Ep. 187 Elizabeth Oldfield - Becoming More Fully Alive

We live in turbulent times. I know we have all felt the shaking in the past many years. Division, Death, Disconnection wreak havoc. There are ways that we cope that don’t bring life and joy only more sorrow and pain. But there are ways that make us more fully alive. There are practices that enable a life of flourishing and may just save our civilization. And that’s what Elizabeth Oldfield does in the conversation. She talks about the importance of relationships and connection in living a fully alive life. We walk through how early life experiences led her to question what a good life entails, and she came to see relationships as central. She talks about challenges like consumerism that discourage connection, and practices like community living that can help cultivate generosity and care for others. We share that listening across differences and protecting vulnerable groups are keys to building a more just and compassionate society. So join us as we discover ways that make us more fully alive.

ELIZABETH OLDFIELD hosts The Sacred podcast and is the former director and now senior fellow of the think tank Theos. She appears across the media, including BBC Radio and television, UnHerd, the Financial Times, and beyond. Oldfield is also a contributing editor at Comment magazine, chair of Larger Us, and a coach and consultant working with purpose-driven individuals and organizations. She lives in an intentional community in South London with her husband and children. Her book FULLY ALIVE: TENDING TO THE SOUL IN TURBULENT TIMES is out now.

Elizabeth's Book:
Fully Alive

Elizabeth's Recommendations:
Black Ops
The Origins of Totalitarianism

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Transcript

Elizabeth Oldfield: 0:00

Scientists called homophily. And I use the phrase people like me PLM, which is just deep down, almost all of us prefer people that are like us, that look like us. Sounds like us have the same interest as us. You know, we sort of wish we weren't those people, sometimes we can pretend we're not those people. We really are those people. When we start paying attention to these very granular tribal isms. If you notice who you feel warm towards, it is people who remind you of yourself, or someone you love, maybe people who you feel less warm towards, they will not be reminding you of yourself. It is as simple and embarrassing as that. And this was all over first century Palestine, Jesus sees these dynamics playing out and then he walks between these tribes. And he absolutely explodes these purity boundaries. And he, like mischievious, Li puckish Lee repeatedly up ends, the tribes that are all over. And realizing that I could do that, and it actually looked quite fun was a big breakthrough moment. For me, it's like, well, this will actually cause a little bit of good trouble. If I am seeing with people I'm not supposed to be seen with.

Joshua Johnson: 1:22

Hello, and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create, and the impact we can make. We longed to see the body of Christ look like Jesus. I'm your host, Joshua Johnson. Our show is powered by you, the listener, if you want to support the work that we do get early access to episodes, Episode guides and more. Go to patreon.com/shifting culture to become a monthly patron so that we can continue in this important work. And don't forget to hit the Follow button on your favorite podcast app to be notified when new episodes come out each week. And go leave a rating and review. It's easy, it only takes a second. And it helps us find new listeners to the show. Just go to the Show page on the app that you're using right now and hit five stars. Thank you so much. You know what else would help us out? share this podcast with your friends, your family, your network? Tell them how much you enjoy it and let them know that they should be listening, as well. If you're new here, welcome. If you want to dig deeper find us on social media at shifting culture podcast where I post video clips and quotes and interact with all of you. Previous guests on the show have included Michael ware, Caitlin shass and Skye Itani. You can go back listen to those episodes and more. But today's guest is Elizabeth Oldfield, Elizabeth Oldfield hosts the sacred podcast and is the former director and now Senior Fellow of the think tank, the Eos. She appears across the media including BBC radio and television on heard the Financial Times and beyond. Oldfield is also a contributing editor at comment magazine, Chair of larger us and a coach and consultant working with purpose driven individuals and organizations. She lives in an intentional community in South London with her husband and children. Her book fully alive tending to the soul in turbulent times is out now, did you know that we do live in turbulent times? I know that we have all felt the shaking in the past many years division, death, disconnection, wreak havoc. There are ways that we cope that don't bring life and joy but only more sorrow and pain. But there are ways that make us more fully alive. There are practices that enable a life of flourishing and may just save our civilization. And that's what Elizabeth Oldfield does. In this conversation. She talks about the importance of relationships and connection and living a fully alive life. We walk through how her early life experiences led her to question what a good life entails. And she came to see that relationships are central. She talks about challenges like consumerism, that discourage connection, and practices like community living that can help cultivate generosity and care for others. We share that listening across differences and protecting vulnerable groups are keys to building a more just and compassionate society. So join us as we discover ways that make us more fully alive. Here is my conversation with Elizabeth Oldfield. Elizabeth, welcome to shifting culture really excited to have you on thanks for

Elizabeth Oldfield: 4:30

joining me, and very happy to be here.

Joshua Johnson: 4:34

Well, that is good. I love your book fully alive. It's, it is fantastic. It helps us walk through these places to figure out what is the good life what is life supposed to be about? How do we walk in in places were where did this impetus for figuring out what it looks like to be fully alive? How did that come about in your own life? Where did that come from?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 5:00

Interesting, I think it crept up on me slowly. I have always been someone interested in ideas, and a very, very intense consumer of novels. And one of the things that I think that novels does is it projects you into other people's lives or other people's shoes, other people's hearts and heads. So should naturally give you an interest in what a good life looks like and what wisdom is, I think becoming a Christian and my teens really forced us those kinds of questions to the surface. And then a really bad accident in my early 20s, that didn't quite bring me up close to my own mortality. But for me, I place my own limitations on my own vulnerability, sent me to a bunch of funerals, a collection of those things, made this question more and more central to my life. To

Joshua Johnson: 5:50

be fully honest, that's a very interesting thing to happen. So early on in your life, a lot of times we get to, you know, you get to midlife, you're looking at the second half of life, and you're trying to figure out, let's look back, what does actually living life look like? What is wisdom for the rest of my life look like? And these are the the middle age questions. Why do you think it started to pop up early on in your life? Yeah,

Elizabeth Oldfield: 6:17

maybe I was just an old so never, never really heard many young person's body, I do think it was this and said, the weird, the weird confluence of things where I really shattered my leg in a skiing accident and had to move back in with my parents having just kind of like blasted into adult life. I've got my first job at the BBC and my first flight in London, it was it with this very kind of independent section of city life in my head, not actually touching the city life or whatever the kind of, you know, clean, young Christian version of that was. When I moved home, there just happened to be this spike in funerals, there were three people in our extended family that had passed away. And I might not actually have gone to their funerals, if I hadn't been fully dependent on my parents for care at that point was in a wheelchair, my leg was in a car, so I couldn't wait there at all, I was on a lot of drugs. So it just went to these funerals over the course of a few weeks. And there's something about funerals that are very terrifying, because the things that someone says at the end of their life is really, you know, it's a really hard thing to Unity. How do you how do you solve someone's life? How do you say, this is what this person meant in the world, this is what remains of them, this is what we will take with us in our memories into the future, I just became incredibly clear how all the things that I was focusing on in my early 20s, were pretty much irrelevant, you know, no one really cared if they were impressive in their career. Like, I'm sure if they were a Nobel Prize winner, had would have got mentioned, and if they, you know, if they one of them was a nurse, and there was this definite sense of like the care that they extended to their patients left a legacy. But otherwise, nothing about jobs, nothing about parents, nothing about how nice a house they lived in, nothing about impressiveness, coolness, success, all of these things that we sort of don't consciously think we build our lives around. But if we're not careful, we will because that's the narrative, the machine that we're in all the time, so stripped away. And it's just relationships, it's just, this is what this person meant to me, to us to whoever they meant enough to, to show up on the day to celebrate their life that that relational impact is what lasts, and it was just like, oh, okay, so that is what I need to make my life about. And I think you're right, I think it happened really early for me. And I'm really grateful for it.

Joshua Johnson: 8:40

Realizing that it is all about relationships, I think a lot of your lens now is about how do we connect one to another with humans with God in our community, and connect well, and I love even your, your talk about sin as you write about sin in the in the first chapter, but as about disconnection, where why is the lens of connection? And why is connection so important to us to live? Well. I

Elizabeth Oldfield: 9:12

just think has everything in case it's one of those things that I came to intuitively and then backfield with theory, which is often how I work and I have just sort of relax into that, you know, that moment in those funerals, the sense of how I wanted to be at work, the sense of what I could see actually brought us joy. I seem so clear to me that this kind of deep connection with our own soul and our relationships with other people. What it you know, Martin Buber talks about it's all that's really real, all living is meeting like we are only fully human. When we are in these relationships, on all our relationships, you know, horizontal and vertical and an inward I don't know what that axis is. Our our working are flowing our flourishing, right and If I could, I could just sense it and see it. And then as I came here to study theology and begin to think about what a Trinitarian anthropology is, and if I believed that we, as humans are made in the image of a God that is, before anything else happens, relationship, love, connectedness, and creating is an overflow of that. And that we are made an image, you know that it goes all the way down. And then you can you know, you can look at it in neuroscience, you can look at it in sociology, you can look at it in biology, there's, there's the interconnection and the inter interdependence of us, as humans and of all life just seems like the fundamental underlying logic of all things. But then I'm biased. That's how I see it.

Joshua Johnson: 10:46

But I think it's a such a fantastic view, to see the world to be involved in the world you're looking at. I mean, here in the United States, we're looking at a place where there's loneliness is on the rise, people don't have friends, we're disconnected, more than we've ever been in a world where they're supposed to be all this connectivity. Like I'm talking to you across the ocean, like right here. And I don't know how we do this. But we are, we're here and we're connecting one to another over this incredible internet. But we're still we feel disconnected, we feel lonely, we feel we don't have life. Like we're looking for it, we're yearning for it, how do we start to find real connection in this world? That is not just pretend.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 11:46

I mean, I think that's the work of a lifetime, I think is, I would say, the place that you start is you recognize the scale of the problem. And if you accept that relationships are everything, then you need to make choices accordingly. And you need to live accordingly and retire accordingly. And that is, goes very strongly against the cultural scripts and, and the kind of paths that we've had laid out for us, which is that, you know, individual self actualization, individual fulfillment, autonomy, and freedom, and choice are what a good life is, you know, there's something almost nothing moral about freeing yourself from constraints in order to follow your one true path and find your your one true vocation. And I think there's healthy and unhealthy versions of that, right. But the idea that there isn't, this sort of isn't, there's no such thing as individual flourishing. There's no such thing as individual. Joy, actually, I think I'm coming to believe or only in only in kind of small, small parts, I think, I think there are moments of joy that we're having as individuals where we're not with other people or because we are actually connecting with our own soul, and the the sort of the deep holy parts of ourselves. And we're connecting with the love of God, that even that is relational, right. And it requires therefore, acts of resistance, different habits, I work, one of the freelance jobs I do is I work with an organization called the relationships project in the UK, which is a sort of mainstream secular charity, trying to help people across the board see that the relation that prioritizing good relationships make everything better. So in the health service and education. And it's incredibly hard work because of what they call the frilly fallacy, which is because you can't measure relationships very easily. And when you try to they very easily get walked in instrumentalized you know, Facebook friends is not the same thing. Because we live in this very econometric logic, that that story that big story F as Michaels calls it, you know that the sort of the dominant story of the economy has seeped into all the other parts of our lives because we can't measure relationships, they there is a nice to have, you know, in an organization's like, Yeah, it's nice to have nice relationships, but really, we're here to do this, really, we're here to serve our patients, we're here to make money really, we're here to help people live longer. And the thing is, if you have good relationships, all those things get easier. But you have to there's a leap of faith required to prioritize them and in your own life, like I need to give up some of my free time and some of my comfort and some of my convenience to in covenant relationships with people. And there's very few places that encourage me to do it and help me and give me the scaffolding because it doesn't come naturally. I am naturally disconnected right? I am in my I am sinful I am wanting to draw back into myself and resist the thing that I know is good for me.

Joshua Johnson: 14:42

So as we walk through this, this lens of connectedness relationship is so important. The culture resists that edit tempts us away from connection relationship. You walk through the the deadly sense the seven deadly sins and And you're in your book, Why do you think that's a helpful framework for us to view, the disconnection that we have in the world.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 15:10

So honestly, just I did not expect to write a book about sin. That was not what I started trying to do. If you had a real commercial hat on, that is not what you would set out to do. I had this burning sense that there were treasures in my tradition, humane, psychologically astute, liberators ideas and practices that the world needs. And that in this moment, in particular, the world needs and loads of people who had no interest in Christianity, outside the church, had no idea that these things were in here. And that something useful I could do is to try and translate them, or try and correct this terrible gap between the stories that are told about my faith and culture, and my lived experience of it. As I started writing, and the things I wanted to write about, and these were about a tension, and they were about what might actually be life giving about the Christian sexual ethic, and about how do we create a stable sense of self, and what does it mean to, to commit to communities and again, again, we sort of know what we want, but what's stopping us what's what's, why don't we move towards the things that if we gave it any thought we would realize that we need it? And then I realized that, you know, someone, someone was asking me something in a different conversation was a thought sin was I was like, I think I think centers disconnection, actually, there's, you know, there's legal ways of thinking about it. But for me, the language that most hits home is this relational language. That is the way we disconnect from our own soul and the earth and other people and from God. And then I was like, I suppose this was stopping us. And if we don't take the problem seriously, if we don't start with, why don't we connect? Why don't we live in healthy relationships? Why don't we prioritize this thing that makes us fully alive? Then it's all just aspirational, hot air, and it's sounds nice, it's not actually going to help anyone. So I was like, Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go off to San, and I'm gonna see if I can translate that most prickly part of my tradition and help it make sense for those who might not expect it to. So

Joshua Johnson: 17:13

if you're looking through the the sin, what was the what was the one that crept up in your own life? You got? Ooh, that one's really hard for me. Yeah,

Elizabeth Oldfield: 17:24

yeah. Yeah, you see, and I'm really trying to write about them. Because the other thing about centers immediately makes people feel judged, right? Sounds very finger pointy. And so I'm trying very much to go. These are my struggles. These are my temptations to disconnection. And it it's avarice. I still actually struggle to read that chapter. Because the seriousness, which is the Christian tradition, the seriousness which it brings to this question of acquisitive nurse of hoarding, you know, bigger and bigger bonds, the root of all evil, it then the particular thing was always followed me through my life is at the end of the parable of the sower, where it says, and some seed got choked by the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of wealth. You know, and I like all of us, I'm part of systems and structures, which are continually encouraging me to be a good little consumer, to adapt to my level of comfort, and then start wanting the next level of comfort. To really deep down think that I do actually really need very high quality sheets.

Joshua Johnson: 18:38

You know, they feel, though,

Elizabeth Oldfield: 18:41

is it a need this, the expansionist tendencies of my concept of need, which I think have always been there, right, the Bible would not have to be speaking to the first century audience so starkly about it. If it wasn't an ancient and eternal problem of the human heart, and the way we live now, we see that extraordinary catastrophic consequences of it for the poor and for the planet. And I'm completely complicit in it, and reading and writing that chapter. And getting to the end and going God have mercy. I have just ignored. I haven't mainly ignored this very, very central theme of the tradition that I claim to be a part of. The hypocrisy is really, really uncomfortable. It

Joshua Johnson: 19:27

is so difficult to move away from that. I mean, this is probably why Jesus talks about money, almost more than anything else, right? He talks about the love of money, the word of evil, it is the you can't love money, and God, same time. What does it look like? This is the culture that we swim in. I could we swim in a consumeristic culture, it is so difficult when you have been raised in something and the whole framework of society really works around it, to butt up against it and say, Oh, this isn't the way that we should be living. This isn't right. It's going to take a lot. What are what some practices for you to confront that within you then to, and to move towards the poor and the marginalized, and reckon with your stuff.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 20:21

Honestly, I felt like a real beginner. We moved into a, I mean, I want to call it an intentional community as a very small commune, and micro monastery with another family three years ago, partly out of this partly of climate anxiety, partly out of how do I create a formation for myself, that gives me any hope at all, of taking seriously this different set of values and this different kingdom, actually living the things I aspire to have defined my life when someone speaks on my funeral, she owns some really great clothes and 74 serums is not what I want them to say, you know, I want them, I want something more for myself. But if I'm not careful, that is what they will say. So I have we moved into community and that ethic, which is defined by quite a lot of sharing is helpful, because it's slightly loosens my grip on my sense of life, but it's my home, it's my kitchen, it's my food, it's my money, you know, we are sharing beyond our nucular family, we are trying to have a posture of hospitality in which people are welcome. And they are fed, and they are sent away with something to bless them. And that there is a sense in which if we could all be moving towards this, we wouldn't only to own the things ourselves. We could have one, you know, lawnmower one, Hoover one, whatever it is set of tools, that we could radically reduce the things we actually need to own for ourselves. If we trusted, that sharing would happen, that we could trust each other that there would be given take that no one would be hoarding for themselves. So community is one of the ways attempting to grow in generosity by just like pushing our boundaries with it, like how much can we actually comfortably or uncomfortably giveaway, both monetarily and just in terms of stuff. Not very much to begin with. But more than when we weren't paying attention to it, you know, slowly trying to like strip off that, that bit of me that thinks safety is in possessions and in my bank account. And then practices of gratitude. You know, these are things that sound simple, they're like stupidly simple. They're not original. They're simple and indescribably difficult to actually live every day, rather than just weighing on about, and I am just beginning to take them seriously. It's really difficult.

Joshua Johnson: 22:43

I mean, when I, my wife and I moved into the Middle East, and you know, I wanted to vacuum my floor. I was like, I'm gonna go buy a vacuum. And my wife is like, no, ask our neighbors. And it's really hard for me to be dependent on others in community and saying, I need something that you have that I don't have. And we can actually reciprocate this relationship and share with each other. And it's really it was, I still find it very difficult to ask for help, or to give help. One of the things that helps me in in all of this connection is seeing things through the lens of my son. He's six years old, but he's asking the same questions is like, why aren't you giving money to the homeless person? That's on the street like, what what are we doing? Why can't you give them money? What like he's, he's talking about other people connection, generosity, empathy for for others, he's talking about our possessions. Like, he started this practice. He's like, Hey, I don't need this. I'm gonna go give it to my friend. Like he's starting to give his possessions away just freely. How does it How has your the view of your life and what it means to be fully alive through the lens of your own children, and helped shape what you think about these things?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 24:07

Yeah, I don't make sure ordinary, like the sufferer, the little children's come unto me, like, become like a little child. We had a really hard, ongoing situation in our church where there are a lot of people who became Christians in Iran, and then were threatened with prisoner execution and fled. made their way to the UK incredibly dangerous journeys are in a hostel and have join our church. And it means that we're beginning to sing in Farsi and there's a farsi Bible study starting. They are beautiful, and we love them. And the UK Government wants to put them on a plane to Rwanda. And on a barge, essentially a prison ship in the temps, and the coach to deport them showed up. You know, I think you guys have been dealing with ice and similar ly brutal attitudes to to illegal immigrants, for longer than we have, it's quite a new thing for the government to be taking, I would say this level of brutality towards people who have already suffered so much. And protesters blocked the bus and some people from church went down and help block the bus that was getting to the thing. And it meant that my kids school said, they disrupted an announcement about walking, if Pete if kids walking home on their own, there's a protest happening. So like, maybe avoid this error because the police came in and arrested a bunch of the protesters. So my kids were saying, you know, what, why couldn't we walk home and I was explaining that some of their people, friends, they know from church, what the government was trying to take them away. And my son went, well, then he can come stay with us. And that was like, Yeah, and we, you know, in our community, we've been having this conversation all day on our WhatsApp group. We have lots of visitors. We don't have space for longtime visitors at the moment, and we don't have separable space from the kids. And we're working towards that. We want to build it one to adapt the house. So there is a portion that can be given to refugees and people in crisis, but it's not there yet. And safeguarding things, and there's all these like, complex adult, what is our actual capacity of care? What can we do financially, and the simplicity of a child being like, why why are they not staying with us mum was so ambitious, particularly for my son who's an introvert and always complains that there's too many people in the community house. And it was almost partly with him in mind that I had not really taken that suggestion seriously, because I'm trying to protect him from his space feeling constantly overloaded. And when he asked that question, I was like, Lord, give us wisdom. What does this mean? So yeah, they often have this logic much better than we do.

Joshua Johnson: 26:42

Yeah. Yeah, they do. It's, it is pretty amazing that they have that. There's another thing, you know, writing about I think, is really, I think it's important for our culture to reckon with is all of these are important, but the sexual ethic of our culture, and how things leads are leading down disconnection, when, right now, you know, hey, everybody is free. This the porn ification of sex like we have, everything is out in the open, like you look, I mean, you could find all sorts of images. But one thing that's happening is that we see even SATs that people engaging in sexual activity is going down, that we have a disconnection even in people wanting to engage in sexual activity one to another. How do we start to rearrange our connectivity in a healthy way in a way that brings about life and sin and literally brings about life, but brings about life in our sexual relationships? And what does that look like for for us today?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 28:01

Joshua, I would not deign to have a solution for that problem. I think, in this area, in particular, we need to take such care how we speak, because I mean, money is a triggering, and our subject, you know, the chances that some of your listeners will have felt quite annoyed with us and judged or judgy because we even though admitting our own hypocrisy raised it, all of these things are very, very defended, very tender, very easy to be triggered into shame. And very easy to be triggered into judging other people. And that's one of my like, the Bible is a complicated book. It's really hard to you know, there's there's lots of enigmatic things in it. But when Jesus says, Judge not lest you be judged, I thought it was pretty clear. So, prefacing all of that, the way I tried to approach it, and I was really bounced into this once I had the seven deadly sins. I was like, Okay, I'm gonna have to write about lust, is to is to is to say that the public narratives about the Christian sexual ethic are bad, you know, and for some good reasons, but it has been used to shame people it has been used to judge people it has been, many people have experienced its communication is really harmful in their lives. And I just think, the more realistic we are about that, and the more careful and respectful of that being some people's experiences and stories, the better. And in writing it, I came to have this sense of I don't think it's, I don't think it's what it has been communicated to us. I don't think it's what we think it is. I think that there is a very feminist threat to this idea that sex is powerful intimacy, building vulnerable activity, and that as with power and with money, we have to take it seriously. We have to wield it responsibly. Because then the thing I landed on is the sort of two key threads in the Christian sexual ethic that I think helped inhumane and liberators are never treat another human being as an object that just feels like absolutely category. I mean, it's Kant's categorical imperative, but it feels like absolutely foundational and the opposite of what we're told to do. Not just important, and not just in casual sex, sometimes in married sex, right, like, someone else is the vehicle for my own satisfaction, my own titillation, my own pleasure. And we need to be very wary of that incident, which is in all of us, and see it as soul danger. Because if every human being is a precious icon of the Divine, there is something deeply wrong, deeply desecrating about that move. And I know that sounds judgy. And I have done it. And I just think, the caution around that is something we really need to hear in the same way we need to hear, be careful about money, it will become your master. And the second thing is about power in the vulnerable, that, you know, I was trying to think what do what do I think is the heart of a lot of this. And in the same way that the Hebrew Bible seems to me to be obsessed with the protection of the vulnerable with this quartet of the vulnerable think it's Bergman talks about, you know, the alien, the stranger, the widow and the orphan. They're the four of them are together again, and again and again, across these texts. And when God is angry, he is often angry, because people have not protected those vulnerable groups, as sex is the most vulnerable making act that we know. And especially for women, frankly, and so, taking care, requiring commitment requiring faithfulness of men, which was new in ancient world of men to seems to me to be right at the heart of thing, and it eventually felt to me like a very powerful sort of quasi political stance against extractive forms of sexual activity that are oppressive, and do not protect the vulnerable. And I wanted to find a way to offer that as a lens. For people that might think it's all just about gay bashing and controlling female sexuality. This

Joshua Johnson: 32:04

is beautiful to think of, you know, let's not object, other people and objectify things, protect the vulnerable. I mean, it's very much this is what this is what Jesus was, was all about, saying, Hey, I see you is looking at the woman at the well. You've been involved with, you know, five different marriages, this this guy is not your your husband, but I see you I see your pain, I see your shame, I see all of the the difficulties in your life. And then she started to come alive. And I love that examples that she started to say to her own community that shamed her, that put her to the side saying, Look, come see this Jesus who knows all about me, but he doesn't shame her in that same way that the community does, even though they know about her as well. How do we start to to walk through that, that area to walk with people not shame?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 33:11

I think I've been thinking about that. That passage recently. And it sort of came to mind came to my attention that we read that passage, often in this very 21st century way, as if she chose. This woman had agency and she bounced around from men to men, and now she was living with her boyfriend. That was not a thing. In the first century, Middle East, this woman had almost definitely had no agency whatsoever. In this situation. She had either been passed around a bunch of brothers as they died. But she was she was a concubine. She was acting as a sex slave. Right? This is a victim. This is an oppressed woman. And this is what I mean about the protection of vulnerable. She has been both oppressed and victimized and ostracized. And Jesus says, predatory sexual power has messed up your life come and drink and I will give you water that you will never feel thirsty, right? I will take you scum on the bottom of the shoe of most of the men in your community. I will treat you in an entirely different way. And it was really difficult chapter to write because I realized that it was really quite pointedly mainly about male sexuality. I do think it's, there are like, you know that there are ways that women can disconnect and be tempted to disconnection in their sex lives. But frankly, the endemic harm in this area of our lives, because of this sort of bodily vulnerability of women and the bodily vulnerability of the Act, and the our ability to get pregnant means that we are not like damsel in distress and always vulnerable and without agency but the there's a power imbalance in heterosexual male female sex and Not to take that seriously and how we think about this seems to me to be very diluted. And I also had this like, I want almost all theological or Christian writing about sex, writes about it from the male perspective. And I want to, I want to center the woman with the center, one free female desire and female experience without worrying that it will be titillating or difficult or, you know, lead men into sin because there's no space for it. In most places. Sorry. That's my rant.

Joshua Johnson: 35:33

I love that rant. A good job keep got I think that the wrath chapter is really important in our culture, like what you know, you're we're moving towards wrath, we're moving towards not seeing each other across differences. That polarization. Talk is is all over because we are moving to polarize opposites. You know, you're trying to do some some great work on your podcast, the sacred as you're talking to people across differences and seeing them as, as humans and listening. Well, what have you started to learn as you started to engage across differences and listen to people's stories, and to walk with people and in places where you don't agree, and you don't think that it may make you a little bit angry on the inside? But you sit there with people's stories? How has that changed your relationship with other people? Yeah,

Elizabeth Oldfield: 36:32

hugely, my life is radically more interesting. This, you know, this, I came to this work through such a strange mixture of things. I started again, with a sort of intuition about things that were going wrong. And then I was learning about child development and fight or flight and what happens in our body when we're in fight or flight and how to parent a toddler. And it was like, oh, there's things that happen in a toddler's body when they're defiant. And, you know, just shut down and they just cut they can't access rationality, that I'm now seeing patterns in adults, right? I'm particularly when we connect with each other. And then when I've realized that the Christian on fire tradition is, in all this, you know, that it's all there is this extraordinary heritage. And the the understanding, I think there's two key things that I came to understand that really changed how I interact in the world and how I understand these dynamics. And one is this thing that scientists called homophily. And I use the phrase people like me, PLM, which is just deep down, almost all of us prefer people that are like us, that look like us, sounds like us have the same interest as us. You know, we sort of wish we weren't those people, sometimes we can't pretend we're not those people. We really are those people, when we start paying attention to these very granular tribal isms. If you notice who you feel warm towards, it is people who remind you of yourself, or someone you love, maybe people who you feel less warm towards, they will not be reminding you of yourself. It is as simple and embarrassing as that. And this was all over first century Palestine, Jesus sees these dynamics playing out and then he walks between these tribes. And he absolutely explodes these purity boundaries. And he, like mischievious, Li puckish li repeatedly up ends, the tribes that are all over. And realizing that I could do that. And it actually looked quite fun was a big breakthrough moment. For me. It's like, well, this will actually cause a little bit of good trouble if I am seeing with people I'm not supposed to be seen with. And the second thing is that when we're in fight or flight, which almost always kicks in when we are outside our tribe, and we're with someone who is not like me, that that just is like a it's a body thing. So body reaction is a set of hormones that make it difficult to empathize or be curious, make everyone look like the enemy and make us withdraw. You know that if sin is disconnection, that moment, the temptation is always there to pull back from ourselves to get snippy. To get aggressive to get contemptuous or just to like withdraw, go passive shut down, create our parallel cultures. Avoid ever being in contact with people not like us. And Jesus says, when someone hits you in the face, turn the other cheek. And I came to see that you can very easily translate that as when you are in a situation of threat. Resist your fight or flight. Do not hit them back, or run away which are the two natural responses when someone hits you in the face or you are out of your tribe and feel threatened. Stay curious, stay open, hold the gaze. Keep asking questions and the person as your fight or flight wears off. The person transforms magically from an enemy who you want to roll your eyes at. To a fragile, complicated, yes, foolish, yes, beautiful person made an image of God and this is really enjoyable. thing to experience? Yeah,

Joshua Johnson: 40:03

it is. It is pretty amazing to be able to listen across differences. And to find that common humanity amongst each other. It's a difficult thing to engage in to start because it's a fear inducing thing to, to engage people that are not like me, right? Yeah. And so how, how have you said, Screw it, I'm going to do it anyways, I'm getting over my fear of, of uncomfortable setting, that I'm just going to engage in something that scares me.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 40:43

I mean, I think it felt urgent, I felt like, actually, this is one of the ways this sounds grandiose. But honestly, some days I'm like, This is how we save civilization. This is really important, important soul work. So even though it's uncomfortable, I am somehow shirking my responsibility, both as a human being and as someone who apparently is trying to follow this figure in the New Testament who was doing these things. And also, because I could feel how people like me syndrome, that preference for people like me, closes your world down as really, really unpleasant, being like low level irritated, slash full blown rageful. with other people, I was just like consuming the news, and the world was becoming more and more full of terrible idiots. Like, that is no place to feel fully alive or to no joy. So it was part, this is a responsibility and a calling. And part. This feels like even though initially it be quite uncomfortable, I'm gonna get to a place that is more spacious and interesting. And it is, it really is, like, if we, if we believe this, if we believe that all human beings are made in the image of God, and we are made an image of a Trinitarian God, which is what I believe, then it is possible to create a point of contact, frankly, with anybody, they might not be up for it. But if we're up for it, they're much more likely to be because we are, you know, we are social creatures, we mirror each other people pick up on each other's cues, even walking down the street, you know, so it makes a grumpy noise. As you go past you can feel it, you're like, oh, what's wrong with you? Someone smiles, like Oh, hi, you know, tiny Social Triggers, have these ripple effect. And we are inviting people into a moment of encounter in our posture. And right now, it just, it really is fun. I mean, I have quite a high risk tolerance, and quite a high social awkwardness tolerance. And I am probably more of a weirdo about this. But to see situations transformed from tense to actually really tender. It just is quite addictive.

Joshua Johnson: 42:58

But I'm glad you're leading the way on it. And you're helping us realize that it is addictive, we can we can get into it. And we can do it and we could get in the ring. We need to get the muscle you just got to practice, you got to practice all of these things you have to practice. So thinking about practice? And what is like, how do we organize around these different practices that we're moving towards to become fully alive? To live this life? How do we organize around it? I mean, there's a lot of people you in your book, I mean, you call a Rule of Life, to say these are the practices that I'm going to be doing? What does it look like for you? How can we start to engage in these practices? To pay attention to them?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 43:44

Why do you think it? It really, it really needs to start with those deep values and their sense of right, what is the kind of person I want to be becoming? What do I want people to say about me at my funeral, I've what is going to give me the best chance of growing in that direction. Given this underlying theme of the book, which I didn't really expel out, I didn't really realize until I'd written it. What is formation is this sense of the way we use our attention and our time. Basically, our habits are who we are becoming as they once we've sort of set up Okay, where is it that I want to be going? And for me, it's obviously very informed by the New Testament sense of the fruits of the Spirit. But people will maybe have different things they're trying to move towards. How do I pay attention to my formation in the now. And so the rule of life was really helpful for me, and it's this monastic concept, which is basically, you structure your time according to your values, not according to the demands of the economy. So we have time for prayer, and it's different types of prayer and we have time for hospitality and it is it's a given there's no there's no like, obviously someone's ill, but we don't have to decide every week. Are we going to open our home and feed some people? It's Monday night. There are people coming in We have an Iron Man, we feed some people like that's what we do. And on Wednesday night, we have time as as as as housemates in our little community. And once a month, we have time for fun, because fun is a really strong value of ours. So I think, starting with your values, and then looking at your time and going, how do I avoid? How do I basically, I always think of Mark Zuckerberg being like, he's gonna wear the same outfit every day, so that he doesn't have to make a decision about his clothes. I'm like, I don't, my future self needs as much help as I can give her she's going to be tired and grumpy and distracted just like I am. So I don't want to reduce her decisions. So they don't have to keep deciding to do the things that are going to form me in the direction that I want to go. It is just a given that I am going to do the things and collective. The collective helps massively with that. So that is why we live in community. But if you can find other people that you can create some committed rituals and rhythms with where you You are brave enough to be the intense one and go, can we actually take this seriously? Like, could we not just not come if we don't feel like it or slake at the drop of a hat? Could we invest in whatever it is this friendship, this practice or, you know, helping out with the Foodbank together or whatever is the thing that you think is going to help you grow into the kind of person you want to be. You have to fight for it. The world will not help you protect the time you have to. I have had to lock myself in with as much scaffolding as I can usually manage because I am a distractible Enneagram seven and I do not like structure. But I am like, now I know I need. So

Joshua Johnson: 46:30

reflect on the structure of your life, the scaffolding that you have that you go, I need it. But as a seven I, a, it's really hard for me, where have you found joy in the scaffolding in the structure, whereas Joy crept up and go, Oh, this is why I'm doing this.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 46:49

So I have come to the conclusion that most of the things that are good for us, do bring us joy. But some part of us doesn't know that. And so there are so many times. I mean, every Monday morning when I have to set my alarm to

wake up at 6: 47:03

30am to go to the chapel and pray. Literally every time your alarm goes off, I go. Like, why am I doing this? I ate lebryk encode a day. And he's like, it's like this benign peer pressure. It gets me out of bed because otherwise someone will see be like yeah, Kalish didn't make it to prayer. And then I get there and it sets up my day better. And I don't want to I'm knackered I don't want to do house night, I want to get into bed with a Netflix rom com, and a large bottle of white wine, and not talk to anybody. But actually, the difference between how I feel after a night in bed with a large bottle of white wine and a rom com, versus like a night of actual interaction with people that know and love me, is really different. And so the joy comes in the disciplines. And you know, people used to say that to me, what is the Richard foster business discipline of selling the, you know, the joy of discipline, whatever that operation disciplines, that's a celebration of discipline, I mean, like, just none of it. None of it comes naturally to me. But I now have enough evidence on which to base the fact that my, you know, all different Western traditions have languages, but my flesh wants me to take the path of least resistance of numbing, distracting, pushing down my feelings, consuming instrumentalizing as far as possible, sometimes it's fine. You know, it's not like I beat myself up about those things. But actually, the deeper harder choices are almost always the ones that are like, lead to a sense of aliveness lead to a sense, sense of spaciousness, lead to a sense of intimacy leads to a sense of connection. So yeah, just giving myself everything I possibly can to make those choices easier, has really helped.

Joshua Johnson: 48:51

That's good, was with a big, you could talk to your readers and say, What's one thing that you hope that they would get from your book?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 49:00

Great question. Honestly, it's permission to be honest. I tried so hard, not to be s. And not to try and make myself look better than I am. And not to pretend that actually sometimes I'm really scared about the state of the world. And that being a person is often very painful. And we can only find ways through it, I think when we're honest about those things, and are so grateful to know the love of God and to feel part of the Christian tradition. But one of the challenges of that space is there's not always full permission to be honest, I think, and people are very concerned about getting things wrong, or saying the wrong thing, or yeah, there's just that it feels like there's often quite a lot of reticence to speak about these things in an unvarnished way. And I sort of want to create a bit more space for that.

Joshua Johnson: 50:07

Yeah. And I think we could get there. You know, when I first picked your your book up and started read the introduction, I didn't you start a story of of weeping in the car after he your daughter is singing a song from Matilda. The musical. And so as soon as I read that, I closed her book, I turned the song on, I started, I started weeping as well. And like, I was like, Okay, Lord, I want a better world for my son, I want a better world. For the next generation, I want to give them a place where we can move towards connection, we can move towards a world where we, we see each other, we know each other, we love each other, we actually care for one another, we care for the earth and the planet, as we're going to give them a better world than we have now. And I don't know if it's possible, how can it be possible. And your book helps give language to what is possible, what is possible for the next generation to bring about a new world and a better world, to walk people into a place of relationship and connection and care and love. And to resist the temptation and the sin, which is disconnection, objectification hoarding our stuff as being wrathful and angry and saying, My way is better than your way. And now we could see that there is a possibility to move forward, I just want to say thank you for for this work, that it would be able to touch me and I just, I pray that it touches many more people, so that we can move towards that place of connection and love, that will save the world that you did say earlier that this can save civilization, of moving across differences. And I think we can and we can move towards that. And I am starting to feel like there's an inflection point coming, where the world is shifting and changing that we have already had that are shaking and unveiling. And now we're moving we're gonna move into a different direction, because everything has just opened up. And we're seeing reality for what it is for the first time and, and many, many years. And we're waking up. And so thank you for your work in this and what you've done in your book. Time

Elizabeth Oldfield: 52:36

key, Joshua. That is, that means a lot. I really worried for myself, I needed to, I needed to find a way to study myself, I needed to find a way to actually take seriously this medicine that I think is there for us if we choose to take it. And if it's helpful, that brings me a lot of joy.

Joshua Johnson: 52:55

Yeah. I've a couple of questions I like to ask at the end one, if you go back to your 21 year old self, what advice would you give?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 53:03

So honestly, because I just had that experience with all the funerals at that age, I don't think she needed it. If I went back to my 18 year old self, it would just be brave, brave. Be brave. The sort of Liberator II journey I've just been prepared to be weirder and weirder, as I'm like, no one to really lead. That particular bit to kick it.

Joshua Johnson: 53:30

Be brave, do it walk forward. Anything you've been reading or watching lately, you can recommend.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 53:37

Don't know if you can get it. But there is a BBC comedy called Black Ops is absolutely hilarious. And I just feel like sometimes we just need a really good comedy. I have been reading I've got I'm giving a lecture tonight about power and transparency and leadership. And I've been reading Hannah Arendt on power and violence. And she's pretty dense, you know, she's right at the edge of my academic political philosopher tolerance. But from what I have understood of her, she's really transformed my understanding of what power is. And its opposite to violence, and it is about relationships. And that's really been helping me.

Joshua Johnson: 54:20

That's really good. How can people go out and get your book fully alive? And then where would you like to point people to you? How would they connect with you?

Elizabeth Oldfield: 54:28

Thank you. Yes, so it's being published by Brazos. It's available on that website, or I would highly recommend transport your local bookshop if you possibly can, and avoiding the giants that gobble up all of the market. And I would love to point you to the podcast which is called the sacred or my substract which is called more slowly alive.

Joshua Johnson: 54:52

Well, it's all beautiful work and beautiful things I would highly recommend. You go out and you would read the book folio Live, I love it. And I think I will be handing out copies to people because they need it. And they need to walk through it. I love your podcast, the sacred. It is. It's a joy, to listen to you and the people that you have on to be able to hear people's stories and walk with people. I love how you you summarize your seasons as well and saying, Hey, what are the things that we've we've learned, and how we can walk this out. Together. It's been a beautiful thing for me to, to engage in your podcasts and your substack is fantastic as well. So go out. And yeah, just follow Elizabeth Lee. She's amazing. And so thank you, Elizabeth, for this conversation. I really enjoyed it. And I hopefully people get a lot out of it. And they walk forward with connection and growth one to another to each other to God, to creation and to ourselves. So thank you, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Oldfield: 56:06

Thank you for having me. It's been a joy