Restoring the Soul with Michael John Cusick
Helping people become whole by cultivating deeper connection with God, self, and others. Visit www.restoringthesoul.com.
Restoring the Soul with Michael John Cusick
Episode 266 - Brian Boecker, "Navigating the River of Integration: Overcoming Stuckness and Embracing Vulnerability"
"I think there's ways in which I've defined life on the banks. To get into the river would be, in a sense, losing my life. But there's actually something that awakens in me, and I begin to see I was actually made to be in the river." - Brian Boecker
Ever feel stuck in life and not sure how to move forward? Our colleague at Restoring the Soul, Brian Boecker, joined us to help you unravel this feeling and guide you towards the River of Integration, a powerful concept by Dan Siegel that embodies the flow of energy and defines mental health and well-being. Discover how understanding your family system and navigating the banks of rigidity and chaos can lead to harmony and expansive well-being.
Together with Brian, we let go of control and find solace in the parable of the Prodigal Son, viewing the river's banks as coping strategies and embracing vulnerability. We also emphasize the importance of community and leaning on others in times of struggle, breaking free from cultural biases of individualism. Don't miss out on this insightful episode that will inspire you to examine your life and move towards greater well-being. Join us on this journey toward healing and integration!
HELPFUL RESOURCES:
Episode 215 - Brian Boecker, "The Awakening: A Move Toward Wholeness"
Episode 223 - Brian Boecker, "False Self vs. True Self"
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I think there's ways in which I've defined life as on the banks. To get into the river would be, in a sense, losing my life, but there's actually something that awakens in me and I began to see I was actually made to be in the river.
Michael John Cusick:Hey everybody, welcome to the Restoring the Soul podcast. It's another episode, and today I am talking with my colleague at Restoring the Soul, brian Becker. Hey Brian, hey Michael. So, as we were talking about some of the content that I want you to share today, the topic was really how do we as counselors, but also how do people, identify exactly what's behind their stuckness? Most people that go to counseling are stuck somewhere. They're not where they want to be or they're in a place they don't want to be, and we help people get unstuck. So I want you to introduce this topic. We'll unpack it a little bit, but why don't you just jump in with what's on your heart?
Brian Boecker:Yeah, i think I've been really blessed. I think Kurt Thompson probably loved his work and the things he's brought to the conversation and then that introduced me to his friend, dan Siegel, and I just love Dan's work and kind of how it's just brought a whole different flavor and taste to therapy as well as to mental health issues. And he has this concept and he calls it the River of Integration and he talks about it and it's really helpful just in identifying maybe some stepplaces both within me but also in relationships but also in kind of family even systems and what's going on there. So he refers to this River of Integration. He says all mental health is kind of like the flow of this river and I think he talks about it being an embodied and relational flow of energy that really defines kind of our mental health and well-being. And that river is kind of bounded by two banks. That bank on one side is the bank of rigidity, the second is the bank of chaos And he describes that river as flowing and it's what when it flows, it's like what creates harmony and this concept of even flow that we've heard from different authors, but it's that sense of, i think it's an expansive, it's a well-being. He uses these five words to describe that river. He says it's the cross stick faces right. It's flexible, adaptable, coherent, energized and stable. And so when you're in that flow, that's where you're kind of like optimizing your self-organization and your relationship, both self-organization with yourself, but also with others in relationship, he would say. When that river is blocked or if there's anything that disrupts that harmony, it usually sends you to the one and two directions either towards a sense of rigidity or a sense of chaos.
Brian Boecker:Again, dan's a brilliant man. These things, actually those ideas or words even come out of a deep study of math, which it's like I know how to use math. I don't understand it when people start talking on that level of it, but it's really helpful to me to see that right. These ideas of rigidity, of I need order in control, i need predictability, on the other side of chaos is life is just pure random. It's kind of every man for himself kind of feel to it. I think that's been helpful for me to see like I think, in my family system growing up, my parents probably were more on the rigid side of things.
Brian Boecker:My dad was a scientist brilliant. He was always a measure twice, cut once and sometimes wasn't quite sure if he wanted to cut, he might throw in another measure just to be sure. I was probably on the other side. Probably I brought more chaos to our family system. They weren't always quite sure what to do with me, but I think what that left me with is I'm chaotic.
Brian Boecker:The solution to my life is probably over on the other side of the bank, which is rigidity. There was always this sense of like I'm kind of chaotic. I got to get more rigid or structured to actually solve my problem. I think that always left me in some ways like I can never measure up to my dad's perfection. I can never measure up to his precision, his ability to do things. I think one of the greatest gifts my dad gave me in his later years was he began to name some of the fears that drove his perfection.
Brian Boecker:That just goes.
Brian Boecker:Oh, i can relate to that.
Brian Boecker:That feels like, oh, we're actually feeling and experiencing some of the same things, the way we've gone about handling and it's been very different.
Brian Boecker:That felt like a connectivity that moved us both in some ways towards the river kind of of integration in that way.
Brian Boecker:And so I think the other pieces, i think those polarizations, have felt really true in my life, especially in my Christian journey, right, i think rigidity or structure getting it right, you know, real emphasis on truth and kind of the structure, has been really strong and that's always the solution to any chaos or struggle that you're facing, right.
Brian Boecker:And it's been really true that it's felt like, oh, i can actually move towards this river, where Segal uses this idea that we penjulate between the two banks, that we need elements of both banks to have this structure in our life, but also the surprise of the randomness or the unexpected, and both those pieces are needed to bring kind of the joy and the energy that we kind of are looking for in our life in that way. And so I think it's been really helpful for me to see that personally in my own kind of inside of me, different parts of me that that's related to, i think it's been really helpful to see that in my family of origin I think it's helpful to think of that in relationship with other people that we might get stuck in one of these banks and how we both actually move into more the river together with it.
Michael John Cusick:Wow, that was an amazing summary. The first time that I heard about the river of integration and the rigidity and the chaos was from you. I had read Segal's material and just really skimmed over that. I've heard podcasts Actually, one of them was with Kurt and Dan together But when you unpacked it for me the first time I just thought this is really important And the thing I love about it is just like interpersonal neurobiology itself, which Kurt and Dan both live and move and write about.
Michael John Cusick:It's a kind of meta theory where it's a big way of understanding our sense of self in relation to where we're stuck. But it also is extremely practical and you can bring it down to the specific level. It's almost like all forms of disorder, psychopathology and struggle, from addiction to anxiety, depression, impulsiveness that they can fit into. Or it's a back and forth between the rigidity, which is about control and having power, not being vulnerable, and on the other side, the chaos, which is all about vulnerability. There is no structure, there are no boundaries And I'm really helpless to engage with and control my own life. So great words and description to the stuckness and the points of pain.
Michael John Cusick:Talk a little bit more about the river, because one of the reasons why this was compelling to me is the river is, of course, a Judeo-Christian image. You've got Jesus in John, chapter seven, at a Jewish religious festival where he stands up and he says streams of living water will flow from within us, and the contingency there is that we have to acknowledge that we're thirsty, to acknowledge that there's something more that we want and in some ways, to acknowledge that we're caught up in the rigidity or the chaos and that we want to be in the river. The other one, of course, is in all throughout the Old Testament, but in Psalm 46, where it says be still and know that I'm God. That whole Psalm is a psalm and a picture of chaos happening, where the psalmist talks about the rivers melting into the sea and the earth quaking, and then this invitation is to be still and know that I'm God, but it's after. The psalmist says that there is a river who makes glad the city of God And its references, jerusalem.
Michael John Cusick:And Jerusalem, geographically speaking, has no river. So this river is an internal river, it's the river of the life of God, and the invitation is in the midst of the chaos be still. It's like saying, with rigidity or chaos, jump in the river and just flow. That's kind of the image that I get. So how do we, you and I, because you know we always try to preach to ourselves first before we preach to others But how do we help people get into the river, into this place where there's the faces, the flexibility, adaptable, the coherence, the stability and the energy?
Brian Boecker:Yeah, i think that's a that's a great question. I remember a number of years ago, right for me, this song by I'm Steven Curtis Chapman, i think it's called dive right, and he's talking about diving into the river, you know, and it's just like okay, to where it wants to go, right, like it's the sense of, and I think that that spoke to me. There's something about my movement, again as an enneagram. Nine is like I have to step up and in right, i have to kind of dive into the river, take that risk that I'm not in control And I don't know where this is necessarily gonna go. And I think sometimes that that's The pull for me, right is, i'm not sure where this is gonna go.
Brian Boecker:It feels a little bit chaotic And I'm not in control of it, and so I think there's a sense, especially with rigidity, and I would say this is true for our false cells. Our false cells clamor for control, uncertainty, and I think the river invites us to. Yeah, you need to let go of that And be willing to kind of jump in or dive into that. Again, i feel like I jump banks. If I'm over on the cast side, i see rigidity as a solution. Right, if I'm in a really rigid place. Then it's like, well, just let go and just do whatever you know, and it's like both of those have elements of what's true. But again there's this pendulum back and forth that I'm receiving the coherence or the structure that I need, but I'm also going back and forth between those two, two kind of elements, in that I think, to go to your illustration, right I it really hit me as I was kind of unpacking this right, the prodigal son story really contains all these elements, right, younger son being the chaotic part, the older brother Being the rigid part, the father being really the place of integration and wanting to draw both of them Into the party.
Brian Boecker:And I think that's a really helpful Image of grief. For me is that God's not on the banks, he's in the river, he's inviting me into that and it's gonna look full of truth, it's gonna be full of grace and it's gonna be without condemnation. And that that feels like it adds another depth to me, that when I feel that voice of Condemnation, when I feel like I'm just being pounded with truth, like with those internal voices, that I'm not really in the place of the river Right, like there's a place of that gentleness, that kindness, that Playfulness and caring of God right, but it's also structured. It's like there's things to be done in a certain way. Right like that He invites me into that and I feel like that is a really helpful In terms of a healing image of God. Right like that God is in the river And he's inviting me in a sense to come and play in that.
Michael John Cusick:I love the way that you Integrated that story of the prodigal son and those characters and how it kind of brings Segal's whole model together. That's really rich and I'll definitely be pondering that and meditating on that. It strikes me that the chaos on one bank and the rigidity on the other bank are not just physiological reactions Although that's part of it but there are ways of actually avoiding The surrender and the trust and the vulnerability of being in the river. So they're coping strategies and they may not be consciously chosen. But to be in the river, you know, if we're talking to a Christian audience and followers of Jesus that are stuck and struggling, and if we just say, hey, jesus is the river, god is the river, you know, jump in the river. That is the answer. But there's reasons why we don't. It's really vulnerable to trust that we're loved, that we're welcome, but there's grace that we can be seen in those places. And then the other thing and I'm kind of developing this in my mind as, as we're talking and that's how we both Process is like oh, here's clarity, just as we're talking.
Michael John Cusick:Every, every river bank I've ever been in by virtue of being a bank is higher than the flat level of the water, otherwise the water would spill over the banks.
Michael John Cusick:And so there's a sense where, if I'm up on the bank of rigidity or I'm up on the bank of chaos, that I have to descend, that I have to go down, and not just to be next to the water or even on the water, but to go into the water. And that makes me think of this classic analogy of the iceberg, that the minute we go below the water line, we're going into what Larry Krab used to call the line of pain, and going down into the water is the pain that we're trying to avoid or control or manage, as Jesus talked about in so many ways. It's when we lose our life that we find it, that we find our life by losing it. By so stepping into the pain and going down into the river, we're actually discovering something the embrace, the grace, the welcome, the sufficiency of God, and then, to use attachment language, it's there that we can be seen, soothed, safe and secure.
Brian Boecker:Yeah, Yeah, i really like that, Michael, because I think your words are true, right, like, i think there's ways in which I've defined life as on the banks, to get into the river would be in a sense losing my life. but there's actually something that awakens in me And I began to see I was actually made to be in the river and that becomes a very different experience of that world. I think the other thing that really stands out to me is that in the river is really true and God-honoring desire. right, i think to the banks, there's either a deadness I think these are, dan Allender, categories right, there's either deadness or there's demand. right, like, i must either have this or I'm going to just die to it.
Brian Boecker:And I think in the river, somehow that desire finds its fulfillment in a way that it was designed to be, or I begin to taste it in ways that I fulfill it. I think in this earth we don't have that fulfillment that we all long for, but we get taste of it along the way. that begins to say, oh, this is what I've wanted, this is what I've been longing for, And I think that's the imagery of thirsting, do you mean? and the entering into the river is kind of attending to that thirst.
Michael John Cusick:Yeah, yeah, the other big image that comes to my mind and this is obviously very different from where we started but baptism And throughout the scriptures and in ancient traditions they didn't just have a little fount with a small pitcher where they would pour water on somebody's head, or they didn't have at the back of the altar a place where people would get dunked. It was in a river. And we know that in the scriptures with John the Baptist that he was in the Jordan River and baptizing people there. And I'm really jumping around here. But one of my favorite movies from about 25 years ago Angelina Jolie, john Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton, and the movie was called Pushing Tin And Billy Bob Thornton and John Cusack are air traffic controllers And there's infidelity that's involved.
Michael John Cusick:But the Pushing Tin are the airplanes that are up in the sky, and so there's a moment where Billy Bob Thornton confronts John Cusack for being a bad husband and for being pathetic, and they're out in the woods and he's yelling at him in this secular kind of sermonic, hellfire, brimstone way to jump in the river, to jump in the river and to cleanse yourself from your sins. And because it's secular, it was obvious that the point was not that you're sinful and you need to be cleansed. But you need a new beginning And the river is the place to not be on this bank of. In the case of the movie, his chaos was he was unfaithful to his wife. The rigidity was that he was trying to be a good guy And the one place he could feel competent was going to work and being a hero by keeping all the planes in the sky. So this image of the river, it's the place of life, it's the place of, as you said, flow and energy, but it's also a place of rest Because of the flow. It's a place where we don't have to strive, it's a place where we don't have to stay in control or maintain control, nor do we have to experience the consequences, and oftentimes the victimization, of being in a place of chaos and powerlessness.
Michael John Cusick:A friend of mine taught NFL players how to swim, and she was a swim instructor, but she just developed this reputation for adults who never learned how to swim. So these NFL players would be very ashamed. Right, they're successful, they're handsome, they've got money and like they can't swim. And so she worked with them and she said the hardest thing to teach them was to float. You know you can sink, you can kick really hard with your legs and exhaust yourself and stay above, but you ultimately need to learn how to float, to swim, yeah, and it feels like the river is in the ultimate picture of release and rest and relinquishment and surrender, and therefore freedom is in floating And that's the invitation of the river. Come all you who are weary, and I will give you rest.
Brian Boecker:Yeah, i really like that imagery and I think that's a good imagery. I think the further you go out on the banks, the more striving and violent you get, right, and so I think both of the banks actually join together, probably in a place of violence. Do you know what I mean? The more rigid you are, the more you have to get control and demand that you keep it more chaotic You get, the more again I think they almost join in that place of violence, because chaos ultimately leads probably to rigidity and rigidity ultimately leads to chaos.
Brian Boecker:But I think that picture of the river is I get to actually rest into, and I think floating is a great word because you're actually being held by the water and it goes back to that tension. And that's where Segal also uses this word for integration, right, That river is a place of the linkage of differentiated parts, right, and so there's ways in which I become more whole, all the different parts of me become whole. but I think also two relationships, differentiated parts, become linked and connected. They become whole in that without losing that sense of uniqueness, in that.
Michael John Cusick:I'm really glad you brought that up, because I think a lot of people may be listening to this and going, wow, this is interesting, which it is. This sounds really helpful. So now I've got to get in the river.
Michael John Cusick:But the problem is, if we think about the river as the streams of water, the river of God, union with him, all the rest and grace that comes with that, one of the things we frequently talk about on the podcast and at Restoring the Soul is that the reason why we struggle spiritually to be loved, to be embraced and to be held, if you will, to float and to allow the water to be beneath us and to do its work, is because of the wounds inside of us and the disintegration.
Michael John Cusick:So if I'm in a place of great rigidity whether that's anxiety or OCD or workaholism or porn addiction if I just go okay today on the count of three, i'm going to jump in the river and trust God and I'm not going to do this anymore. The reason why that fails again and again and again is that we and here's what I want you to comment on We really need to develop an apparatus, a neurological apparatus, to be able to do that, an emotional capacity to regulate, a spiritual, growing sense of ability to trust love that people just can't go from I've never been vulnerable and out of control to suddenly I am able to tolerate vulnerability and be out of control. Yeah.
Brian Boecker:Come in on that. Yeah, i think that's a great word. I feel like the movement is how am I moving towards the river? Right, i think there's experiences of being in the river And then there's kind of like this iterating back and forth into it. For, again, this is my own journey, right, like I feel like I'm heading towards the river and I feel like that journey to me feels like the experiences of being held by others. You know, experiences of experiencing the river in relationship to other people. Right, them offering me those characteristics of do you know what I mean? Truth with grace, with no condemnation, right. And so I think again, siegel says it well, it's an embodied and it's a relational place that we're going to, and I think that's where it's really important that I'm developing and I'm choosing to enter into experiences, where I experience that within myself, but also with other people, and so I'm beginning to open up that spaciousness within myself to be attentive to that self, but I'm also receiving that from other people.
Brian Boecker:Right, again, this past weekend, i had a project that I needed to do at home. That's been hanging over my head for like two years, right, and I've just thought about it. I've taken little steps in it. But I just felt stuck and I reached out to a number of my good friends and I just asked him I go hey, would you guys mind coming over Saturday and just help me to do this project, because it just feels overwhelming, it feels chaotic to me and I'm not quite sure how to even get into it. And I think just their presence, of their relationship with me, just some willing to do that, willing to sacrifice to be with me in it And I think that word with is probably one of the most important words is I need others to be with me to walk me to the river.
Brian Boecker:And I think as we did that, i began to see, oh, there's movement, there's that sense of agency that's coming back and it feels alive. It doesn't feel like I'm trapped by it, right. And I think for me again, agency is probably a big word And I think that came via that relationship with other people to join me in that And I think I just tasted again a sense of like this is a taste of the river. Right, i'm not alone, i don't have to come up with this all by myself. I've got friends that care about me. And I think probably the most helpful thing was just telling them I'm overwhelmed. It's not just that I want people to come help me do a project. I'm overwhelmed and I kind of need you to join me in this, to helping me move in a way that allows me to engage in a more wholehearted, full way.
Michael John Cusick:Yeah, your vulnerability wasn't that you didn't know how to do the project or couldn't get unstuck. Your vulnerability was that you didn't want to acknowledge that you needed other people. And, first of all, i really appreciate you sharing that And, second of all, i can totally relate to that. During the same weekend, i had my friend Kyle, who flew here from Orlando And during a stressful time he just said I just want to be a good friend And we did projects all weekend long And it was fun and I got things done, but I felt so much peace and I felt loved. And why do you think it is that, especially for Christians, we cling to this idea? it's a true idea, but God is enough. God is enough, god is enough, god is enough. I just need God to help me get into the river Versus. I need to call up friends and say help, i'm struggling, i need you, and that that is a spiritual and profound an act of worship as saying okay, god, on the count of three, i need you to strengthen me to walk down to the river.
Brian Boecker:Yeah, i think we've again, this might be our own cultural bias. We were located in a culture that very much it's individual, it's bootstrapping. I should be able to overcome this. And again, that's never been the narrative that God has for us. There's this sense, and this is what I love about the feeding of the 5,000 is another story that just it's really meant a lot to me the last couple of years.
Brian Boecker:I think it's in John where it says Jesus asked him to feed the 5,000 and the disciples. One of them goes send them away, make them get their own food. Another disciple says if we worked for like two years, we would never make them enough money even then to feed everybody. And then Andrew brings up and goes hey, there's this little boy here, little lad that has his lunch, right, but what's that among so many? And again they're all kind of, in that sense of like they're looking at it from a very different perspective. Yet this boy came And again it feels like the child, right, he's like you could probably picture him. He's like hey, i got a lunch, i'll share, right. And everybody's like don't be so ridiculous, right, this is 5,000 people, you have five loaves and two fishes. And so the reality of that story is, again we go Jesus fed the 5,000,.
Brian Boecker:I would say that little boy fed the 5,000 because he risked offering what he had. He brought his poverty to Jesus and Jesus multiplied and took what he had to offer. And I think that same kind of movement is in me is can I bring my poverty? Can I bring it and then bring it to the whole? And I think that's where, again, community is. Hey, we all bring what we have to offer and we offer that to each other and in that God multiplies and does things. And so I think the idea of, again, individuality versus community and relationship, and I think again that's where Segal would say the shaping of this building of this is a very much a relational activity, it's an embodied activity, and that's again something I need to learn to pay attention to what's going on in my body in regard to that, but also what's going on in my relationships with that, as much as it is what's going on in my journey with that.
Brian Beatty:So we've wrapped up another episode of Restoring the Soul. We want you to know that Restoring the Soul is so much more than a podcast. In fact, the heart of what we have done for nearly 20 years is intensive counseling. When you can't wait months or years to get out of the rut you're in, our intensive counseling programs in Colorado allow you to experience deep change in half day blocks over two weeks. To learn more, visit RestoringTheSoulcom. That's RestoringTheSoulcom.