foreign [Music] podcast with my friend Dr Kurt Thompson my friend pepper Sweeney we are here to discover and explore what it means to be truly known hey Kurt hey Pat can't change the Cadence up there a little bit just to you know I took that pause because I'm learning from the master you know you take that you take that pause and you get everyone's attention and then you can then you can finish the sentence when Kurt and I first started working together on other projects and he was he was speaking and I I was directing the events and Kurt was speaking and there were times where he would take a pause or the best was he would want there to be this sort of beat before he would go up on stage prior to being announced or prior to the the uh the person that was speaking ahead of him and he would pause and I'd be in the back of the room thinking he has no idea he's supposed to be going up right now and he would pause and he would pause and just as I would stand up to come around go through the people and tap him on the shoulder he would stand up and go but he was the king of the paws that's for sure I'm like I'm like the uh I'm like a major league batter waiting for my waiting for my music to start like walk up music yeah oh my gosh I was I I I I was like functionally illiterate back no I didn't know what I was doing no oh my goodness oh gracious hey it's great to see you today Kurt it has been yeah yeah there's been a little bit of time since we've recorded last and I yeah um you know Amy and I were talking um chatting this week and saying you know it's just too long you know there's too long a period of time between when we get to see each other but um the fact that we have this Cadence and we can be together and it's purposeful is hugely impactful in my life and yeah me too you know it's it's time very well spent and we have been talking this season about confessional communities and um today we are going to be talking about confessional communities the later Seasons yeah yeah let's jump in so we've talked about so far we've talked about what it is required in the initiation of those communities we've talked about what it means to be in the middle of those Seasons what it takes to continue into help to you know all the all the some of the nuts and bolts of what happens in the course of that time and then we we get to this question of how do we end one or how do people depart from these uh confessional communities when it comes time for them to do that if that's the case and so we what we mean by the later Seasons this could be anything from uh what happens when a group itself comes to an end or what happens when people are ready to leave a group or they need you know need to depart a group for whatever reason and uh this brings us to the reminder that we have two kinds of confessional communities one that we call a Time limited group at our practice we run both of these forms the first form being a Time limited group that runs for about eight months uh this is uh for people who've never really been in one before they want to get their feet wet in this and they don't know if they can commit to an ongoing group that lasts you know for many of these several years but it is an eighth month thing to which they can commit once a week they're together yeah yeah once a week for 90 minutes the same the same Cadence in that regard but it's it's a It's Time limited and then we have ongoing groups and in the time limited groups uh we get to the end and of course the entire group is it's wrapping up its experience in the center for being known when we are doing these training for people who are coming these are lasting for six months and so we have uh opportunities for people to learn how to say goodbye in proper ways we'll get to that in just a moment but this is a opportunity for us to like pay attention to the reality that things come to an end relationships come to an end and this is like this is one of the more painful things for us in life uh that we will sometimes do all kinds of things to avoid um but that these groups come to an end after being such a rich place for the kind of work that gets done it then gives us an opportunity to learn how do we say goodbye whether you're in a Time limited group or an ongoing group that lasts for many many months uh for several years for some and so we see that in these uh in these times we're drawing these con confessional communities to a close either for individuals who might be leaving an ongoing group or for the group itself and people leave for various reasons um sometimes people uh leave because they're moving out of the area that's one reason that they leave sometimes it happens that people leave because they reach a certain point where they as shocking as this might seem although it happens you know it just it still happens uh people get to a point where they are no longer able to tolerate the intimacy that is in the room because that intimacy is touching some part of themselves and their story uh the pain of which they can't tolerate sometimes people end up having to leave because they discover that they're not able to self-regulate under certain conditions and you know as we said we've got these different phases that the communities enter into and like in the first phase oh we're all here because we think we're all here for ourselves and by the time you get to the second or third phase and you discover that you're really here to work things out with the person across the room from you uh you find again parts of your story being activated that sometimes you didn't know that you were working so hard to regulate and before you know it you're you know you find yourself feeling things and doing things um that uh shock everybody else in the room that surprise you and mean that you can't really stay in the game and uh there are some people who just really aren't able to remain committed to the process um they they want to remain open at one level but they find themselves really kind of continuing to be committed to what we would call a left hemispheric way of being in the world I see the world as a problem to solve so I end up you know wanting to talk about your problems or about offer you the solutions to my problem and that's just you know uh not really tenable for the group because that's not we're not just there to solve problems or to come up with reasons and it doesn't mean that we don't we talk about tactics for entering into people's challenges all the time but those become ways for fostering greater intimacy and that whole notion of being unable to tolerate the intimacy uh with others in the room you know as much as we say gosh I want to be seen soothe safe secure I want to be loved we find that uh these are when people are leaving under these conditions that it's one more uh indicator of how it is that we as human beings find that the most difficult thing for us above all else is to be res to be receptive to love hmm it's far more difficult for me to be receptive to you loving me than it is from even for me to Love My Enemy the reason I can't love my enemy the reason I don't love my friends well is because there's some part of me that as of yet has not been receptive to love has not yet been loved because I'm too terrified of your getting close to that part of me that needs that not unlike the Rich Young Ruler who like couldn't tolerate The Look of Love That Jesus offered to him and then so what we see then at the end of the day is that this leaving this saying goodbye for whatever reason uh it comes as a function of either integration or disintegration when we say goodbye purposefully the very Act of saying goodbye can be an integrative process when we just when we leave for other reasons uh we it is a it is a feature and function of disintegration we've had people who have been part of a group for an extended period of time and then one day they just don't come back they don't return our calls they don't return our texts our emails like they just like completely ghost the community we never hear from you again which is an odd thing but like when you read the Gospels like what people did people ghosted Jesus like I can't do this anymore hmm right when you when you read the Gospel of John as a new beginning says you read from chapter 6 to chapter 10. he goes from feeding 5 000 people who want to be with him to chapter 10 he's saying to the disciples do you too want to leave me and Leslie new begin says therefore we see that the preaching of the Gospel leads not to church growth but to its opposite hmm and we find that in the work of these confessional communities requires everybody Crossing threshold after threshold after threshold in which we're always continuing to make decisions am I willing to be go this next step of vulnerability the next step of vulnerability further up and further in and so what we have for people uh is we we provide for them what we call a goodbye liturgy um you know culturally as a rule we don't say goodbye well to people right um we all we we want to we want to minimize it because we can't tolerate the sadness sometimes we say goodbye violently I was just with some friends uh this past weekend who are intimately who are in Intimate connected part of the community at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Nashville where people were killed back in March uh the person the assailant in that situation was saying goodbye violently to people and and to herself that's a it's it's a it's a place of great sadness and aloneness kind of catastrophic aloneness we don't say goodbye well so we avoid it um but this gives us an opportunity to learn how to do this on purpose and with purpose and so there are some there are the mechanics that we offer to people we have a goodbye liturgy for example which is what we'll get to in a second but so there are certain mechanics so when we have them it helps us have a better sense of how we do this the other thing that it does but saying goodbye on purpose gives us a greater sense of remembrance uh that when I uh say goodbye to you in this way the very Act of departure is an act of loving-kindness it's an act of me saying to you these are the things that I love about you I hear from you the things that you love about me and so even in the departure in the going away the relationship is still being constructed it's still being knit together and so there is this sense of creating memory where I hold you and you hold me even in the departure and then we say that there is this sense that even grief itself as as you know we like to say we are people of great longing we're people of great grief we come to find that grief itself can be integrative to the degree that we are paying attention to these three features of it the embodiment of grief what I what I sense in my body what I feel what I witness in your body like when we share tears in saying goodbye like that that that creates an into like I I have more of you within me and vice versa the embodied expression of emotion so the second the first is embodiment the second is emotion like we want the emotion that is connected to this grief to be present so that we can co-regulate this in the context of a community and then we have empathic responses to that emotional state the sadness of the departure for me to be able to say this is really hard I'm really going to miss you while I am leaving that empathy also strengthens my capacity to tolerate the emotion of grief because it's done in an embodied fashion and then we want to say goodbye to explicit people by offering explicit messages in these communities we don't just have John saying goodbye everyone and then leaving right John is going to say goodbye to Sarah and to Hank and to Julie and to Jessica or like we're going to say this to particular people because each person has a particular part of my heart and vice versa and so I don't just want to say goodbye generically goodbye you all and you know it'd be easier to say hey goodbye you all but as we've said here before one of the missions of confessional Community is to move us continually from a place of imagination to incarnation I mean this is what Jesus is doing with his disciples when he says to them in the Pastoral discourses in the end you know in in John's gospel where he he says like if I don't leave spirit's not going to come and so he's saying to his disciples I'm gonna go and of course you know every single gospel you know like indicates that like they didn't get it they're like what do you like where are you going like what do you like go where like what are you gonna do like no it's like you know we have 2 000 years of hindsight and you say like ah these guys I didn't get like look look I I I'm I don't I'm not going to get it because I don't want you to leave right which is why I don't say goodbye I just don't let myself say goodbye and so there are elements when we say goodbye to there are these these three elements that we highlight when we say goodbye to someone and that we receive from that same person the first element is when I when I say goodbye to someone when I say goodbye to someone in the group I want to say first of all this is how I've witnessed your growing or becoming more integrated or more whole these are the things I've watched happen in your life over the course of the time we've been together and you know we don't say like oh I've seen you grow to be a better person like I have no idea what that means no we want explicit examples and moments recounted again this is about remembering remembering remembering remembering all the work that people have done so here's how I've seen you grow the second element is this is what I long for you further now anybody who's paying attention will see oh that's a different way of saying here's you know here's where I think you still need to grow here's what I think like you need to work on hitting curveballs we're so prone it's easy for us to name the things about somebody else that you know they're not doing right right but it is it is important that we that we acknowledge it in this I I learned this a long time ago from my colleague Kristen Terry who now lives and works in Michigan and you know I remember that one day I heard her say this when she was talking just I I'd love to see you fill in the blank I'd love to see you here's where I long for you to continue to grow in this I'd love for you to do this do this do this and then the third element is articulating to you of this is how being in a relationship with you has enabled me to live more truly this is how you have helped me tell my story more truly how I am more whole how I am more integrated and giving particular examples I remember a conversation that we had it was now about three months ago in which you were sitting over you were sitting where John's sitting right now and I was talking about this and you said this to me and for the next three weeks I couldn't get those those thoughts were in my mind and I was taking you with like I'm giving you specific examples of how your life is affecting me yeah it's so much is is about you know the specifics uh leads to you're important to me dude you know even though I have to leave you know in this moment you are important to me and um I wouldn't say I don't think softens the blow is the right is the right way to put it but um but yeah it's it's you know I've been guilty of the Irish goodbye um you know I have you know and and and and and and in that it can be interpreted as you are not important to me right that's exactly right that is exactly right yeah and we're we're so afraid because like this is the thing right like intuitively we know that uh you know we think we're saying goodbye with this liturgy which we are but we simultaneously are actually knitting ourselves even more deeply together yeah and so there's the part of me that like look I like tomorrow like next week is your last week like I just I like I don't want to be in the room when that happens when you leave for the last time like I can't take it right I can't take what I like because your departure is pulling part of me into the room well and if you just walk out without going through a process like this um you might be okay but the collateral damage that you've caused in the room because of those kind of feelings like I'm you know and and you may not even realize how much you've impacted the people in the room and so and so you just get up and leave and it's it's shattered right right it's it's a confusing um yeah and and yeah and yet if you take the time to do this you know it really shows no I care you're important and here's the specific reasons why and the things I see in you yeah right right yeah I'll just say this is an aside and um I just um acknowledge to our listeners uh that will I'm just gonna go off the interstate sure exit and get back on pretty quickly uh and just name a topic that probably deserves its own episode which I think we can do and I just want to say that what you just named you know how in some respects the Irish goodbye becomes and for our listeners who don't know what that is what is that well it's it's walking it's not speaking as an Irishman yes well it's it's it's originated any Irish listener I can say you know the last name Sweeney I'm allowed to say this but it started out with the guy that had too many pints in the pub didn't want people to know how many pints he's had so he just sneaks out and doesn't say goodbye and so it's become this you know you go to a social Gathering and and you don't really want to make the rounds and say goodbye to everybody you just want to get out so you just slip out next you know people like where where'd Pepper go where's Kurt yeah and yeah and we're just gone yeah this is why suicide is so like why it is the there's nothing in in our in our community here we've had a recent encounter with this our church community and it's been extraordinarily you know disruptive and painful and uh you know there are lots of ways in which we suffer as human beings but there's nothing that is more shattering to a community than a suicide and in no small part because the very thing you're saying like a person leaves and for lots of different reasons and this is this is not an indictment about the people who are leaving it's not anything about the person who dies by Suicide we're not saying that it's not about that at all it is about the effect that it has on those who are left the collateral damage right exactly yeah and when we imagine that and and the and the and how just painfully tragic that is uh we we would be hard-pressed to imagine that my leading a community and not saying a proper goodbye would be at all be anything like that and yet and yet there are hints of the same thing right and yeah and it's saying it's not only sin it's not only feels to the person in the room like they don't mean but it's really saying you know you don't look at yourself as important enough that you don't realize that you're important to people and you don't want to realize that and so you just walk away right yeah dude it's it's so true I mean I I when again back to these you know these farewell Discord this farewell discourse in John like 14 15 16 where Jesus has all these words that he's saying to his disciples in the last night it is a model for like oh this is a guy who in his preparing to go is saying some of the most intimate words that we have recorded between Jesus and his disciples like he's going even deeper uh the Canadian singer-songwriter Bruce Coburn oh man this dude he has this one song uh that is a uh Lament about someone that he's lost to who's died and he in the at the end of the the second half of the chorus the line is uh deeper into darkness someone's closer to the light this person is moving deeper into darkness and moving closer to the light heading in today heading into daylight and I think that's what Jesus is doing in John 14 15 16. and I think that this is what we're actually trying to do we're trying to model John 14 through 16. in this goodbye liturgy we are on purpose acknowledging if I'm the one who's leaving we are acknowledging I'm acknowledging that of my being loved by you my felt sense of being loved I'm not just acknowledging you loving me I'm like I'm acknowledging me and I'm acknowledging you and vice versa and in this in in this way of departure we depart even more whole by doing the hard work of saying goodbye which is we would say like you know God is in the business of transforming everything including death itself and the notion of saying goodbye is like especially when we're saying goodbye for the last time under these kind of in these places is it's like it's like a form of death like where this thing is dying yeah and the texts the scriptures tell us oh my gosh I'm reading this morning the end of John 19 and Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus they come and they take Jesus body and the detail that John gives it's a new Tomb like and it's in a garden right this is Eden this is like it's in a garden it's new too ever been used foreign they're planting a seed they're getting up close and personal with the body they're not messing around they don't send Messengers they don't sense servants to do like these two guys they go and they have intimate connection with the King and he's like he's really dead this is not like American movies where you know thousands of people are killed in the course of two hours the good guys never lose and that last section of John 19 gets us ready for what's coming and we want to say that this goodbye liturgy is in and of itself it's not just an ending it's getting us ready for what's coming so we know that there will be a timing and a Cadence for all this that we you know there's details of which we don't have to go into here but um as as people are involved in these confessional communities when a group comes to an end there is a way that we do this over a period of several weeks when a particular person is leaving a group they will say goodbye to a couple of people you know each week for three or four weeks as they're doing this onboard so everybody has plenty of time um and uh we we see that even the uh bringing to an end in these later stages of confessional communities themselves are opportunities for the work of the Holy Spirit to uh create Beauty and goodness even in that space of sadness uh that that we often want to avoid but we're saying no we are turning into this space of Darkness moving further into it closer to the light I'm reminded of your description of trauma being a shattered lens hmm and this idea of you know it's true it is trauma when someone leaves or even for the person's leaving it can be trauma as well and this process really helps put a gauze on that TR that shattered lens yeah um yeah so the trauma isn't um overtaking yep yeah yeah yeah this is great Kurt thank you so much you know um Learning To Say Goodbye well is a really important thing um not you know like like you say you know the confessional communities um they are practicing to be human and they aren't we're doing these things everywhere right so um so this practice of saying goodbye well is not just for confessional communities this is for for life so thank you for that uh you know we typically have an artistic offering that um Kurt or I offered the end of these episodes um but Amy has asked uh if she could do the artistic offering this week and I we thought that would be great so welcome in Amy Chella oh I see the three of you three of us on a screen together I'm reminded that we are going to be together in person right this fall on October the 26th we are going to be doing a live podcast Thursday evening Thursday evening and then Friday is the celebration or I did it again the connections conference that's right but we're going to celebrate it for for uh Center for being known um and if you would like information on this and to purchase tickets to these things you will go to the cbk.org and Kurt why don't you tell us a little bit about uh what we can expect yeah so um at this point we know that that's that the one day conference on Friday the 27th is going to include a lineup of four speakers that I'm really really excited about Derek McNeil president of the Seattle School of uh Theology and psychology Melissa Russell who's the immediate past president of uh International Justice mission of North America uh Ned Buster who is an acclaimed uh author publisher and artist from Lancaster Pennsylvania and then my my good friend Duke Kwan who is a pastor of Grace Meridian Hill it's a church here in Washington DC and these are four folks that are going to be bringing us really beautiful experience around what their life experience is in their profession regarding what it means to be known and how that affects the work that they do across a range of different venues so that's going to be the day I'll have a few things to say pepper will be once again will be am seeing our time together we're gonna have a great time of sharing and we're still working out some details we don't know for sure but there's a possibility that we're gonna the conference is gonna offer a bit of a something that we might even on Thursday afternoon the 26th the day before but we're still we're still trying to work that out um but I hope to see many of you there yeah it'll be great we had a great time last year and you know we're really I know the three of us are really looking forward to it I can't express to you how much fun it was to be in the room with you guys but also also with you listeners you know it was just so fun oh I was riding high off that for quite a long time so I'm really looking forward to going back to that anyway uh sorry about that Aim so let's hear about this artistic offering this this artistic offering I just to be clear I want I suggested this song to be the artistic offering I did not suggest that I offer it I think that was your idea it might have very well been my idea yes okay so this week's artistic offering is a song called bang it's b-a-n-g and exclamation point and the exclamation point is actually part of the title so it's by AJR a band of Three Brothers they grew up in New York City they were musically inclined from an early age and their record recording studio even today is their living room they record the majority of their work there right there and this song it's it's on my playlist a playlist that because it immediately I can feel it in my body and it elevates it's just it brings me to a fabulous place and what I love about it is two things the story it tells in the production and the story it tells in the lyrics and so okay the production they they these three brothers they were having a bit of a writer's block so they're in their recording studio again in their living room and they hear this can you hear that knock there's a knock at the door an interruption right for sure and one of the brothers is like wait did you guys hear that now I don't even know if they answered the door I'm assuming they did and the one brother is like what if we raise that a couple octaves what if we took that sound and raised it a couple octaves and then if we slowed it down a little bit so then this knock at the door becomes an element in the song and then they have they have a bunch of these things and then then what they wanted to have um a voice transition into the chorus and so they had some lyrics for it they had their dad record it and they're like no that didn't work and they're like okay how about the neighbor that didn't work so one of the brothers did it and then living in New York City they're like oh my gosh the Metro the guy that says stand back doors are closing you know the baritone they're like could we get that guy to do it so they email them the guy replies to send me the lines I'll do it so they have that as part of it okay so that's a fabulous story and then the lyrics so bang it's called bang because it's about transitioning saying goodbye to their teens and transitioning into adulthood and they're like we want to go out with the bang and one of the lines is um it's been a hell of a ride but I'm thinking it's time to go hmm and then one of one of the then it's whimsical because they say we put quinoa in our fridge still we're not feeling grown like they're so it's playful it's whimsical but it's pointed because then it begs the question what is our story of going from Teen to adulthood so it's awesome yeah as I listen to you talk about the same year uh enthusiasm um for this is infectious and yeah I'm excited to go I know the song but I'm excited to go listen to it and also there is a video that's really cool that will link um in the show notes that kind of has them also talking about the process of making the song as they're performing it it's very very cool so thanks for sharing that Amy we love it it's awesome so for our application this week so after you've listened now hopefully you've listened to these six episodes what about being part of a confessional Community draws you how does the notion of being in a confessional community community create distress in you now consider the possibility of being a part of confessional Community training which you can find at the center for being known you can also find at new story Behavioral Health but if you think about that and you're feeling reluctant reluctant to participate in something like that maybe um in that kind of training what what is it that seems to be holding you back from that kind of a thing and then lastly consider the parts of your life that you believe would be more integrated more whole if you were to become a participant in a confessional community tell someone that you trust and consider what you would need to do to make this happen so you have a week to do that this is your application we are going to be back answering some of your questions that you've been asking us on social media about confessional communities and we'll be back with that episode next week those of you who are watching on YouTube and seeing these my two beautiful friends here then you can stick around because we're going to have our after show conversation coming up next love you guys see ya love you guys welcome back to our post show conversation with Amy Chella oh my gosh um okay so saying goodbyes one of the things uh I also was thinking what is the Irish goodbye and I have heard it and then pep when you asked I mean Kurt when you had pep say it like we have a cousin that always does the Irish goodbye we're like we know keep an eye out because he's gonna Scout but that is knowing and you know it's I think it's a lot about I know that when I've done it I've thought nobody really cares if I get out of here knowing that you make a difference in the room like I've heard no you say that see like knowing would make a difference in the room yeah yeah there's a lot of grief tied up in that mm-hmm it just there just is like I'm not I'm not important enough or yeah or you know or I'm gonna or I'm gonna discover that but like I'm gonna go around and Say Goodbye yeah see ya yeah right like I don't wanna I don't want to discover what I already believe is true so I'm just gonna leave yeah and then Kurt when you said knitting ourselves more closely together and and then the exercise of saying what we what we long for what we value the the three things okay this this week uh in my confessional Community the lead went on um what's it called maternity oh on maternity Elite so we knew this was coming and we have we have a plan for saying goodbye and the richness that is in that it's like it's such a gift now it's not this is a not a goodbye she intends to come back of course we never know what can happen but she intends to come back so it's not goodbye forever but going through thinking about what we long for for each other it is so Rich it is hard work and it's scary work but it's the right kind of heart right it was totally and we're not really taught this right we're not no taught how to say goodbye no no yeah I have to say that you know when we've uh we've had a number of these um time limited groups where um over a period of weeks like everybody's leaving and so everybody's having to practice doing this across the room and I think of uh there's there's nothing about these groups that people have more good things to say than they do about this goodbye liturgy um because you know they like where does anybody ever do this or do we ever say goodbye like this and and they will articulate the felt sense of discovery of things right there is a remembrance of fresh Remembrance in the departure um of what we have meant to each other that upon my departure I have that memory in the room of our saying goodbye that kind of like seals it has its own particular way of sealing each other uh in each other's hearts and minds and uh yeah and the grief the sense of grief it's like I felt grief but it's like oh my gosh it's grief because it is such a beautiful thing yeah that's right that's right that's absolutely right um yeah I mean that's connected though right I mean if it's not something something you don't care about there's not going to be much grief no no I'd be like yeah relief I've been so looking forward to this day yeah right when you were gonna were you when you were gonna be done and moved to Nebraska yeah you don't have people having relief counseling counseling [Laughter] yeah yeah and I mean I I think um we have uh uh we are we are currently in a in a season where one of the members of one of our ongoing groups is is moving out of the area and so they're in this process of saying goodbye and uh this is a person who's just done a massive massive amount of work in a very short period of time and the confessional Community has been the you know the laboratory we're we're so much of that has been enabled and facilitated and supported and part of that uh you know part of when they they got to a point where they had to change jobs and the only in in finding new job the only job they could find was out of state and the minute that was the case they're one of one of their their singles largest griefs was like having to leave the group and at the same time it has been the goodbye liturgy that has been the launching kind of propulsion for this person to actually not just leave the group well but to become increasingly uh hopeful about what they're going to which I I think you know we we talk about um this whole notion that hope is my anticipated future that is all grounded in the work that I'm doing right now around my grief in the context of a community who is loving me in that very space and if that's the collection of events that I remember being loved in a hard space that is the very thing that I call on to help me anticipate my future which would only be that of Hope and it's been a beautiful thing to watch this person make that transition in the ongoing groups um do you introduce this idea of it of the goodbye and the start of the so people are aware that if they leave this is what's expected of them we do and we name it and at the same time we name it to kind of know that we've named it but nobody's really paying attention to it until the time comes yeah and um and for most people you know that that time doesn't come for many many many months uh and then you know when the time comes for them to have to announce that they're leaving they say oh so we have a thing that we do like oh oh that's right what what is it what that we do what is that thing I'm saying and here's and here's what we're going to do and and you can see you you can watch the processing of people kind of coming to terms with like oh my gosh you know John is leaving and now I'm going to have to actually say goodbye on purpose and there's the part of me that would just like there's the part of me that would just like John would just like oh yeah John John left like so that I thought I wouldn't have to like like experience the grief but this is the thing even that if we're experiencing this together um again this is trinitarian work all are like we are joining we we are all together in this process and even in this hard space we are practicing for heaven right we're practicing what it means yeah it's the dark to light that you were that's right you're talking about that's right that's right well and it's slow like for our group we it's a six weeks process I mean we don't say goodbye for six weeks but you don't leave for six weeks and that just slows it down it does because then the anxiety or whatever comes up first okay we can talk about that before we even are saying goodbye right and that is that is the thing that people have to get used to as well because people like six weeks like I have to I've announced it six weeks in advance like me I go yeah like I I I just like to say goodbye and Louise right yeah but uh no we're saying no we're gonna take six weeks because like you're really that big of a deal and the and the community is that big of a deal yeah we are that big of a deal to each other yeah yeah that's that's huge right yeah I mean it's just a yeah yeah so like no wonder Jesus Took the time that he took mm-hmm in saying goodbye in John's gospel right I already took the time and then you know you the resurrection right you get to like oh why doesn't he why does why isn't the Ascension just like he like on like at six o'clock in the afternoon on Easter is a period of about 40 days right there are we're gonna say goodbye and now we're like we're really saying goodbye but we're saying goodbye very differently than we said 41 days ago well it's time for us to say goodbye say goodbye yeah uh I'm gonna do the Irish goodbye I figured like we'll just stop recording mid right just leave meeting you do that scarily well you do dude practice yeah literally okay all right guys you guys love you love you until next time [Music] this podcast is produced by Kurt Thompson pepper Sweeney and myself Amy Chella audio production and editing is by Kate and Simons video production and editing is done by Mark Gould if you'd like to connect with us you can find us on social media at being known pod if you like this podcast tell a friend if you love this podcast tell everyone you know and please like rate and review wherever you listen be well be now