analogy, because I do drive a 93. Honda and it often has, I mean, it’s been a great car, and then it’s going to go forever. Like I want to drive it until it just dies on the freeway. And then I just keep walking, and I’ll just leave it there. But it with that, like, I liked how you said this, this head, heart and body alignment. And when you get out of alignment, just like when your car’s out of alignment. You just learn to to pull to the right if it’s fallen to the left. Yep. And, and then you Yeah, you compensate. And then you get to a place where you don’t even realize it. So I have my car every day. So I don’t hear the knocks and I don’t hear. And it’s so funny when people get in the car with me. And they’re like, does it always sound like that? I’m like, yeah, it’s fine. But then my wife drove the car one day and she’s like, What is wrong with your car? Like I had to steer the opposite direction to go straight. But I was like, oh really my god and I hadn’t even thought about it. Because
33:26
I had that same problem with my car when it finally got corrected I finally took it in I got the alignment. I was now driving the I had to retrain myself to drive straight cuz I was so used to pulling to one direction to make it drive. So absolutely we compensate and everything else around us. In our in our in our whole system compensates too. And it seems like we’re doing that with sex, right? And in our culture, and especially the hookup culture, we’re now we’re just like, well, this
33:55
is how it is when we we connect with people bodily first, and we just live our life compensating, compensating. And then yeah, and I think what people do one is if they could experience this true alignment, right, and, and again, not that you have a trilemma and you have no problems, right? No more knowledge still need, I still need to know what to do. But that that, and perhaps maybe like for me with the car analogy is when my wife drove it and then she was like, Hey, what’s wrong? So sometimes maybe we need other people speaking to us saying, hey, maybe it seems like you’re compensating there. Right? And, and you’ve been leading with the body to connect with people. And and that’s not going to be a way to actually get what you want, which is true intimacy and true connection. Right? Yeah. So thank you for that. Thank you for your No, this was really yeah, this was good conversation. Thanks, guys. Thanks for having me on. You’re very welcome. And you will you will Be back. Okay, and when you come back, hopefully we’ll have the T shirts ready. Ready? Once you come back, then we can call you a friend of the show. Oh, okay, on the show first time, I’m
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just a visitor. Here twice, and I’m a friend. Oh, I’m waiting for that invitation. Now we’ll figure out all the prizes and everything else. That’s true. Thank you. Awesome. Thank you.
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All right, we’re gonna finish today’s show with a reoccurring segment that is called the student becomes the teacher becomes a student. And I’m glad to welcome back Matthew Todd, it’s good to be back. Host of exit 311 s. Jessup podcast, student extraordinare. Just now a friend of the show, friend of the show officially Oh official says more than I have achieved in a great many weeks. So I’m getting well now you can tell your parents you’ve become a friend of the show. I’ll be proud. You will get the T shirt t shirt will be made. Yeah, I can guarantee it. I know the guy who’s on it. Who’s making that T shirt he he follows through. That’s right. That’s right. He does follow through. Yeah. So I do I have another important question for you. Because I just have a lot that I need to learn. And this is kind of, you know, I know you’re being a sophomore. You’re just now maybe being a part of this culture. And and this will definitely be probably your future in the next, you know, two to six years like is half hopefully to hopefully do and for two. Yeah, amen. Well, we act graduate, but I mean, like, just life after life after post grad. So here’s the question, why? Why is everyone getting married in barns these days? Why is anyone getting married? And like, what, what’s the barn attraction because I grew up in the country, like I grew up around a barn and never grown up as a kid was like, you know, I want to get married here one day. I think that’s actually why so nowadays, we have a lot of people especially who come to a private Christian school who are not growing up around Barton. So like, okay, the idea of like, the simplicity that a barn in vibes is kind of like, foreign almost, it’s like, wow, look how drastic that is. That’s so, so neat. Like, wow, look, how quaint. That is. There might be a simpler times. Yeah. And so they want to and also, I bet cheaper. There you go. Well, I don’t know man. The barns I’ve seen. They’re like nice barns. Oh, they’re not even used barns. They’re like like wedding barn wedding barns. Yeah, they literally are wedding barns. That’s crazy. But I kind of like that. I like that idea of I do think it’s kind of a harkening back and maybe in the midst of our craziness of our culture of our technologies. Yeah. That they’re like, you know what, let’s go back to that simpler time. Maybe we met on the farm. We’re both farm hands. We met and we got married. And we had each other I know, and then you’re and you just, you know, you just work on the farm every day milk cows and make back right, the kids Little House in the peristyle. Yeah, I think okay, I can see that. Like, yeah, that makes sense. It might I mean, to get a little deeper here and my I have a connection to the fact that like, there’s a lot of people millennial age who are very into, like, liturgy, they’re getting more and right into like those. I’m a fan of that. I’m, I’m away. I heard on the podcast. Yeah. See? Yeah. You your listener? I am one of the That’s right. That’s right. You are I am one of them. And that is perfect. We thank you for your listening. Thank you for that. That’s why now your friend of the show. That’s I’m glad I made it there. So I feel very proud. Okay, so now I think Okay, I understand a little more about maybe the drawl to barns. But now I have a question for you to follow up. Okay. Okay. This is something I feel like I should know, but I definitely don’t. And my parents mentioned in the day and I’m, I’m lost. So I want you to know what it means to call someone collect.
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A collect.
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So but it’s like a phone call. Right? collect? I don’t quite right. Okay. Yeah. So So here we go. This is a history lesson. This will go way back. We’re going back before the time of cell phones what we do? Yeah, there was there was a time in the recent past where we did not have a phone with us at all times. I can’t imagine it right. Yeah, I just you can’t fathom that. Like, this is even way before the internet like it is. And so there used to be payphones in establishments or a high school. I grew up and we had one payphone in the lobby. And it was like 25 cents, I think to make a call, so he had to have a quarter. But if you didn’t have a quarter, you could call someone collect, which meant they they got a message when they pick up the phone and says Will you accept a collect call from and then it would be my voice like Mark. Dad picked me up at school. And so then your parents would be like, okay, I accept it. So now that quarter gets charged to my parents phone bill. So they pay for that phone call. Because you had to, there was no free calls. There was no just calling. Yeah, this is land before cell phone. It’s kind of I’ve heard a follow up kind of question to this, you know, from people but again, considering land before cell phone is like, how did we ever meet each other, like meet people? Like if we were like, hey, let’s all meet somewhere, like without cell phones without texting? Yeah, like, that was like you wrote like letters. Right? And we literally just had to audibly say to each other in person. No way. I will see you on Tuesday at 4pm at the mall to get I like your daily planner. Yeah, write that down. Exactly. I’d write down and then you just show up to the mall. And if no one showed up, you’re like, well, I guess they’re not coming. That’s rough. He just went home. I will say it’s one of the hardest things to go somewhere and then like not know, people would be there. But then also sometimes I’ll get there. And if I don’t have my phone, it’s like, the mean the mall near here is ginormous. Right? So it’s like, where are you going to meet right? How are we ever gonna see each other? And so if you if you just said when I was like, Let’s meet up somewhere, you had to be like, specific? Yeah. Like let’s meet in front. So like that hard. But yeah, the wetzel pretzel, thinking about how like, I’ve been enabled to be lazy about just like, Let’s meet at the mall, which is not fair of a place to meet, because that’s ginormous need to say, yeah, you know, three quarters left of the web tells you exactly to that kiosk right there. And we couldn’t even say now all those kiosks or fix your iPhone screen kiosk. didn’t exist. So we didn’t even have those kiosks nearby. Exactly. Go to the fix your iPhone screen one right here. Which Which one? There’s 17 on this row right out front of apple. That is a collect call. I’m glad. I’m glad that I learned a lot. Why did I learned a little more about barn culture? I kind of like that kind of yearning for simplicity. Yeah, I appreciate that. So thanks for teaching me that. Matthew Todd, and I look forward to having you back on the show to answer some more questions. Thank you for letting me be on here again. I feel like I’ve learned a lot. It’s a privilege. Really. Thank you.
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Thank you for listening to Jessup. Think Be sure to follow us on Twitter at Jessupthink we would love to hear your thoughts on the episode and engage with any questions you have. Our aim is to provide a framework for further reflection and deeper exploration of these important topics. You can also help the show by leaving a review on iTunes these reviews help the podcast reach new listeners. Until next time, I’m Mark Moore and this is Jessup.
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If you’re interested in learning more about Jessup, please visit us at jessup.edu. William Jessup is the premier fully accredited four year Christian University in the Sacramento area offering over 60 academic programs in undergraduate and graduate studies designed to see every student equipped and transformed into the leader they are called to be as you go. Don’t forget to hit subscribe and share so you never miss an episode. Thanks for joining us for Jessup think.