Life Unwasted

In a volcano camp, Angelie remembers grownups praying over her body while nobody asked what a scared middle schooler actually needed.

Avery talks about growing up in Indonesia with New Tribes Mission, then returning to the United States with a car, a band, and a life that no longer fit the supporter version of who she was supposed to be. She remembers smoky open mics, private journals, family interrogations, and the fear that honesty could cost more than approval.

In Cameroon, Marjorie sat with online strangers, missionary school rules, and a friend’s pain, wondering who would be harmed if she spoke.

A boy on missionary ships keeps Star Wars and superheroes alive, until imagination becomes the door out.

Steve remembers the damp leather seats, the climb into the Malaysian highlands, and the rule that good children did not cry. After losing his mother, gaining new siblings, and moving across continents again, he learned how to smile on command while feeling untethered inside. Years later, a small town in northern Canada, a garden, and evenings with his daughters finally begin to feel like home.

Erin grew up moving between a Kalinga village, the mission center, Faith Academy dorm life, and later the United States, always trying to choose one place that could claim her. She remembers rice pounding, bamboo trips, lockers that felt almost unreal, and a body that froze when danger arrived. Years later, therapy gave language to feelings she had learned to bury, and to the child who wanted sports, friends, and somewhere to stand.

Alicia grew up in Mexico inside a family that knew how to look composed in public while doors slammed at home. A fall from a backyard swing set, a scorpion filled hotel room, white pants in third grade, two cats left behind when the family did not return. Years later, therapy gives those scenes new shape, and Alicia starts practicing a harder skill, asking for what her body and heart need.

She did everything right—faith, marriage, obedience—and still ended up in an abusive home. That’s when she realized: no one was coming to save her. Not even God.

Jonathan was seven when his family moved to Madrid and settled in a neighborhood overwhelmed by heroin use. What began as his parents’ calling turned into a growing rehab community, and his childhood unfolded inside it. He built real relationships with people in recovery, many of whom later died during the AIDS crisis. As an adult, he can see what he couldn’t then. It was not just unusual. It was formative in ways he is still working to understand. * Audio file has been replaced.

This live conversation returns to Holly several years after her original Life Unwasted interview. In the time since, her book, The Missionary Kids: Unmasking the Myths of White Evangelicalism, has entered the world, and she has a different kind of clarity with her. She talks openly about releasing a story she could no longer keep inside anymore and about the uneasy waiting that followed the book launch.After publication, she describes the aftermath as quiet. Responses came slowly and from unexpected places. Missionaries and educators wrote to say the book defined things they had witnessed but never known how to articulate. Within her own family, the subject remains largely untouched, and that is something she chose in order to preserve relationships she knows are fragile.Attention turns to what happens when belief systems get exposed. Anger and defensiveness follows. Holly talks about how writing helped her recognize those reactions without being controlled by them, and how it allowed her to draw a clearer line between evangelical culture and the teachings of Jesus she still takes seriously.Audience members chime in about boarding schools and making sense of childhoods that were formed by constant movement and enforced obedience. The evening talk offers recognition and validation.

A phone line crackles, and Terri laughs through tears, remembering how goodbye always came before she was ready.

This was our very first recording. It has been remastered with the help of our MK friend Justin and now it's ready for your listening pleasure.

Mary recounts growing up in Kenya, Tanzania and the Philippines—where corporal punishment, neglect, and unsafe dorms shaped her childhood. She speaks about using her body as currency, discovering neurodivergence, and the slow, tenacious work of relearning trust and building a life in Virginia Beach. MKs will hear the raw logistics of survival and humane, practical steps toward healing.

Go live your life!

We see you. Hope is a beautiful thing.

Go live!

Home is where our people are /home is where you make it

The Ruins. The in-between.

A big thank you to all of our guests. You make everything possible.

Birthdays. Heartaches. Tears. Growth. Breakthrough.

You're enough. We love you just as you are.

Life is complicated. Embrace the good, the dark, the bad, the hard, the joy.They all mean something. Life is worth living when you're living all of it.

Life gets better; it really does.

You're all phenomenal individuals. Thank you to our guests and also our listeners who've all joined us in this fascinating journey. We will be back in a couple of months.

High school crushes. 20 years later. Everything comes back full circle.

Forgiveness is mine to give. The journey from 'hurt' to 'heal'.Trigger warning: This episode contains discussions related to sexual assault. 

adjusting. strategy. seeing life as-is. life is generally beautiful.

A rebel at heart. Humanity breaking through. The perpetual outsider.

authentic presencesharing traumasYou're much better than you think you are.You're a good person.

An MK childhood in the Philippines collides with a rough return to Texas. Dorm chaos, depression, and purity rules set the fuse. Years later, working as a bouncer, Jim realizes the anger that kept him safe is costing him peace. He turns toward honesty, community, and a kinder ethic. For MKs who grew up between worlds, his path names the tug between armor and openness—and the slow work of healing.

In this conversation, Caleb and Kyumin sit down with Clare, whose story stretches from Faith Academy in the Philippines to Lancaster, England, where she now serves as a priest and chaplain at a secular university.Clare grew up as a missionary kid in institutional settings where “normal” family life was replaced by dorms, rules, and carefully managed emotions. Early boarding school experiences meant systemic homesickness, distance from parents, and the sense that her own feelings weren’t safe to express.After returning to the UK, Clare wrestled with what it meant to belong anywhere—culturally, spiritually, or emotionally. Her journey included a difficult time at university marked by a suicide attempt, a later diagnosis of bipolar disorder, and even a heart attack tied to undiagnosed heart issues. Along the way, she found therapy that helped her name what had happened and begin to claim her own story.Now a chaplain in a secular university context, Clare lives in the tension of loving parts of the Christian tradition while refusing to stay silent about harm—especially around sexuality, power, and mental health. She talks openly about leaving a toxic local church, learning to listen to her body, and discovering practices like meditation and yoga that help her manage ADHD and her drive for risk and adrenaline.Together, Clare, Caleb, and Kyumin explore what it means to hold onto the heart of Jesus’ teachings—solidarity with the marginalized, resistance to empire and militarism—while walking away from the systems that try to own those teachings.This episode is for anyone who’s ever sat in a pew wondering if they’re the only one thinking, “If this is supposed to be good news, why does it feel so crushing?” and for MKs who are still trying to figure out what “home” and “faith” might look like on their own terms.⸻In This Episode, We Talk About: • Growing up as a missionary kid at Faith Academy and in other institutional settings • The impact of early boarding school life: limited contact with parents, systemic homesickness, and “acceptable” emotions • Returning to the UK and trying to fit into a culture that didn’t quite feel like home • University years, suicidality, and being diagnosed with bipolar disorder • Surviving a heart attack and learning to listen to her body’s warnings • How ADHD, adrenaline-seeking, and risk have shaped Clare’s life—and how practices like meditation and yoga help her regulate • Becoming a priest and university chaplain in England and working in a largely secular context • Leaving a toxic local church and choosing herself, even when others might not understand • Why some Christian counseling can be harmful—and Clare’s caution about “Christian therapists” focused more on conversion than care • Reconciling her understanding of Jesus with the politics of empire, militarism, and state-church entanglement • What a more spacious, honest, and compassionate faith looks like for her now

In this episode of Life Unwasted, Kyumin and Caleb talk with Micah, a Brazilian missionary kid who grew up between West Africa and South America, in dangerous neighborhoods and strict boarding schools. Micah shares what it meant to live between cultures, lose a close friend in high school, and slowly reevaluate — and ultimately leave — the faith that shaped his childhood. Join us for this incredible interview with another fantastic missionary kid…In This Episode, We Talk About: • Micah’s parents’ experience of being sent to boarding school in Senegal at a very young age • Growing up Brazilian while being educated in Western, evangelical school systems • Learning English quickly and living in a part of Africa where daily life included real danger • Attending a New Tribes boarding school in Brazil and what that environment was like • The death of a close high school friend and how that loss shaped Micah’s view of God, risk, and calling • What it feels like to live “between cultures” without a clear sense of home • Micah’s outside-looking-in view of American white evangelicalism • The long, quiet process of questioning and eventually leaving the church • How he’s now thinking about meaning, community, and his own story on the other side of faith

In Season 8, Episode 2 of Life Unwasted, Kyumin and Caleb talk with Josh about the long, messy work of making sense of your story when faith, family, and “calling” were all tangled together.Together, we explore what it’s like to carry experiences you were never given language for, how shame and silence can shape a kid’s whole world, and what healing can look like years later when you finally start telling the truth — to yourself and to others.This conversation sits right in the heart of what Life Unwasted is about:making space for stories that were minimized or dismissed,honoring the kid you used to be, andimagining a future where your voice, your boundaries, and your body actually matter.Whether you grew up as a missionary kid, pastor’s kid, or simply in a high-control religious home, Josh’s honesty and reflection might give you new words for your own experience — and remind you that you’re not alone in trying to untangle it all.In This Episode, We Talk About:Growing up in a religious environment where certain feelings weren’t allowedThe quiet ways kids learn to “disappear” to keep adults happyHow spiritual language can be used to explain away harmThe cost of speaking the truth about what happened — and the freedom it can bringWhat healing looks like when you’re still connected to people and places from your pastLearning to listen to your body, your boundaries, and your intuitionFinding community with others who “get it”

SummaryCaleb and Kyumin, both former missionary kids, sit down with filmmaker Ari Ali, creator of Ben Between Africa. Ari tells the story of trying to understand her mother’s MK experience and what that journey opened up inside their family. We talk about love, calling, silence, and what it takes to start real conversations at home. This episode is for MKs, parents, and anyone curious about the long arc of repair.Why this mattersMK stories often live in the gaps between what happened and what was ever said. Ari’s film gives language and shape to those gaps. This conversation explore show art can help families tell the truth, keep dignity, and stop passing pain forward.Topics we cover·      What Ari set out to learn about her mom, and what surprised her·      How filming changed the way their family talks about their past·      Boarding school, separation, and attachment·      The line between honoring a calling and naming a cost·      What MK parents can do today to break cycles·      Practical steps for more authentic conversations at homeResources mentioned·      Ben Between Africa (film): https://www.benbetweenafrica.com/·       The Missionary Kids: Unmasking the Myths of White Evangelicalism (Book): https://www.broadleafbooks.com/store/product/9798889832034/The-Missionary-Kids

This episode centers on Rachel’s deeply personal story of survival, recovery, and breaking generational cycles of abuse within a fundamentalist missionary family. Rachel recounts growing up in a controlling religious environment, being sexually abused by her brother, and later manipulated by her father, a missionary who isolated her from her mother under false pretenses. Her story mirrors those of previous generations—her mother and grandmother suffered similar abuse and silencing within the church. Rachel’s eventual marriage to a pastor repeated these cycles of control, religious hypocrisy, and suppression of her voice. After years of emotional trauma and illness, she experiences a profound physical and spiritual reckoning, ultimately finding strength to leave her abusive marriage in 2022. With the help of a few trusted friends, she rebuilds her life, opening her first bank account at 39, reclaiming her autonomy, and beginning to help other women facing similar oppression. She reflects on the hypocrisy of religious systems that shield abusers and silence victims, contrasting these with her rediscovery of authentic faith and community. The metaphor of the “Phoenix” recurs throughout her story—a symbol of rebirth, healing, and empowerment. The podcast hosts emphasize the need for systemic accountability in the church and celebrate Rachel’s courage as an act of collective liberation. Key takeaways include the intergenerational impact of trauma, the psychological and physical toll of silence, the power of truth-telling, and the transformative potential of supportive relationships.

Go family!

Durian!

Toss salad!

You're welcome here!

Cool Nerds!

Go MKs!

I'm free to be me!

The venture continues!

I am proud

Cry more

Blaze

We can grow Trigger Warning: Episode contains mention of sexual assault and suicide/self harm.

Sleeping on the library roof

Go Vanguards

Go be!