This Whole Life
How does our mental health relate to our faith? How can we become whole while living in a broken world? Every day, we all strive to encounter God amidst the challenges of balancing faith and family, work and leisure, our sense of self and complicated relationships. Pat & Kenna Millea bring joy, hope, and wisdom to those who believe there *is* a connection between holiness and happiness. Kenna is a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist; Pat served for 15 years as a youth minister; together they have 7 children and a perfectly imperfect marriage. From their education and experience, they share tools, resources, interviews, and stories that point the way to sanity and sanctity. (Music: "You're Not Alone" by Marie Miller. Used with permission.)
This Whole Life
Ep103 Addicted to Hustle: What Your Busyness Is Really Covering Up
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"When we are busy, we are numbed out to this sense of inadequacy that we all know is real. Deep, deep, deep down." ~ Kenna Millea
What does it actually look like to be addicted to the hustle and not even realize it?
How does staying perpetually busy become a coping strategy for the deeper questions we are afraid to sit with?
What if the solution to your busyness is not better time management, but a ruthless commitment to doing less?
In episode 103 of This Whole Life, Pat and Kenna Millea get honest about their own addiction to hustle. Drawing on John Mark Comer's The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, they explore why so many of us, including two licensed therapists who know better, cannot seem to slow down, and what our busyness is really covering up.
They dig into the spiritual roots of hurry, why John Mark Comer calls it the greatest threat to the interior life, and how the Catholic social tradition has been telling us for over a century that work was made for man, not the other way around. Kenna shares a moment from her own therapy that reframed everything: the possibility that her anxiety has been masking depression all along, and that staying busy is the most productive-looking way to avoid sitting with the hard questions of the human experience. Pat gets equally honest about the cost of hurry in his own fatherhood, admitting that far too often he is yelling at his kids not because of what they are doing, but because he is in a hurry and their seven-year-old slowness is incompatible with his schedule.
They close with four practical S's from Comer's book: silence and solitude, Sabbath, simplicity, and slowing. The challenge is to pick just one and try it for a week.
This episode is for anyone who has answered "how are you doing?" with "so busy" and quietly wondered why that answer feels both true and empty at the same time.
Chapters:
- (00:00) - Cold Open
- (00:37) - Welcome and Episode Intro
- (01:47) - Lightning Round: 90 Seconds with Kenna
- (09:39) - Highs and Hards
- (16:07) - Why We Might Be the Worst People to Host This Episode
- (17:46) - The Spiritual Roots of Busyness
- (21:41) - The Mental and Emotional Cost of Hurry
- (34:12) - Busyness as a Coping Strategy
- (42:47) - The Louis C.K. Conan Clip and Joy Antibodies
- (47:29) - Four Ways to Fight Back: The Four S's
- (54:00) - Challenge by Choice
- (54:55) - Closing Prayer
Links and Resources:
- The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer
- Louis C.K. on Conan: Everything's Amazing and Nobody's Happy (language warning, do not watch with kids)
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Interested in more faith-filled mental health resources? Check out the Martin Center for Integration
Music: "You're Not Alone" by Marie Miller. Used with permission.
