Guest Carol Feil - Speaking to the Lies and Shoulds

Host Terri welcomes Carol Feil, a seasoned writer, gardener, photographer, speaker, and church mentor. Together they explore the powerful journey of transforming our internal soundtrack. Carol's gardening analogies and personal stories offer relatable insights on breaking free from the guilt-inducing "shoulds" that weigh us down. Carol shares her wisdom on replacing self-defeating thoughts with God's truth, drawing from her life experience and deep spiritual journey. Discover practical strategies to recognize harmful thought patterns, uproot lies, replace them with biblical truths, and establish new mental habits that align with who God says you are. Whether you struggle with negative self-talk or simply want to cultivate a healthier mindset, this conversation provides both inspiration and practical steps toward freedom.

 Catch Carol Feil on Instagram, her website, and on Facebook

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Transcript

 Hello and welcome to Anchored Not Anxious Podcast.

 Terri

I'm here with my guest, Carol Feil. She is a Christian, seasoned writer, gardener, photographer, speaker. and  church mentor. She believes God loves us more than we can comprehend. He's closer than we realize, and God will help us move our internal soundtrack from should to could.  Carol, I am so glad we can do this podcast on letting go of should so we can reach for the I could. 

Before we get into our conversation,  tell us a little bit more about yourself.   

Carol

I am a mom to three adult children. I'm a grandma to four. I'm coming up on my  40th anniversary for marriage and it is just great to be in this season of life and, uh, be able to look back and see the places where God has met me in the struggles.

 And I think that's why I'm so passionate about sharing in those social media spaces, um, with younger women who, um, maybe struggle with their view of themselves, their concept of who God is, and just speaking truth into their daily lives, the things that they deal with, uh, big and small. And for them to know that the Lord sees them right where they are.

He knows their struggles and he loves them deeply.  

Terri

I love that. And more importantly, I love your hunger for wanting to know and relate to God, because I love that too. And God absolutely wants a relationship with us, and you know, part of that starts with knowing who, who they are to God, right? So, um, alright, let's dive into the topic of letting go of shoulds so we can reach for could. 

I'll start. With a little bit of my background, I am prone to self defeating thoughts.  In my 30s and 40s, self defeating statements had full access. Sadly, I rarely mounted a defense against the accusations. Uh, the statements sounded like You should have gone to college earlier, or you should have said no. 

 You have yourself to blame.  You'll never. Ugh, I've heard you'll never so many times, and this is the one that I still struggle with. What makes you think you can?  I mean, these shoulds.  Can'ts and nevers have nested in my memory over the years. They, it's become white noise and injured my self worth.  I mean,  I've spent a lot of time digging for the roots of these messages, but it hasn't been simple, you know, but I really felt like I was tired of buying into the lie. 

So Carol, what is the start point to gain control of a hurtful mental soundtrack. 

Carol

I think For myself, it was the realization that although that soundtrack was playing on repeat, when I realized I hadn't asked it to play, that I hadn't pushed the start button,  I realized I could do something to change the soundtrack.

 Because they were showing up didn't mean I couldn't stop them.  And The only way I knew to stop them was to speak truth over the lies and truth is God's word and there's so much rich, uh, richness in his word that, um, from the Old Testament to the end of the new, that God just gives us to tell us who we are in him, who he is, and because of who he is, we have the confidence then to attack the lies the enemy constantly throws at us. 

 Truth over lies and richness in his word,   those are very powerful statements.  Do you have an example of a truth that you used?  Yes, uh, one of my one of my I will never leave you or forsake you. The Lord is never far from us. Even when we feel like he is, he is always right with us. 

There are,  things like Romans 8, 1,  where it tells us there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ. And, uh, that helps me fight away those feelings of unworthiness. And even in our struggles and difficult choices, the Lord is right there with us. And when we are in Christ, uh, we no longer stand under shame and condemnation. 

Philippians 1, 6 reminds us that he who began a good work in you, Will in fact complete it and so I used to think that my faith walk was just that lovely escalator that just like the roller coaster just takes its ride up to the top, but like the roller coaster, the other side is a little bit of a twisty, sometimes a white knuckle ride, and it doesn't mean that God is left.

It means that he's asking us to lean into him in the process of those hard seasons. And the combination of leaning into him, listening to his word, gives us the tools we need to speak truth over the lies.  

Terri

Yeah, I, the thing about for me was that,  I would be in the process of thanking God for,  making himself known to me. 

But then I started  seeing like my entire sin history,  like on a big  billboard in front of my eyes. And , Oh my gosh,   the shame , and I couldn't get rid of that, even though I knew that,  like you said, there's no condemnation, he's doing a good work in me.

But somehow,  Bolded right there.  I had so much trouble trying to,  clean that off the whiteboard, which is exactly what Jesus did for us, right? You know? Yes. Yes. But,  you can say that. But to live it,  and I think this is a,  

Carol

It's a struggle for any era of life, but in our instant gratification culture that we live in, we microwave our coffee, we drive through for food, we have groceries delivered. 

To sit with something and to walk through the process. This has not been an overnight thing for me. I turned 61 this year and the realization of this has really only come in the last decade. And so I've lived a lot of life sitting under that and at the same time sitting under great biblical teaching, listening to pastors and, uh, women who have been incredible Bible study leaders.

Teach the truth of God's word. And so we know God's word. I think what the enemy loves to do is try to convince us that we're not worthy of the truth that he gives us. So anywhere he can, he tries to, he, the enemy tries to speak the lies, but it's a recognize root out, um, Replace, repeat, and the repeat part can be hard, right?

We're like, we wanna be one and done. We wanna go to church on Sunday and be good for the whole week. And the reality is we have to keep coming back to those truths and maybe, maybe we repeat a truth many, many times in a single day. 

Maybe there's a verse that we just have to speak over a lie repeatedly. That's how athletes get strong. That's how our brain takes in new information. You didn't get all of your education without studying hard to remember what you needed to know. And yet as believers, sometimes for myself, I think I read that verse. And then I go on about my day as if I'm Mighty Mouse, you know, with my cape flying. 

And I need to read that verse and repeat that verse. And this is why we want to dwell on these things. We want to abide all of these words that come from scripture that are really calling us to sit with the truth, to meditate on it. And it's not a one and done. It is just like being an athlete. We have to work that spiritual muscle. 

Terri

Ooh, that well said, Carol.  Ooh. All right.  The next thing is,   the Apostle Paul tells the Colossian Christians that they're praying for them. He says, we ask God to give you complete knowledge of his will and to give you spiritual wisdom and understanding.  

And what that verse tells me is a woman can ask for and receive from God spiritual understanding. And when she says,  God, show me who you say I am. Show me what you see.  He will do it.  Carol, describe  the spiritual wisdom you have acquired, allowing you to love who you are, as you are,  and the way you draw strength from God. 

Carol

There's, there's a few parts to answer this, um, how I have, uh, uh, acquired wisdom has been years of walking with God, years of, uh, sitting in Bible studies and loving getting to learn and, um, the same thing with church on Sundays. The other thing, Terry, for me has been, um, in friendships and looking for, uh, Um, we have a variety of friendships, but making sure not to miss out on the friendships that also encourage us in our faith so that we have, uh, friends who are like minded.

It doesn't have to be our only set of friends, but for sure to have that on our priority list, somebody who's like minded, who's also encouraging us with the truth. How great is it to get a text from somebody when you didn't tell them anything and they just come in with a verse and they say, can I just let you know I'm praying for you today? 

When that happens, that's a big boost in the middle of somebody's day. Because usually. I feel like that's the Holy Spirit prompting somebody else to do something in obedience. They don't know what's going on necessarily in my day, but later I can say, I don't know if you realize it, but the timing of that was so incredible, right? 

And that happens in social media now too with, uh, I love to be on Instagram with ladies and in the direct messages to have a conversation with somebody where we're just able to be back and forth and encourage. And so there's multiple parts to this idea of acquiring this wisdom again, like the athlete. 

It doesn't happen overnight and it matters who we surround ourselves with. Um, Of course, I want to be in the world and sharing the truth of who God is just by being who he made me to be, but I also want to be sure that I am, um,  able to have people speak truth into my life so that when they see things, um, it's a very symbiotic thing in the,  in the family of God to have, um,  that cohesiveness between us. 

Um,  I think another thing is I am in my 60s, but I still have women older than me speaking into my life.  And I think we just never outgrow the need to have somebody who's a little further down the road.  Just speak truth to our heart. 

Again, the Holy Spirit uses that and for somebody to see you and observe and whether it's a compliment or a gentleness to say,  that was a little harsh what you said. Did you mean it that way? Maybe not even something I said to them, but they overheard just to say, I just want you to be the best version of yourself. That God created you. So I'm just going to, and there's relationship there that doesn't come out of the blue. You know, I would probably question that, um, from somebody, but where there's relationship already established. And so being that person for someone coming behind me.  

And at my age, there's a lot that can come beyond,  but then also knowing that I have not attained, there are women who have lived more yet than I have, and I want to glean from them as well.  

Terri

Oh, yeah, there's a lot of wisdom out there. And I,   I really picked up on the fact that,  you said,   we hear from God,   we find out who we are to God by spending time with him, by having relationship with him.  And,  , I'm huge about looking back and crediting God with that history of faithfulness and truthfully,  you, you can't see it at the time. Very rarely is not until you look back,  and that can be true even of human friendships where what you didn't appreciate. 

You know, that, that wisdom that your mom was trying to give you,  it's like, ah, what do you know, old woman?  And then next thing you know, , you're like, wow, she really knew what she was talking about. Yes. But, .  You said speak truth into your life, you know, women, God, the Holy Spirit, but  there's a lot that we are taking in. There's a lot coming at us.  

Carol

More  coming at us than at any time in history because we're, we live in a digital age, right? We're in an information age and we want to know the latest headlines from across and around the world.

It used to be, uh, the newspaper came once a week, not every day, you know, maybe twice a day in big cities, who knows, um, but the inundation of information that we have and to. I don't have the wisdom for myself to make a conscious choice to turn some things off so they don't even come through on my phone.

 Like, am I willing? from this hour to this hour. I have it set from nine to four on my phone. Just there are a bunch of things that the notifications cannot pop up. I have to go seek them out. And that's been so helpful to just filter what comes in. Um, There are things that would be fine if they just weren't on my phone at all, right?

 Um, we can, we can have an oversaturation and that's, that's going to be unique to each one of us, depending on what our personal ways of taking things in are. But the challenge is for myself, I always say, am I spending as much time in God's word as I am on social media or, you know, whatever it is, because it doesn't have to be a negative news reel for it to have a stressful impact on us. Reading other people's struggles repeatedly for 24 hours a day  is not a bad thing, but it does weigh on us. And so because we have access to so much more, recognizing that maybe we weren't meant to take it all in at one time and giving ourselves permission um, To refrain from some of that, not to ignore it completely, but just to put a check on ourselves.

I can't eat sugar all day and expect to be healthy. I can't take in news cycles and expect to not feel something stress related because of that. And so it's a, it's a wisdom, it's a wisdom thing. 

Terri

Yeah. And , speaking of the  shoulds,  with all that coming in, we're constantly being hit with you should take this  that's going to regenerate your skin from the inside out.

 And I'm like, what?  But you should have this, , there's so many shoulds coming in and   it's coming from school. It's coming from families. It's coming from communities and friends. Um, and even church,  church can be even  a huge with the shoulds. Well, you should be on this committee or you should come to this dinner.

You should, , and  this thing builds up in our minds about how we're falling behind and failing and, uh, speak a little bit to that, Carol, 

Carol

Yes, and, um, I will just put the  caveat that as shoulds, not every should is bad because there are some shoulds in scripture, um, that encourage us to love one another. There are some things where When the should is wrapped in a directive from the Apostle Paul or someone like that, we put that in a different category. 

But the things like you were talking about that come at us in the news, the advertising, all of these things, even from well intended people in places we like to serve, like our church, um, Should is often perceived as having a guilt inducing and a shame  cloak covering that comes with it.

And I think the enemy, particularly, and when I say the enemy of our souls, I'm talking, uh, some people will say Satan, the devil, um, he,  He loves to trip us up. He wants to keep us from trusting in the God who created us. And so the shoulds are sneaky little things. Like you were saying, should have done something sooner, should have got my education when I was younger, should have worn something different today.

It could be the smallest little things. But it just builds and it builds and it builds and what it creates is just a negative feedback loop that we're constantly digesting, like all of the things in our information age that come at us, right? The shoulds have been around way before the internet was.

 This is nothing new. And I am pretty sure that people in the Old Testament of God's Word also struggled with I mean, think what some of the moms might have said to some of those brothers who constantly fought with each other. You know, you should be more like your brother. That's  right. And, and the challenge is to find out what it is God wants from me in my service to others, in, uh, the way that I interact with my community and to be sure that we can take those shoulds and put them through that filter of recognizing them for what they are, holding them up to the truth. 

And then, because I'm a gardener, I like the idea of rooting them out. You know, we pull, if we just pull the top of a weed off, the root grows right back. So we want to pull it up from its roots  and we want to replace it. 

With truth statements, and the great thing about our information age is you can get your Bible app online and you can open up to search and say, um, truth, you can open up comfort, hope, and you put that in and it's going to bring up a bunch of verses for you to go to for whatever the guilt thing is for you.

I wasn't as compassionate as I could be, whatever that is, we take that to God's word. We find a word of truth and we just blanket it and we just keep doing that. We just keep piling truth over those shame lies. And it's a long, it's not an overnight fix. It's a long battle because probably  by the time we recognize that's an issue for us.

And it's been pretty well implanted in the way we think and process things. And so it will, it will take a while. But I think the Lord  doesn't, uh, he doesn't love that, but he loves this part of it because we have to lean into him for the fix. Now we're in relationship with him, which is what he's wanted all along.

And so he just welcomes us to come and lean in,  absorb his truth, to be reminded that he sees us, knows us, and loves us. And that those shoulds are things that his son took care of on the cross that was all cleared away,  but we live in a world that's still able to tell lies and the enemy that tells us the biggest lies somehow those end up just twirling around, but we have the privilege of going to God's word.

 And finding those good words of truth to speak over what you speak over your shoulds might be different than mine, but if it comes from God's word, I just think, wow, even when I'm trying to figure out what to pray, open Psalms or Proverbs, and you just can't go wrong praying scripture back to God, right?

Like, okay.  It's like, I'm good. I figured out what to pray today.  I'll go to Proverbs, that book of wisdom, and Lord, you just settled that in on my brain, you know? 

Terri

Yeah. Well, I love the garden analogy because I'm a gardener, too. And, , I got a visual, Carol, that  if you've got these lies, which are the weeds, uh, you just need to use God's word. That's, that's your weed lie killer, right? You just, you just dump that on there and saturate it. And then eventually that'll weed that lie is that's so good. And the only thing you've got left  is the truth. 

Carol

That's right. That's right. And that's what we want. We want to dwell on the truth. We want to live in truth.

 Um.  You know, the, all of the letters to the churches in the New Testament,  they're not directly written to us, but the principles in there certainly apply to us. And Ephesians talks about being prepared for the fiery arrows of the evil one. Well, don't you think those shoulds are just those flaming arrows the enemy's trying to shoot at us?

And what is Ephesians tell us to do? I believe it's in chapter six that it talks about putting on the full armor of God. I don't go into garden without some gloves, right? We put some boots on, um, again,  taking the concept of what we do in athletics, in education, academia, all of these things and applying some of those same principles to our faith walk and saying, Of course, I have to work at this.

Of course, I need to put on the armor, the helmet of salvation, the gospel of truth, the breastplate of righteousness. Those things all come from knowing who God is, and we find that out by reading about him in his words to us, the Bible, 66 books written over 400 years, all to tell us how much he loves us and cares about us.

 Terri

And, uh,  The truth hasn't changed. It still stands.  It sure does.  And it's just as good as it was back then for those old Israelites. Exactly.  Um,  so the world tries to tell us who we ought to be, and of course Satan certainly lends his two cents.  There's our own harsh voice, the well meaning family opinion, and friends. 

So what steps can we take? Can we take to make I can  or I could statements louder and bolder overriding the lies and the should statements inscribed on our memory? 

Carol

I think I would go back to my list of  when we recognize that we're there, then we have to take repetitive action, right? We have to go through the process of rooting out the lie.

We continue to replace lies with truth. And then we repeat that all over again. We recognize, we root out, we replace, we repeat. And,  uh, this is. a good thing for us because we are creatures of habit in so many ways. And so the things that we do in repetition do become patterns of behavior for us, but they don't become patterns unless we Push into them and I ran track as a young girl a long time ago And you don't get faster by just stretching and sitting on the sidelines.

You get faster by Putting your track shoes on running Working out so that on the race day You have built up some stamina, you've built up the ability, you know where your body wants to slow down, you know how you have to pace yourself so you can push harder.  

The Apostle Paul uses illustrations of athletes in the New Testament as well and just that idea of coming back when the Lord reveals something to us, whether it's through a friend or through scripture to recognize that there's a could that we're working on. Lord, I can come to you. Not I should come to you, although that's not a bad should, but the one that carries guilt with it is not the one he wants us carrying. I can come to you anytime. Um, I, I could say something different to that individual that always trips me up in conversation, or I could could Nod and say, Hmm,  interesting.

I can give a non answer and not let something escalate, right? Um, I, I can, there are so many I can things. When our kids were little, I used to say, uh, you get to. I think it started at summer camp one year and I adopted it for my home. But the I get to's, I get to pick my toys up, I get to put my plate in the dishwasher after dinner.

It's not I have to, it's I get to.  We, we get a twisted sense of what has value in our very comfortable culture and in places around the world where dishwashers are not a thing, then wouldn't it be great for my kids to grow up saying, I get to put my dishes in a dishwasher because there will be seasons of life where they also get To wash. 

So let's know what it is. We're appreciating, right? Right.  Whatever that is. And that's a, that's a, a first world, uh, representation there for sure. But, um, the, I can, I get to puts it in a positive upward spiral as opposed to the, I should, which is a guilty downward spiral,.  

Terri

You know, when you were talking about the repetitive action, , replace,  replacing the lies with the truth, um, spending time with God,  we're miserable with the shoulds, but  sometimes it's just got to get so bad.

I know for me, , I just got so sick and tired. Of that soundtrack in my mind that I finally said,  What do I What do I need to do? And I think it comes down to how bad do you want it? I mean, you're talking about track. We think about cheerleaders. How bad do you want it? How? How much time are you willing to commit to the practice and the repeating the routines and the discipline it takes to do it?

Yeah. Get up early or whatever, , and then when you start feeding yourself the, I can get rid of shame. I cannot bite that apple that's telling me, , I'm ugly. I can beat this. I think,  we're calling the Holy Spirit. We're calling God  to come alongside because we're saying we're ready.

Carol

We're ready for  the next step and, and I think so much of it we cannot do on our own strength, which is part of the struggle, right? Coming to the realization that I can't do this in my own strength. I did want to add Terry in this conversation here when we're recognizing that these thought cycles recognize  who it is.

We've allowed to speak into our lives because sometimes we allow voices in that maybe aren't. The highest priority voice, whether that's an actual person or a source from a book or a newspaper, right, recognizing what are good sources to glean information from, and then filtering some of those that are not helpful or not saying healthy things, um, Recognizing that God's character is holy and unchanging, how much he loves us, how much he paid in sending his son, how much he sacrificed for us, relying on his strength instead of our weakness, remembering that he conquered the grave, right?

Um, recognizing that God put a call on my life. What does that mean to have a call on my life? For me, that's sharing the joy and the hope that is within me, which is my faith in Christ Jesus because he took away the sin that separated me from a relationship with almighty God. That, that price has been paid.

I just have to accept it. Free gift does me no good if it's still in a box on the shelf, right? We've got to open it up, receive it, welcome that into our lives. And that repeating. the repeating cycle, repeating scripture. Um, there are parts of our culture that want to reference a mantra. What's your mantra?

Well, for a believer, the mantra, the thing that you repeat is God's holy word back and forth into your mind. Write it down. I have all kinds of little cards, you know, um, we live in a sticky note world and I have a girlfriend who writes her verses each week and puts them on sticky notes on her dashboard in her car.

Now I live where the sun shines a lot. Those will peel off eventually, but what a great way to just be reminded. I mean, I'm looking right here in my desk. Look at all the colors that you can put up.  You can decorate your car.  You can decorate all the mirrors in your house.  

Terri

Oh, well, Carol, this  This has been an awesome conversation. Your wisdom and your insight are motivating and inspirational.  Friends, if you want to know more about Carol and connect with her, check the podcast episode description for all the links.  Carol is on Instagram and her website is carol file.com. That's That's Carolfeil.com, and that's where you can read her blog and subscribe to her Yellow Boots Insights.

Oh, and don't forget to share Carol's wisdom with a friend or family member. Anything else, Carol? I, I, I'm just so glad I got to have you here on the show. 

Carol

I know, Terri. It's such a joy to be together. You and I have met in, in the online community, both of us getting input for ourselves for things that we wanted to do and being in some training together.

And that's been a great thrill to get to see, um, that you are doing the thing that I remember you talking about. And so congratulations on the podcast. It's such a to be a guest of yours. And thank you for pointing out where people can find me. I'd love to connect. I love to be on Instagram and Facebook, and I do send out a twice a month newsletter that they're welcome to come and be part of. And, uh, just more of what we talked about here. 

Terri

Great. All right. Well, uh, thanks so much for listening and until next time.   📍