Finding Your True Identity: Breaking Free from the Counterfeit Life with Eric Moyer

In this exciting episode of Morning Tea with Coach Kennedy, we dive into the fascinating world of identity with the incredible Eric Moyer! As a researcher, author, and founder of Redeeming Identity, Eric shares his inspiring journey from educator to expert in educational psychology, showcasing how understanding our identity can truly transform our lives!

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Good morning everybody. Today is Friday, July tenth, two thousand twenty-six. And this is your morning tea with Coach Kennedy. Last week we learned about how breathing techniques, mindfulness, meditation can improve stress management with Asher Lester. This week we dive into the world of identity with Eric Moyer. Stay tuned. Today's guest is Eric Moyer, who is a researcher, author, and speaker with an with a background as an educational consultant and is the founder of Redeeming Identity. His focus is helping other educators, pastors, and leaders across the country on how understanding our identity can change while we grow and heal. Hi, Eric. How are you today?

SPEAKER_00 2:07

I'm doing great. How about yourself, Sarah?

SPEAKER_01 2:10

I'm good, thanks. Would you like to tell us about yourself and how you found your path?

SPEAKER_00 2:17

Wow. I would absolutely love to. So my start was as a teacher, but just like anything, journeys always take you on different directions. There's always those places where you have intersections that you kind of go one way or the other. And I've had lots of those that have taken me through from being an educator to being in ministry to getting my PhD in educational psychology to where I am now in being, as you said, an author, a speaker, a coach, somewhat around the concept of Christian identity. And it it was an interesting path to during my work and getting my PhD in educational psychology, that I found that I had a real passion for the idea of identity and how that intersects with religion, and specifically the focus of my research over the past couple of years has been Christian identity and the intersection with educational psychology.

SPEAKER_01 3:27

Wow, that sounds like you've been on quite an extensive journey there with a lot of educational background and learning things. I'm kind of curious as to why you think our identity changes as we grow and heal.

SPEAKER_00 3:46

Well, part of the idea of the the idea of redeeming identity is that we were created, we were created to have a purpose, to have a design. And the world around us is always telling us all of these things about who we're supposed to be. And or on the other side, you can be anything that you want to be. So we always get these conflicting messages that we're many times trying to meet based on which groups and which messages that we're hearing. And we're many times trying to conform, if you want to think about that, to what other people and what society and the messages that we're getting, and we end up getting what I call in the book a corrupted identity. It's not the identity, the person that we were meant to be, but what we're doing is we're trying to meet all of these different expectations that have been communicated to us. But then as we are kind of on that journey, kind of like my own, it's this idea that we start figuring out that who we have become is not really who we were meant to be. And so that's when we we continue to start searching for that identity, for that who we're who we were created to be, our true identity, if you want to think about it that way. And so as we are growing, as we are changing, the goal is always trying to become closer to, if you want to think about it, we have that aspirational identity, and that's what we're trying to become, so that we can live out of that authentic life that we were really designed to live out of.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Yeah. Exactly. A lot of and a lot of us truly struggle, and some of us never really find our true identity, and we just struggle all our life to find out what life we're supposed to be really living, and we can tell that we're living the life of a quote unquote imposter. That they're not our authentic selves, but we just don't know, don't have the tools to how to get there.

SPEAKER_00 6:05

Right. Yeah, I I I think of it like I use not the idea of imposter, but this idea of a counterfeit. It's I don't know if you've ever been to New York and you go to, I think it's Canal Street, where they have that whole stretch where you can buy pretty much anything, but 90% of what you're gonna end up buying is a counterfeit. It looks very much the same. It can be useful, but it's not really the true thing that you the true thing that you were hoping to get. And that's kind of like a lot of our identities. What we do is we have adopted an identity that really is something that we're hoping fulfills everything that we meet, but we find out in the in the end that it was that there's something not quite true about it. It's that counterfeit. And sometimes we get tired. I know so many people that have that I've talked with that eventually they've settled. They're like, okay, this is as good as I'm gonna get, and they kind of go, No, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna settle with this. This is good enough. And it's kind of like they're gonna walk around with the counterfeit handbag for the rest of their life instead of really striving for that really true identity that they were meant for.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

Yeah, exactly. And that's so sad when people do that because everyone does deserve to find their true identity. I'm kind of curious what happened in your life that made you realize that you were living a counterfeit life? You said that you started out as a teacher, and then your life took a turn. What was the catalyst event that happened?

SPEAKER_00 7:49

It was actually really interesting. I was writing an article recently that that kind of got me thinking about that exact question. And I was a teacher, and then I moved into doing ministry for for a number of years, and I thought that I had found my purpose. I thought that I had found exactly what I was meant to be and what to do. And I was working along that path, and I was having a conversation with a leader that I knew and that I really trusted, and I was talking with him about my idea that like this was my purpose, this is my path, this is kind of what I was going to focus on and go down in that direction. And he looked at me and he kind of went, I know you, and I know you really well, and no, I don't think that that's really it. This and he knew me really, I mean, I knew I trusted this man really well. And he's like, I don't think that this is quite where the direction you're supposed to be going down. And it was in one of those intersection points where it was like, okay, I could either keep pushing going down that path, or I could take that wisdom, that piece of information from a person that I trusted, and really then take that re-look at things. And I found myself looking forward and opening up possibilities, which I had never thought of before. And that was that intersection point where it's like, okay, if this is not where I'm supposed to be, what are what could be the possibilities of where I could go? And that was kind of the intersection point that that moved me into a new direction where I started going into research and looking at this, which has gotten me to the point where I really enjoy what I'm doing. I enjoy the the message that I've the research that I've done and and the ability to help people in a much deeper and I think meaningful way than I could have if I would have stayed in on that other path.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

That's excuse me. That's interesting that you said that somebody else told you that that was not the correct path for you to be on. It was close, maybe, but not the exact true path. And that something inside of you said to listen to your person that you were trusting. And I'm kind of curious, how did you know to trust his instinct versus your own? What what was that defining factor knowing that maybe that's worth looking into?

SPEAKER_00 10:39

It actually took it's actually really interesting. It sounds like I I like sat there and I was like, okay, great, yeah, I agree with that. At first I was like, no, he's wrong. No, that's that's absolutely no, no, that's the wrong thing. And that was my first instinct. My first instinct was just to, because that's kind of me a little bit. It's like I'm just gonna rebel against what someone else tells me and go my own pathway anyway. But as I kind of processed it and went, okay, so if I continue down that path, it's gonna be kind of running up against other people that are very much like this gentleman, which I did trust and I understood what he where he was coming from. Or I could look at different possibilities. And it was my it my first instinct was to like say, nope, you're wrong. But then it was the as I kept moving forward, it was the reality, the realization that there was more out there that I could have gone. And that's kind of opened up the it was really the question of was I so focused on who I thought it was at that moment that I wasn't going to let it go? Or was I willing to let go of something of who I thought it was at that moment to then open up the possibility of accepting something even better?

SPEAKER_01 12:10

That's perfect. Excuse me. I know for myself that some I'm kind of the same way. When somebody suggests something to me and says, hey, you know, this path over here might be a better option for you. Or even when people have told me, hey, you deserve something better than what you're currently doing, I couldn't see it. I I it was kind of like if I had an invisible wall in front of my face. And I had to to kind of break down that wall so I could see what other people were seeing true about myself. But I I had to do like a lot of inner work in order as a tool, figurative tool, to knock down that wall. And then once I saw this other side, then I oh okay. Now I can see what people are saying.

SPEAKER_00 13:06

Yeah, it's it's kind of an interesting thing that whenever we kind of work whenever we are on a path, sometimes we get that tunnel vision, we get that hyperfocus where we're we I don't know if you've ever walked I love hiking. And sometimes you can get on a path and you start hiking and you're looking at the path, but so many times I find myself not stopping and looking at everything around me that is that is out there. And I think we do the same thing. We get on a path, we get on a I we've we kind of set our identity a little bit, and we think, okay, this is who I am, this is who I was meant to be, and then we hyperfocus on that. And we don't we we sometimes miss the possibilities of what could be because we're so focused. And and that's when I think having other people speak into us is a real benefit. But that's also sometimes, and I think you may have experienced this as well experiences come, situations come, tragedies come, difficulties come that really sometimes shake us and help us to get past that hyperfocus because they almost force us to look at things in a different way. And we may not see, I think you said this just a second ago, it's like you may not see the benefit of that situation until you get to the other side. But the benefit was that it forced you to look at something and your life and your identity and your purpose and all of that in a different way, which helped you move in a direction that you may not have done otherwise.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

Yeah, very true. For me, the thing that happened to me was betrayal. I was severely, severely betrayed by someone that was very near and dear to my heart. And once I found out that they had betrayed me so severely, I said, that is enough of that shit. I will never allow myself to experience that ever again. And that's kind of what cracked me open and catalyst me onto my path because I wanted to make sure that I could educate people, one, on the type of people that are out there in case people don't know, because a lot of us are very naive as to how people truly are. So I wanted to educate them about that and make sure that nobody could feel the pain that I have felt. And so that's why I became a life coach, so I could basically protect people and educate people and make sure that people are are getting to their core authentic selves like I did and to live their best life because that's what we truly are meant to do on this earth is live the best possible, the most happiest, loving, most fulfilling life that we could possibly can. So excellent. When you were going through your transition and you noticed that maybe you were quote unquote repeating old patterns or something that might not be in alignment with where you were going, what did you do to make sure that you are keeping on track and not sliding backwards?

SPEAKER_00 16:50

That I think that that actually gets a lot to what we talk about in my book, Redeeming Identity, which is that what we do ends up coming from who we are. And I think you said it just a second ago. We we tend to go back to old patterns very easily, because that is really the foundation of who we are, the old perspectives, the old principles or truths that we hold, and the old purposes that we live from. So one of the things that I learned from both doing the research and from my own self is that this idea of transforming who we are, the which ends up impacting what we do, and you said it gets to who we are at our core, is it's not it's not at all like you can't do everything at one time. It is these small progressive steps of transformation that that that we go through. And it is it is this idea, and like I talk about identity, and you've heard me, I think I've said this a few times, but the what we call the four Ps our principles, our perspectives, our purposes, and our priorities. That's what determines, that's what defines who we are, our identity. So as we're going through that transformation, it's just recognizing that I'm not trying to change everything at once, but it may be that I just need to change a perspective. I need to change how I'm viewing something. It's how I am interpreting the viewing the world, viewing the people around me, viewing the circumstances. And it's not that I'm changing all of them. It's just maybe that I'm changing one. And if I see myself that I'm going backwards and I'm working from an old perspective that I thought that I had gotten rid of a while ago, it's recognizing that it's a process. It's a, it's okay that I slip every once in a while. Be have some grace and some mercy on yourself and just recognize that you're not per you're not maybe all the way there yet, but then just reinforce that you're just going to try, recognize that it's still there, and work to figure out why it is still there, and how can you then go back to that new perspective that you wanted to come out, that you wanted to see things from.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

That is that is a very good way to go about it. Just re I I call it go back to your why. Why are we doing this? And then when you are going back to your why, then it kind of redirects your old thinking again to your new thinking. It's kind of like the the saying rinse and repeat. Well, you mentioned four Ps. Can we dive into that a little bit more?

SPEAKER_00 19:58

Please, yeah. The alright, whenever I started looking at identity and I looked at the research, especially in Christian literature about identity, I saw that there was literature that was basically saying your identity is based on what your purpose is. And I think that that's an important thing. Some people were saying it's all about what you know. You just have to change your in the information, which is your principles. I found in psychology that it's actually not one or the other, it's actually all four that work together. It's what I call the four P's, the principles, your truths. These are the things that are the foundation. This is your beliefs, your beliefs of how do you define things. Then from that, you create perspectives. This is how you interpret things, this is how you see the world, this is how you come into a circumstance and you interpret the certain situation, the relationships because of how you view things, your perspective. That also then impacts your purpose, your why, your motivation. We do things because we have a purpose, but there's meaning to that purpose. And so your purpose helps provide motivation and meaning for why do we do things. But then there's always this last step, which I always call priorities. It's that how do we make decisions? What do we say is of primary importance that or of more importance than another? So it helps us make the correct decisions when we come up to a place where we maybe have two things that may seem to be different purposes in the same circumstance. How do I know which one do I am I going to work towards? And that's our priorities. What is important, what's not, what is of most importance.

SPEAKER_01 21:51

Perfect. You mentioned just right now, sometimes we have two options that might come up while we're on our path. How do we know besides our priorities? How do we know which choice is truly meant for us to complete while while we're on our path, and it won't deter us and make us go on a different path altogether?

SPEAKER_00 22:23

Yes, it is besides our priorities, but that really is how we make our decisions. I I tell this story in the book, which I think is really a great thing to remember because it's a different way of thinking about. If you think about how people think about priorities, and if you someone told you to write out A list of your like top 25 priorities of what you were going to do. And an old man told this business, this young businessman, that this is what he was supposed to do. And then afterwards, he told him, circle the top five of his priorities. And so the young man comes back and says, Okay, I get your lesson. I have my top five priorities. I'm supposed to spend most of my time here. And then like any time left over is the rest of the 20. And the old man looked at him and he said, nope, that's not the lesson. The lesson is those top five priorities, that's what you spend all of your time on. The other 20 are just distractions. And I think that's the way I think about priorities is what is your priority? What is the priority? What is the thing that you want to or you feel most called to in your life? That is what we want to focus on. That's what we want to make our goal. That's what we want to put all of our energy into. Anything else that is not one of those top priorities is just a distraction.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

I like that a lot because I've often wondered for myself, and I know I'm not alone in this, what is actually my what actually matters, what actually doesn't matter. And I know that I can tell the difference between what matters and what doesn't matter, just like everyone else can. However, sometimes when I'm in that very tough spot where it's like neck and neck, that list would be so helpful because then I could be like, yep, this is a distraction because this is not in alignment with where I'm going. So I think I'm gonna actually start doing that because that's very useful.

SPEAKER_00 24:40

It's a different way of thinking about priorities because we we try to, we're told so much in our culture that you can do everything. And you can become everything and you can hold on to everything. But the reality is that if you try that, you become a person that is a mile wide and an inch deep. And you don't really get the joy that you were really meant to experience because you were meant to be a specific, you were created to be a specific person with a specific identity, and that's the goal, that's the priority that we want to we want to help people discover.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Yeah, it truly is. You know, you use uh an analogy about a mile wide and an inch deep, and that kind of reminds me of when I was going to my coaching class, and they were saying that if you don't niche out that you're going to be for everybody and nobody all at the same time, which is essentially the same thing as what you just said about being a mile wide and an inch deep. You're everywhere and nowhere.

SPEAKER_00 25:55

Right. And that's and that's not, it's like you you're spreading, you're spread so so thin, you're spreading your life so thin that there's really no no place that you really deeply are invested. And I think that that is one of the challenges is that people try to be everything to everyone or in every circumstance, and you can't. You you you really need to have those priorities as part of your identity and really start figuring out what those priorities are.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

And they can change.

SPEAKER_00 26:36

They can.

SPEAKER_01 26:37

They can. Um what is one way, or what is the best way that you would recommend someone to start building trust within themselves so they can know that they're making the best choices for themselves?

SPEAKER_00 26:57

Well, I come at this, and I'm gonna I'm gonna say this from my perspective, but I come at this from a from a religious perspective. And so my answer would be probably is gonna be very specific, is that there is a part of recognizing that we were created for a purpose and that there is a and I believe that there is a God that created us for a purpose. And sometimes the first step is trying to build, reconnect that relationship with God, where we can kind of go, okay, I know that I've been kind of going down my pathway for a long time. I need maybe some guidance on who I was really meant to be. And I think to me, the first step is really that one step of going back and recognizing that we were created for something by someone who knows us, who loves us, who has a passion for us to be everything that he created us to be, so that we can experience everything that he wants us to experience. And so sometimes I think always for me, the first step is going back to that step, is kind of reaching out and finding that relationship with God that is going to help provide that direction that we sometimes can't find on our own.

SPEAKER_01 28:34

Beautiful. What's one way that you would best connect with God? Or as some people might want to call it, the universe, divine source.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

For me, I find that I mean in Christianity, it's the Bible. It's getting to know them. But I think it's not just doing it, just doing it because we want to do it. I know so many people who are in religion, and they do the religion because that's what they've always done. And this is one of the things I actually talk about as from a personal standpoint, is that if you're going to do this, it whether it's connecting with God or whatever, wherever you're gonna go, but with God, in my case, I there's practices of reading the Bible, of prayer, of spending time alone separate from sometimes the world around us, and just focusing on getting to know Him. And there's an intentionality of doing those things, of reading the Bible in prayer, of not doing it because I'm supposed to do it because it's a religious practice. There's a difference. Whenever you're doing it with an intention of getting to know who God is so that he can show you who he created you to be, there's an intention there. It's like you if you have a relationship with someone that you really that you really trust, you want to stop and spend time with them and get to know them, but there's an intentionality in taking time, stepping away from sometimes the other distractions that are out there, and spending time getting to know them. And I think that that's one of the things that I that I always recommend is go back to some of those spiritual practices, but now do it with an intention that may be different. Of I'm not just doing it just to do it. I'm doing it because there's a purpose of I want to discover who I was meant to be.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

Perfect. I really, I really like that a lot because there is a huge difference between just doing a religion to be doing it and to do it to find out who we are. So very well said. Eric, thank you so much for your time today, sir. Is there anything else that you want the audience to know about you, your business, what you do, or how to work with you one-on-one?

SPEAKER_00 31:17

No, I I really appreciate the time. I enjoy the conversation, sir. It's it's been great. If people want to get to know a little bit more about what I research and my book, I do have a website called Redeeming Identity. And I'll also send you a link. Um, so if you want to put it, I don't know if you do show notes, but I can send you a link. The book has just been released. Actually, today is really the first day. It's actually on Amazon. So we're celebrating that. And you can get it through Amazon, but you can also get it through my website, and I'll probably send a coupon. So if people are interested, they can go to my website and use the coupon code to get a discount on the book.

SPEAKER_01 32:03

Perfect. That is excellent. And I don't do show notes, but I put put it in the description.

SPEAKER_00 32:09

That would be great.

SPEAKER_01 32:10

Yeah. I'll put everything in the description so that way everyone has access to it.

SPEAKER_00 32:15

Excellent.

SPEAKER_01 32:16

And I hope that you have a wonderful day and continue to do wonderful things with your business and your writings. And thank you so much for your time today.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

Well, thank you for you. And I I hope that everything goes well with your coaching and that you continue to help people discover who they were meant to be. So thank you for the work that you do, Sarah.

SPEAKER_01 32:40

Oh, thank you so much. Talk to you later.

SPEAKER_00 32:43

Talk to you later.

SPEAKER_01 32:45

Bye.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_01 32:47

And there you have it, folks. If you want to work with Eric one-on-one, feel free to check out his website, RedeemingIdentity.com. And for more coaching tips and tricks or to work with me one on one, feel free to check me out at Guiding Pathways on Instagram or Facebook. Until next week, everyone, this has been your morning tea with Coach Kennedy.