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Music.

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I'm Pastor Luke, and I believe that you can experience lasting life change for your good and for God's glory.

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Today we're going to start talking about a pretty significant topic that we'll spend

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the next several weeks talking about, because I really want us to begin to unpack some of

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the things that are going on inside of us.

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A lot of our conversations that we've been having on this podcast so far have been things

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is doing with kind of just waking up to our circumstances is beginning to say,

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all right, what's going on in my life? How can I begin to be honest about what's happening?

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What's going on in my life, what I'm dealing with.

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And now we come to a place where we need to start digging in a little bit more.

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We start to look inwards so that we can begin to see what's going on inside my

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heart, inside of my soul, inside of my mind? Why am I behaving these ways? We've started to confront

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that, yeah, perhaps I'm living a life of insanity. I'm living in a way that does not lead to the

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direction I want to go. Maybe I've been holding on to things that I shouldn't be holding on to.

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Maybe I've got wounds that need addressed that I've not dealt with. Whatever part of those

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conversations has resonated with you the most, that might be true.

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But now let's start to dig in a little bit more.

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We're going to talk about identifying the false self.

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So let's talk about that a little bit.

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So my question is, is like, my question is, who are you really?

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What is the real you like how many people actually know you in?

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Like in your raw form right who know you unfiltered,

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When I get ready for the day right when I get up I get my day going I.

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Pick out some matching clothes at least I try to I Take care of myself. I try and brush my teeth make sure there's nothing in my teeth and I head out,

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right and I try and put out this image of kind of like just you know put together and then when I get home for the day I come home and I take off all

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my clothes I put on my comfy pants and my comfy shirt and I sit out I relax ha

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right and my question is is what are you like when you're in your comfy pants

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what are you actually like not when you're trying to put on a show or trying

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to put on an outward look or image or picture for everyone else.

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What are you actually like? What are you like when you stop worrying about trying to present a perfect image to other people?

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We know what this is like, right? But what if it's more than just cleaning up our appearances?

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What if we don't ever have spaces where we feel like we get to wear our comfy clothes?

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We don't feel like we ever get to just be ourselves. There's no one in our life

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that we get to be honest and vulnerable with. What if we feel like we're constantly putting on a mask so that others can't see us? That kind of living

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is unsustainable. It just is. If we're living in a world, in a life where we

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have to put on a mask and we can't ever let someone see us, we can't ever be

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honest about something, that is an unsustainable place to live.

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We all do this to some degree, but when it becomes a way of living, we are walking into

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a very unhelpful space.

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It is a core need of humans to be known and to feel accepted.

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When we don't believe that our true selves are acceptable, we start to build what I call the false self.

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This isn't an idea that's unique to me by any means. Other people have written and talked a lot about this,

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but this is just me applying this to this particular.

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A particular topic and particular way of thinking about things.

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So here's a definition of the false self. The false self is an image of ourselves that we desire to be and for others we desire to

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see. It's the image, it's the mask, it's the performance, it's the way we want to be perceived by others.

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It's the lies, it's the white lies that we say to kind of like smooth things over so

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that we look like the good guy, or it looks like we've got it all together, right?

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The false self is built by any number of things.

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It can be built by our family's expectations of us in response to our insecurities.

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The false self can look any way we want it to.

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Some false selves are really prideful and confident while they know it all and they

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have it all together. False selves are really timid and respectable and kind of behaved, they might always do the right

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thing and they might be very well behaved. Like the false self can look any number of ways,

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but it looks the way that we think we ought to look. It looks and behaves the way we want other

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people to think about us. That's the false self. It's the mask. It's the image that we

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paint on so that other people see us a certain way.

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But it's more than just that, because when we build up a false self,

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there's a counter thing that happens.

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We begin to develop what's called a shadow.

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Things might be okay if we put up a false self and there's no big consequences,

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but that's not how it works. The false self doesn't contain our actual state of being. It doesn't carry our needs.

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That doesn't carry our wants, all of those things, all those things that we removed from the false self, right?

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Cause we put up the false self. We got to like, Oh, I'm going to take this away.

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I've got to hide this thing. Kind of pull this back. Can't show this.

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What happens at all those things that we removed from the false self?

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They went somewhere. They went into the shadow. And this is what I mean by the shadow.

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The shadow is the part of ourselves that we hide away from others and ourselves underneath our false selves.

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These are the things that we don't want to talk about. These are the wants, desires, needs,

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things that we don't want to talk about, things we don't want to even acknowledge

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there in our own selves. Let's talk about some examples of what the false self and the shadow might look like.

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Someone might want everyone to think that they're really accomplished and good at what they do.

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They put hard work into putting out an image so that others, that they will praise them and admire

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them. But if they do that, their shadow might actually be really insecure. What they actually

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might really want and need is not to be praised or accepted for how good they do things, they

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might actually just want to be praised and accepted for who they are and not what they do.

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Someone else might have a false self that puts on a smile for everyone around them.

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They try really hard to be there for everyone in their lives, but secretly they feel really

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lonely and they feel really sad.

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Your shadow wants attention and acknowledgments of some big hurts that have often been ignored.

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Sometimes there's this direct correlation between the shadow and the false self.

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Sometimes the false self is trying to get a thing that the shadow wants, but it's kind

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of a false way of getting it. It's kind of an indirect way of getting it.

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And sometimes the shadow is just a combination of all the bits and pieces that we just don't want others to see.

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It's the part that we don't want to talk about. So let's think about this a little bit. Let's apply this to ourselves for a moment.

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The false self, like particularly if you're dealing with addiction, right? The false self is when you're hiding it, right?

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It's the maybe you put on a really good face and And at least you think that most people don't know that you've got an addiction or a problem, right?

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You've put on a really good facade, that false self of having it all together. You're really happy. It's all put together.

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But what people don't see is the shadow. They don't see the secrets. They don't see the hiding, the sneaking,

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the constant thinking that you might be doing about how you can do that thing next or get your next drink,

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whatever your particular addiction is, right? That's the false self and that's the shadow.

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Maybe we feel like we need to put on a particular false self in order to make people happy.

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Right? We put on false selves all the time to make people happy, to just kind of skate by because,

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you know what? Like nobody wants to hear about my hurt, about my pain, about my past,

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and it's too messy, it's too bad, it's too awful.

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If people were to hear that about what actually happened in my past,

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they would be scandalized, they wouldn't want to be my friends anymore.

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So we hide that away and we put on that false self and we don't deal with it, right?

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Those are very easy, very common examples of the false self and the shadow.

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And we might think that the shadow is hidden from view, we might think and hope that it is,

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but the reality is that just because maybe people aren't immediately seeing our shadow

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doesn't mean that it's not having an impact on how we live our life. The shadow is often

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connected to any of our unhelpful behaviors or habits. If we have a shadow that is hiding behind

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a good performance but it secretly wants to be known and accepted, we might find the shadow is

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compelling us towards behaviors that actually might result in us being caught or exposed or

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be found out to be not as good as we want because we actually want people to know that we're not.

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Perfect and then for them to respond the way we hope they would but we're very afraid that they they won't, right?

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Shadows often cause us to behave in ways that are crazy. When we act out in a way that doesn't seem to make sense

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with the way that we normally act out, right? If we're like 90% of the time, we've got the false self put together and we're kind of doing things.

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And then like every once in a while, something kind of crazy happens, right?

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Well, that kind of crazy thing is probably the shadow that those parts of yourself that you've been hiding

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saying, hey, we're still here, we want some attention and they find a way out.

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If our shadow contains hurts or feelings that we don't want to address, then we might develop

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coping mechanisms that we use to escape or to ignore those feelings in the shadow.

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The things that compose our shadow want to be addressed, they don't go away.

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Talk about that image again of building the false self by looking at ourselves and pulling

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things away and adding things that aren't there, right, in order to create this image,

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what do we do with what's left over? We can't get rid of it because it's you.

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It doesn't go anywhere. It stays. And so if we're just hiding it, we're running into a problem.

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And so what we find is that the more we pull our false self and our shadows away from each

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other, the bigger and stronger the internal conflict becomes.

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We're given two options it seems sometimes, right? If we're saying, you know what, like I've got this false self and the more I put effort

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into building that false self to keeping that image, the bigger and bigger the shadow seems to get.

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The more I try and hide the shadow, the bigger the false self gets and the greater this tension

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gets as it's kind of like a rubber band that's being stretched out to its limits.

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That's how we feel sometimes when we're living in a really unhealthy place, like a rubber

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band being stretched and stretched and stretched and how long are we going to hold until we,

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snap, until the false self crumbles and the shadow comes out. So we've got two options.

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First is to double down Try harder and harder to be the best version of ourselves, right?

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And we might believe that well, we should be like our false self. We're like, well, yeah, that's not really who I am

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But that's who I should be right. Isn't that how I ought to behave?

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It might not be real But it's who I'm supposed to be if you have a religious background you grew up in a church you grew up in a family

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That went to church Maybe you grew up in a family that went to church,

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church on Sundays, but any time outside of being in front of people in public, you didn't

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act like a church, or act like a family that went to church, right?

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Like a lot of ugliness and secrets in the family, but a lot of putting out a performance,

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putting out a, this is everything put together, this is how it's all okay, this is the way

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it's supposed to look. This might be your, a very familiar option, right? We just need to try harder.

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Rid of our sin and our imperfections. Oftentimes, even our communities, even church communities,

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will encourage this behavior. We praise people who are seemingly able to keep themselves

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in line with sheer will. This might produce short-term results, but in the long term,

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it leaves us with lots of guilt and shame. Hidden sin abounds, and our shadows grow bigger.

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This is a huge deal, particularly in churches and in anyone who's been in the Christian

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religious circle before.

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Oftentimes people who kind of live the perfect Christian life on the outside get praise.

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They get kudos points because they read their Bible like they're supposed to, they go to

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Sunday every, or they go to church every Sunday, they do all the things that they're supposed to do, right?

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But what if that's just a false self.

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What if underneath of all of that, there's still a whole bunch of hidden sin?

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They just seem to have always had it together, they never really mess up.

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We praise those type of people in church oftentimes, but the problem is, is that what we might

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be praising is we might be praising their false self.

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And behind that false self is a lot of guilt, a lot of shame, a lot of hurt, a lot of fear,

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If people were to know what's really going on in here, I would be kicked out of the church.

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The other option might seem to just live the way that our shadow wants us to.

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This might relieve a lot of tension, but usually leads us to somewhere where we don't want to go.

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We talked about one option. Live into the false self. We put up a better picture, we put more makeup on, we put on better clothes, we try and behave

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better. Well, when we do that, there becomes a lot more shame, a lot more guilt, and the shadow becomes bigger.

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Well, okay, well let's just live like our shadow wants to. Let's just do whatever my impulses say.

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Whatever is all the things that I've been hiding and I don't want to talk about.

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All of that. What if I just did those things?

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Well, you could, but chances are is that actually is not very healthy either.

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Going to end up making choices that you don't want to make, that aren't in line with your

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values, that aren't very Christ-like, that are going to lead you away from where you're going to want to go.

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That's not good either. So, what then do we do? Our shadows often offer solutions that are quick fixes or are detached from the root

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of the problem. Our false self might cover up our dysfunctions while our shadow wants us to indulge in maybe

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drugs or alcohol or whatever addiction or behavior you're dealing with in a response

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to feelings that we're trying to not deal with,

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to not address. So what do we do?

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The false self covers up the real us and the shadow distorts the real us.

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Both ends of those spectrums. One is covering up the real us,

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the other is distorting the real us, behaving and living in a way that doesn't feel

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like that's actually us either. Well, the solution to this problem is to meet in the middle.

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The solution is to let our false self and our shadows meet in the middle.

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When we pull down the false self and we open up our shadow to the light of connection,

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forgiveness, and grace, we find that suddenly the shadow begins to shrink.

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If we begin to take down the mask, begin to become vulnerable and honest and open, then,

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And then, oh, that shadow's not as bad.

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And then we find a place where we can kind of bring them into the middle.

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We are neither as good as everyone thinks we are or as bad as we believe we are.

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Or vice versa. That can be flipped sometimes. I like to say that people are rarely either as good as you think they are or as evil as

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you think they are. They're probably somewhere in the middle. And that applies to you and me.

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When we open up our shadows and our false selves to genuine connection, we begin to find healing.

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When we start connecting both parts of ourselves to our stories, we can begin to see where did that come from?

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Why do I hide? Why do I hide this certain part of myself?

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Or why does this certain part of myself feel like such a big deal?

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Why do I want to be accepted so much?

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Why does this matter? We can start to identify the real roots of things, and we can start identifying what

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we really need and want, and when we do that, we can find healthy new ways to get those things.

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Let's talk about this from a biblical perspective for a little bit.

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I'm going to read for you a passage from 1 John 1, verses 5-9.

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This is John the Apostle saying, this is the message that we heard from him, talking about Jesus.

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Heard from Jesus, and we declare to you, God is light. In Him, there is no darkness at

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all. If we claim to have fellowship with Jesus, and yet we walk in darkness, we lie, and we

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do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have,

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fellowship with one another. And the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin.

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If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

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If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us, and will forgive us our

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sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."

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I don't know about you, but that sounds an awful lot like a solution to that problem.

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Jesus is saying, if you follow me, you don't get to live in the shadows.

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You don't get to live with a false self and a shadow.

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No, no, no. Follow me means walking in the light.

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Following me means that you get to let the false self down a little bit and that you get to let the shadow be exposed,

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to the light of God to the light of forgiveness of grace of,

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community to the gospel and what you find is that you,

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Come somewhere in the middle and you experience grace you experience forgiveness

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You experience newness of life.

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See, can you see how the gospel completely disarms that tension inside of us?

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How it retracts that rubber band? How it says, you know what?

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Here's the thing. Whatever's going on in your life, whether if you have an addiction, if you have maybe a secret sin,

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sin, a thing that you don't want anyone to know about. The thing is, is that God

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knows about it, and you're not fooling Him. And the thing is, is that He sees you,

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sees all the things about you that you wish nobody would ever see. And you know

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what His response is to seeing all of those things? It's not anger. It's an

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invitation. It's love. It's come know me and know my love. He's saying, look, I know,

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that you are weak, human, humble, that you're not able to be perfect. That's the

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thing. We get stuck in the Christian life thinking we've got to be perfect, we got

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to be just exactly like so, we got to have this perfect image, and we're not.

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When that's not actually it. Jesus is saying, no, no, no, no. Like, I died on the cross so that you

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didn't have to be perfect. I died on the cross so you could be who you are right now, and that you

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could begin to take steps forward from there. The message of the Bible is not that we need to

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pretend to be a better person than we actually are. The message of the Bible is that God has

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enough grace for where you are right now. And when you step out of darkness, and you,

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step into light, that is where you find forgiveness. In that place of grace, you can actually begin

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to move forward. If you're in a place where you've got to fall self up, and you've got

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a big shadow looming behind you, trying to make any progress, it's just rubber band pulling

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against rubber band. You're not going anywhere. But if you can come into the grace of God.

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You can say, you know what? God actually has grace for where you are right now, for how much pain,

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suffering, hurt, how much sin is in your life. He's got enough grace for you. He can handle you

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where you are right now. If you can accept that, come into the light where Christ will purify you

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of your sins, where you confess, and He will take those sins from you. That is the promise at the

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end of that passage. He is faithful and just to forgive and purify you from all unrighteousness.

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That is a promise. And then you find that where you're at, God is okay with, and that God is

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willing to walk with you in the path that He's calling you down. God has enough grace for you

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right now. He will neither leave you there, nor will He demand that you make

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some sort of unrealistic leap forward. God will walk with you through each,

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small right next step. That's the encouragement I have for you. So I want you to take some time this week. Reflect. What are some

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characteristics of your false self? How would you describe the picture of yourself that you feel like you're trying to present to others?

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What does that look like? What is your false self look like?

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And then reflect on the other side of the coin. What are some characteristics of your false self's shadow?

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How does that shadow show itself to you?

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What are the indications that there are some things you're not wanting to deal

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with? You don't want to show people. And then, where do you see those two things in the story of your life?

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They didn't come out of nowhere, right? Is there a habit in your life?

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Was that connected to something that happened as a kid?

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Something that happened that your parents struggled with as well?

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Did it kind of come out of a place where you were experiencing a lot of hurt? Right?

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Where did you get this idea that you needed to perform well,

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that you needed to do things just right so that everybody would like you?

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Where did that idea come from? Where is that in your story? Look at both your shadow and your false self, identify some of the

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characteristics of each, and then ask yourself, where do those connect in the story of my life?

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We're going to continue to dig into some of these questions over the next couple of weeks, so,

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invite you to join me on this journey as we begin to dig in and see where are the places where God's

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God's grace and love want to begin to penetrate and help bring us forward so that we can experience

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lasting life change for our good and for God's glory.

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Thank you for joining me today in this conversation.

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You can always leave me a comment or send me a message. you can email me at.