Episode 187: Worthiness Wounds Part 2: Protect and Provide

You are listening to the Overcome Pornography for Good podcast episode 187, Worthiness Wounds Part 2: Protect and Provide. 

Welcome to the Overcome Pornography For Good podcast where we take a research-based, trauma informed and results focused approach to quitting porn. This approach has been revolutionary and changed thousands and thousands of lives. I’m your host, Sara Brewer. 

Hey everyone, welcome to today’s podcast episode. I am getting a lot of really great feedback on that Worthiness Wounds Part 1 that we had. And I don’t know, I just love that phrasing, like worthiness wounds. It just connects with a lot of us. We know exactly what I’m talking about when I say that for a lot of us. And it just sounds like something that is so fun for me to talk about. 

And I love working through the pornography stuff, but you guys can tell I don’t really care as much about the porn as I do care about all the things that’s happening underneath the surface that is really painful and creating unwanted behaviors. So I care about the shame, I care about the buffering, you know, those are the things I talk about. You’re not going to hear me sit here and tell you how bad porn is. That’s just not what we do here. 

We look under the surface, and the worthiness wounds, that sounds like something so fun that I would love to just talk more about. So we’re going to. We’re going to talk more, we’re finally doing our part two.

For those of you who want more help on this and want to work through this stuff in a really deep way, please consider coming to join us in Overcome Pornography For Good. I have milestones on this stuff. The shame milestone, which is a new one, is really, really, really good for this. And it has exercises and things for you to do and ways for you to actually start retraining your brain around this to heal the worthiness wounds. 

And then of course, all of the coaching, all of the coaching, all of the support, which we have amazing coaches and I’m in there. And it’s just the best place for you to go if you want to heal this is going to be the program. 

So let’s kind of dive into this part two. I want to talk specifically about the wounding around that phrase, “protect and provide.” Protect and provide for men specifically. And let me just start it by saying I love this role of masculinity that a lot people take on of protection and providing, protect and provide. But when this role of protecting and providing is wounded, it shows up in a way that hurts people instead of helping people. 

And I also want to make sure that I clarify when I say this masculine energy of protect and provide, I’m not talking about men. Okay. So we all have masculine and feminine energy in us. So no matter what your gender is, you have masculinity and you have femininity. It’s masculine energy and feminine energy, you have both. And to have a really beautiful, balanced person, you want these energies to be balanced in a way that works really well for you and your soul. 

So I think the first worthiness wounds I was like, I was talking a lot to men and to specifically conditioning for men. And it’s kind of similar here, we’re talking to a lot of that conditioning that men get. People who are raised men and male and have this specific conditioning there, I’m kind of talking to that. But I do want to make sure that I’m very clear here that it doesn’t just exist in men. 

And even if some of the conditioning I’m talking about, you know, I’m saying it to men specifically, anyone can benefit from this. And when I’m talking about this masculine energy or this masculine role to protect and provide, I’m not talking about it’s men’s role to protect and provide. It can be anyone’s role and any of that masculine energy that kind of helps that protection and providing. I mean, hello, think about a mama bear. Like women also use that role of protecting, protecting and providing, you know, it’s beautiful for both. 

Now, let’s dive into the conditioning here and the wounding here and how we can start to heal this. So just to recap on worthiness wounds, if you haven’t listened to the first one, I would recommend going and listening to the first episode we did on worthiness wounds. But they come from systems where your worth is based on things that are outside of you. 

And so your worth is not just there, your worth is how you act. Your worthiness is based on how you act. Your worthiness is based on what you do. Your worthiness is based on, for men, some of that conditioning, even if you can see how it’s maybe not the best, but it might be so deeply ingrained that you can still kind of feel it. But the worthiness of, am I providing? Am I making enough money? Am I having enough positions? All of those things. 

Of course, there’s like the religious wounding of worthiness around purity. I’m not worthy because I’m not pure. I’m not worthy because I viewed porn. I’m not worthy because I had sex. I’m not worthy because of whatever that is. That can also create a lot of wounding. And I’ve talked about that in other episodes. 

You know, some people really don’t like it when I talk about it and how that worthiness belief actually creates a lot of problems. Some people get like, well, you have to be, you’re not worthy. You’re not worthy if you’re viewing porn, and you have to be worthy in the eyes of God to be, you know, that’s what we’re striving for. We’re striving for worthiness.

And I like us to try to switch those words up a little bit. So instead of we’re striving for worthiness, maybe we’re striving for being prepared, if that word fits a little bit better for you and your belief system. But like when we’re striving for worthiness, ooh, what does that really mean? It means that we’re not enough. We’re not worthy. 

Anyways, I’ve done a number of episodes on this, but you do not show up well when you believe that you’re not worthy. When you are not worthy, you do not act in a way that really helps you exemplify your values. And it’s also kind of, there’s like a lot of shame behind it and kind of shame inducing. And that does a number on psyches and can create a lot of long-term negative results if there’s a lot of shame and you never feel like you’re worthy enough. 

And so yes, strive to be better. Yes, strive to be the best that you can be. And strive to do good in the world. And strive to live the values that you want to live, all of that. 

And maybe we can avoid the label, if you’re not there yet, or if you’re having a struggle with it, or if there’s certain things you’re working through, we can get rid of the, “you’re not worthy” label and replace it with, oh yeah, there’s just some things I need to work on. There’s some things that I want to work on. There’s some things I need to do to be more prepared to live the life I want, or to be more prepared to be with God or whatever, however you want to phrase that in your own religious or spiritual beliefs. 

Now, again, back to this idea of worthiness wounds, they come from these systems where your worth is based on really specific things. That can be systems where your worth is based on your actions, how much you have, whatever that is. 

These systems, they typically don’t celebrate a whole person with all the things, creativity, nurturing, passion, tenacity, vulnerability. It instead favors very specific roles and very specific traits. And so even if you are this whole person with both feminine and masculine traits, feminine and masculine energy, like we all are, it’s going to really favor one side of that and might shame you for the other side. 

And so favoring very specific roles and very specific traits can become toxic. So an example of protect, this value of protecting and this role that you want to take on as a protector, it’s so powerful and so good and so beautiful. But it can become harmful and toxic, and let me give you some examples. 

When the protection value is accompanied by benevolent sexism. Being a protector, you’re not really being a protector as much as you are being an inhibitor. So what is benevolent sexism? So benevolent sexism will show up here with this idea that maybe I need to protect women because they’re weaker than me. 

And I’m going to dive into this a little bit more and I want you to put on your curiosity brain instead of your defensiveness here, because this benevolent sexism, it shows up in tons of places. And so as I talk about it, you might start to notice it or recognize it in yourself, and that’s okay. 

That’s okay. You have it programmed into you. And are you willing to look at it and challenge it so that this role of protector, you can use it in a really valiant way instead of a way where you’re subconsciously, maybe it’s becoming a little bit toxic? Okay. 

So benevolent sexism, it’s sexism that’s kind of hidden behind niceties. Sexism that’s hidden behind, oh, but we just love women. We love them so much. And I protect them because they’re weaker than me. So I want you to think of a slave owner, but a really kind slave owner. Imagining back in the day, right? So they’re really kind. 

Their idea is, you know what, I’m providing for these slaves, they would have a much harder time without me. They’re lucky to have me because I’m a kind one. I’m a good one. I’m not hurting them physically. This person is still a captor. They still have slaves, which is horrible. But they kind of hide behind this idea that they’re a kind one. They’re a good one, so it’s okay. 

So maybe that can help us understand this idea of benevolent sexism a little bit more. What it does is it perpetuates this idea that women are weak and need to be protected by men, instead of I’m a protector, not because they’re less than, but because that’s who I am. 

So other examples of benevolent sexism is going to be declining women opportunities, but then praising them for it. So for example, women are so good. They are already so pure and they’re already so good and so pure and angelic, that’s why they don’t need the leadership experience that men do. 

It’s like a sneaky way of declining women opportunity, but doing it under the guise of like, yes, we love them and they’re so good already that they don’t need it, right? 

Or women, you don’t get the same opportunities to lead or to be in charge, but that’s only because God loves you so much. You’re already so good and your important work is to do thankless and thoughtless tasks. Thank you so much for doing this. I’m going to pedestalize you. You are an angel. You’re an angel for doing this. I’m going to pedestalize you. All while in the background, denying you equal opportunity and continuing to expect you to do thankless and thoughtless tasks. 

Okay, so can you see where this protection energy becomes a little bit toxic, right, when we’re using it to continue to boost ourselves up and have some benevolent sexism, or it could be benevolent racism. I don’t know if that’s an actual term, but any of these things, anything behind it, that’s when it becomes a little bit toxic. 

The protection energy also can become toxic when we’re starting to protect institutions over people. This can look like maybe protecting a country, really fighting and protecting a country without looking at the people who are in the country and protecting the people in the country. Or this institution, like a church, right? So we’re really protective of a church, but not of the people in the church. So that’s another example where it can become a little bit toxic. 

Now, the protection energy, when it’s so good and it’s so valiant and it’s so beautiful, I want to talk about this, okay? And let’s talk about this in terms of benevolent sexism. So the opposite of that is going to be protecting the rights of your female counterpart, protecting her equality to you. 

So my husband does this so well. He’s protected, you know, in our home we’ve created a space where we are equal, where we both get to go after what we want, where we’re partners. We manage things really equally in the home and we’ve worked really hard to create this. 

And he protects me in that he protects my dreams. He protects my hopes. He protects my aspirations. He doesn’t do that benevolent sexism stuff that says, hey, thanks for being behind me and taking care of the house so I can chase my dreams. And you don’t really have a choice, I know this was kind of put on you, but thanks for just doing it. But instead he provides a place where we can chase our dreams together and both be partners in our house and both be partners in taking care of our kids. 

He’ll protect me, you know, if anyone makes any little comments about what I do or as a woman you get funny little comments that a man would never get when you work. You get stuff like sometimes you get funny little comments about daycare or having a nanny. You get little judgy comments about that. Or sometimes you get, like when I’m out of town for business things, sometimes there’s little comments about that when my husband would never get those comments, right? So he’s really good at recognizing those and then protecting me when that happens. 

So, you know, he’ll always say something like reiterating how I do a really great job as a mom, but also that I have dreams and hopes in a business that is really beautiful and that I’m not a bad mom for leaving, you know, out of town or just stuff like that. He does a really good job at protecting me in that way. 

Do you feel the difference between those two types of protection energies? One protection energy is like, yes, you are here with me and I’m doing everything I can to help you in a world where men have been the ones in charge forever. In a world where we’re trying to make it a little bit more equal for you. In a world where our mothers and our grandmothers were not allowed to work. Our mothers and our grandmothers were not allowed to have property or have a credit card without their husband’s approval. 

He’s recognizing all of that and really protecting and buoying me up as I’m trying to live my life the way that I want to. 

Another way this protection energy is so good is when we’re protecting people, and specifically protecting children. And I want to bring this up because this is something I see on kind of a larger level that I would love to be able to change a little bit. But protecting children and advocating for keeping children safe in a lot of different settings, and specifically because we’re talking about porn and because I know a lot of us are religious and have these religious communities around us, advocating for keeping children safe in religious settings. 

And I want to bring this up because I do, I hear all the stories. And I’ve heard all the abuse cases and it’s just crazy how many there are. Oh my goodness. But a way that we can protect children here is advocating for policies in our churches where we don’t let kids go into religious meetings with adults alone to talk about sexuality. 

And if it’s your own kids, if you have your own kids and you’re raising your kids in a church, I would really, really recommend that you do this. Even if you trust that person so much, do not let your kids go into meetings alone with adult people, adult men to talk about sexuality. It’s inappropriate. It’s scary. And it’s not okay for minors to be doing that. 

If there’s something they need to talk about, you know, if they feel like they have a need to confess or work through stuff, go with them, go with them. And instead of just pushing that off on the religious leader, you might have to do the work, and it’s hard work, sometimes it’s awkward work and it takes some time, especially if you haven’t cultivated this before. But be that person that your child can come to with these things and talk about these things with. 

And then if you guys want to go talk to the religious leader together, that’s great. But protect your children by being that person for them, being that safe person for them. There’s a lot of nuances there too, right? Because often abuse does happen in the home, and so kids do need a safe place to go and talk about abuse that might be happening to them. And a lot of times that can be a religious setting. 

So one of other things that we can advocate for is trainings, trainings on abuse. Advocate for your churches to have trainings every single quarter on this is what abuse is. This is what it looks like. Here’s what to do if it happens to you. And not just sexual abuse or physical abuse, but let’s talk about emotional abuse and manipulation. You can advocate for your congregation to be taught about those things and then how to report those things. 

And then of course, I always, oh, like if we can advocate for clergy to report abuse. In some states, including Utah, clergy are not required to report abuse. And that’s a problem. That’s a problem because toxic masculinity or this protection energy, it becomes toxic, right, when it protects institutions. So we’re protecting the institution by not reporting this, but also protecting the perpetrator in the name of repenting. 

So in the name of letting, we need to let them repent and offer grace and work through this with them, that’s protecting this abuser over protecting children. And we should always let the perpetrator go through the repentance process while being held accountable for their actions. 

This really healed masculinity will be able to do that, be able to really protect children and love and help the perpetrator, but also hold them accountable for their actions, which needs to be done through the court system in terms of abuse, especially with minors. Especially with minors. So that’s something we really need to advocate for. 

Okay, let’s talk about provide. So there is so much that we can do to work on healing this within yourself. And I’ll do more podcast episodes on this, but specifically now let’s talk about providing. And when it’s that value and that beautiful part is kind of toxic and when it’s really healthy and honorable. 

So the providing, right? It can become toxic and harmful when worth is tied to money. Worth is tied to how much you make, how successful you are in business, how successful you are in your company, blah, blah, blah, right? All of those things. It becomes really toxic when the belief is I have to provide more than my wife, to be a real provider. To be a real man I have to be the sole provider or I have to provide the most. 

And this is so ingrained, right? When I say this, can you feel how ingrained that belief is in men? It’s crazy. It sucks. And I’m so sorry that that belief has been so ingrained into you because, ugh, what it does is it just creates so much pressure. It creates a lot of like icky, hard emotion. And so when providing is solely based on providing equals money and equals food and shelter and all of those things, that’s when it becomes toxic and unhealed. 

Now, when providing can become really healthy and really honorable, in my opinion, is when it not only is talking about providing physical things, but also providing opportunities for other people that you can provide because of your own privileges. 

I’m going to give you another example of really healthy and honorable ways of providing. So my husband, he really provides me an equal partnership in marriage. That doesn’t mean that we do the exact same things. It means that we share the load in a way that really makes sense for our relationship. 

So what doesn’t happen is, you know, typically as women and wives and mothers, you are expected to work 24/7 because you’re on the clock when you wake up taking care of kids, meals, all the things. Husband comes home at five or six or whatever, and then you continue working while your husband doesn’t. That’s kind of the typical way of doing things years ago. 

But a partnership marriage is where we’re talking about all the things that need to be done in the house together, and we’re splitting it in a way that works for our marriage instead of it all just automatically falling on me because I am the woman, because I’m the mom, because I’m the wife, right? 

So if just those things automatically fall on you because of your gender, that’s when it’s like, maybe we need to look at this and talk about it and see if there’s things we need to figure out. So he provides me with an equal partnership in marriage. 

In our family, what this looks like is we kind of switch off. He’ll do laundry one week, I’ll do dishes one week, and we both take care of the kids pretty similarly because we both have similar working schedules. But during the school day, right, he’ll stay home with them one day a week, I’ll stay home with them one day a week, and then we have some child care throughout the week. 

Anyways, it’s going to look different for every single marriage, but his really healthy and honorable providing is that he provides me with an equal partnership marriage where I don’t feel like I have to fight him in order to share the load. 

So let me make a comment here too, when you hear me say privilege, I want you guys to know that it’s not a bad thing. I have privileges as a white person that Black people do not have, and that’s not a bad thing. It just means I get to be aware of it and then use those privileges to do what I can to help other people who don’t have those privileges also live in a safer and more equitable world. 

So for example, part of my privilege as a white person is that I don’t go into rooms thinking about my race. I don’t notice my whiteness. It’s not even something I think about. Whereas a lot of Black people, as I’ve heard their experiences, they say every room I go into, I notice my Blackness. And it’s something that I’m just always kind of aware of, that I’m different, right? 

And so I can use that, recognize that in me, and then recognize that privilege that I have. And then I can use, you know, help my kids learn how to be anti-racist. I myself can learn how to be more anti-racist. I can create business policies where we are, you know, when we hire we try to make sure that we have a really welcoming place and that we’re reaching out to all sorts of people in order to look at all the people who are available to hire. Things like that. 

So if you have privilege as a man in a congregation, let’s say, right? So you’re in a church where women can’t lead congregations, but you can, and maybe you do because you’re a man. You can use your privilege and that really healthy, honorable, providing energy to provide the women in your congregation with some level of equality. And whether that be advocating for them to be able to also lead because they are women, or even if that’s not something that you can do in your religion, there are other things you can do. 

You can provide them with the ability to sit on the stand with you. Like the other women that are leaders in the congregation, allow them similar opportunities that the males have. There’s lots of ideas that you can come up with, but the main idea here is that we’re kind of switching our perception of providing instead of just money, but providing equal opportunity. 

And let me tell you, women really, really, really love this. There’s that book, ACOTAR, A Court of Thorns and Roses, that is so popular among women right now. They love it. And I love it too, it’s so good. It’s so fun. But in the book, there’s these two different men that this main character falls in love with. And the first man is really honorable, really strong and powerful, but he treats her like his wife that is just meant to look pretty and be the woman of the house and do all the womanly things. And his protection vibes with her is like, you have to stay home because I’m scared that you’re going to get hurt. And this is me protecting you. 

And so part of the story is he locks her in the house and it’s a big deal. She freaks out, as any woman would, right, just getting locked in the house. But that’s kind of how he uses his protection energy is like, I’m going to protect you. You’re going to stay home. I’m going to protect you. I’m going to go kill all the bad guys. Don’t worry. I’ve got you. I’m going to protect you. Stay here. 

And then she escapes this and she goes to this other character. And this other character is who all of these women, we just love. We love because his protection energy is, hey, you’re my equal. You’re my equal and I’m going to protect that equality. And so anyone who comes in and makes any comment about how you can’t make decisions here because you’re a woman, I’m protecting that. And I’m reminding them, nope, she is just as equal here in this kingdom as I am. Right? 

And instead of, you know, pushing her away and protecting her by locking her in the house or whatever that is, what he does is he protects her by helping her develop all of her gifts and skills that no one would teach her before because she was a woman. In this book, she has all of these gifts and like powers, but no one helped her develop them because, well, for a number of reasons. 

And so his protection and his providing energy is, let me provide you with the training that you deserve. Let me provide you with the protection of equality. Oh, can you just feel like how much more healed and valiant and honorable that is? 

A great example of this is the Denmark soccer team. The Denmark soccer team, recently the male team, recently refused a pay raise and instead asked that that money go to the women's team to make the pay equitable. So instead of them taking more, they said, hey, instead of us taking this raise, we’d prefer to go to the women's team so that they can be equal to us in what they’re getting. 

Now, worthiness wounds and toxic masculinity, when they hear that, they’re going to say, well, maybe the women don’t bring in as much money. Well, maybe the boy’s team is better, so they do deserve more money. Whereas healed masculinity is going to say, let’s protect some equality here. Let’s provide some sort of equality. 

And yeah, maybe the men’s team does bring in more money, but why? Maybe, just maybe it’s because, you know, women haven’t been allowed to play as long as we have. So this system of soccer we’ve been playing for hundreds of years, and women have only just kind of started in the last, however many years. 

The system has been set up for male sports to make more money. That’s how the system is made, so that male sports will make more money. And so maybe it’s not because they’re less than, but maybe it’s because there’s a little bit of a divide in the system here. And if we refuse the pay raise and instead have it go towards the women’s program, maybe that can provide a little bit more equality. 

Can you feel that? Can you feel how beautiful that is? It’s so, so, so honorable. It’s so much more honorable than benevolent sexism that I was talking about. 

So just as a quick recap, worthiness wounds are a big deal and they hurt. Worthiness wounds can be attached to the protect and provide masculinity roles when benevolent sexism is behind it and when it’s just your worth tied to money is behind it. And instead, when we start to heal our own worthiness wounds, we’re enough, we’re enough. I don’t need to prove my masculinity. I don’t need to prove that I’m strong. I don’t need to prove that I’m all these things. 

Instead, I’m going to use my protection and my providing energy to protect other people’s rights, to protect other people’s equality and to provide equality with my own privilege. Also, I’m going to use it to protect the children and I’m going to use it to protect the people who need protection. Okay. 

What really makes this doable is healing those worthiness wounds inside of you. That part of you that feels like you need to prove yourself, when that part is there, some of these roles become a little bit toxic. 

So, okay, thanks for being here today. Thank you for listening. I loved this conversation. Let’s do more. If anyone has any questions that they want to send in, you can send them to our support at SaraBrewer.com. I’m kind of thinking it might be fun to do some more Q&A episodes. So it can be questions on anything worthiness wounds stuff, it can also just be any question. What are you struggling with when it comes to pornography? What can we work on? What can I help you with? Send those questions in and let’s see if we can do some podcast episodes around the questions that get sent in. 

All right, you guys have a great week. We’ll talk to you later. Bye bye.

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