071: Unearthing Buried Truths and Confronting our Culture with Chanchal Garg

Could spiritual abuse be more universal than we think?

In this eye-opening conversation with author and speaker Chanchal Garg, she shows that it doesn't matter what faith background you find yourself in; the underlying themes of spiritual abuse are universal. Chanchal shares her story of spiritual and sexual abuse in a South Asian context and talks openly about her experience in her debut memoir, Unearthed: The Lies We Carry & The Truths We Bury. She hopes survivors—across faith backgrounds—can find themselves beneath the false narratives they inherit from their families, cultures, and systems.

You'll hear how:

• All trauma is spiritual trauma.
• Cultural context shapes our understanding of identity.
• Navigating dual identities can be challenging.
• Surrender can be a complex process.
• Naming can be a powerful act of reclaiming identity.
• Self-compassion is crucial for personal growth.

Guest Spotlight ✨ 

Chanchal is a speaker, author, executive coach and conscious leadership facilitator.

For over seven years, she has facilitated Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business’ most popular elective course on interpersonal dynamics, impacting over 500 future business leaders. As the founder of Real Space, a thriving six-figure coaching business, she guides leaders to transcend cultural and societal constraints, harnessing their personal power in both work and life.

Chanchal is the author of Unearthed: The Lies We Carry & The Truths They Bury. Her expertise has been showcased through speaking engagements, including Lululemon’s International Women’s Day event, and podcasts such as She Has the Mic and The Healing Place.

Website | Instagram 

Links & Resources 🔗

• Unearthed by Chanchal Garg | Amazon | Bookshop
• The Wisdom of Your Body by Dr. Hillary McBride | Amazon | Bookshop
• The Neverending Story by Michael Ende | Amazon | Bookshop
• The Wingfeather Saga by Andrew Peterson  | Amazon | Bookshop
• IMPACT Personal Safety website

Other Episodes You May Like

• 001: Navigating Toxic Systems and Maintaining Agency with Dr. Alison Cook
• 046: Unity in Diversity and the Work of Healing with the Religious Trauma Network

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Broken to Beloved is a 501(c)3 nonprofit that works to provide practical resources for recovery from and safeguarding against spiritual abuse. Our programs like this podcast are made possible in part by the generous donations of our supporters. Consider joining our community of supporters with a gift of $25 today.

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Episode Transcript 📄

Chanchal Garg
We live a life with these narratives that we've inherited, that we've learned, that we've absorbed from our parents, from our culture, from our school, from our organization, from our country, whatever it is. And we never truly get to see who we are. And so I started to see this theme show up everywhere in my work, even in my own family. And this abuse gets to be perpetuated when there's silence, when there's this narrative that silence equals loyalty, that silence equals devotion, that tolerance equals devotion. I didn't want that to perpetuate in the larger society as well as in my family.

Brian Lee
Hey, friends. Welcome back to the Broken to Beloved Podcast. If you're looking for practical resources for recovery from and safeguarding against spiritual abuse, then this is the place for you. I'm your host, Brian Lee. As an ordained pastor and spiritual abuse survivor, I know what it feels like navigating life after spiritual abuse. I also know what it's like to want to prevent anything from happening to the people you love. It's why broken to beloved exists.

And, we can't do it alone. We need your help. Support our work by becoming a donor to help make our podcast and programs possible. Just head to brokentobeloved.org/support or click the link to donate in the show notes.

We're having a different conversation today. I'm talking with Chanchal Garg about her experience with spiritual abuse in a South Asian Indian context. It is a beautiful conversation, and I hope you hear how much we have in common rather than dismissing her story because you don't know if it'll have any relevance to you. Chanchal is a speaker, author, executive coach, and conscious leadership facilitator. For over seven years, she's facilitated Stanford University's Graduate School of Businesses' most popular elective course on interpersonal dynamics, impacting over 500 future business leaders.

As the founder of Real Space, a thriving six-figure coaching business, she guides leaders to transcend cultural and societal constraints, harnessing their power in both work and life. Chanchal is the author of Unearthed: The Lies We Carry and the Trues They Bury. Her expertise has been showcased through speaking engagements, including Lululemon's International Women's Day event and podcasts such as She Has The Mic and The Healing Place. Now, here's my conversation with our new friend, Chanchal. Chanchal, welcome to the podcast.

Chanchal Garg
Thank you so much for having me, Brian.

Brian Lee
Yeah, it's good to have here. I mentioned in the intro, but this is going to be a different conversation, which I'm honestly excited about because you do not come from a Christian background, but you've experienced spiritual abuse. What I want us to realize is that it's so much bigger than one religion or one belief system. I'm grateful you reached out.

Chanchal Garg
Thank you so much. And yes, it's definitely not isolated to one religion or belief system. I'm excited for this conversation.

Brian Lee
Yeah. And we're here to, like I said earlier, to just chase down curiosity and see where it leads us. It's like one of our values is to not have all the answers and to not be certain about things and to be okay with asking big and difficult questions. And we're here to talk about your book, Unearthed. Dr. Alison Cook often says that all trauma is spiritual trauma because we are all spiritual beings. I really appreciated hearing that. I learned that recently in the last few months, and it's like, Oh, that makes so much more sense because I think people often have a hard time understanding or giving language or definition to what spiritual abuse is. And how is it different from other abuse? Or if it's emotional or physical or financial or sexual or any of these things, and they can all be wrapped up under spiritual abuse. What is your understanding or your definition of spiritual abuse?

Chanchal Garg
Well, I love what you just said, and I very much resonate with this idea that all trauma is spiritual abuse. And And with that said, when I think about my book, my experience, the way I'm looking at spiritual abuse is when someone uses their power to control the spiritual beliefs of another or to manipulate the spiritual beliefs of another person. And so that was my experience, and that's how I look at spiritual abuse.

Brian Lee
Yeah, that's right on. And I think that's what will resonate with so many people who are listening. It's like, okay, it's not just me. And the dynamics are so similar in so many different contexts. For those who may not be familiar with your story, which I imagine is a lot of people in our community, and we'll obviously talk about your book and recommend it at the end, would you give us the short overhead, flyover version of it?

Chanchal Garg
Yeah, absolutely. So Unearthed: The Lies We Carry and the Truths They Bury is about my journey through spiritual and sexual abuse. It is how I was raised because I was born and raised in the United States, fully educated, double master's degree, all of that. And yet there was a grooming that happened. There was a set of ways that I was raised in that allowed this abuse to happen, a way that created a mindset for me that allowed this abuse to happen. The book takes you through what that looks like, takes you through the abuse itself. And then the main portion of the book, which is my own reclamation, my own spiritual reclamation, my own cultural reclamation, all of that, and my reclamation of myself, honestly, because it's hard to, as you know, find yourself and your own spirituality after going through this type of abuse.

Brian Lee
Yeah, I appreciate that. And I think when we don't have an awareness of the culture that we're raised in, it's really hard to recognize the potentially toxic things that are completely normalized for us. And I love how much time you spent at the beginning bringing us into your world and helping us to understand that cultural context, because that's huge for me, too, because I come from Korean-American background, raised by two Korean immigrants. So I'm first generation here as well. And it's just this idea of growing up with your foot in two different worlds and then trying to find your way through school. I loved reading the way that you started out in school, trying to hold on to as much of your heritage and ethnicity and culture as you could while navigating the tension of also wanting to fit in and standing out. You tell this beautiful story of... Was it the talent show that you did the dance?

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
And be a landmark moment for you, of being able to own that and be proud of it and be recognized and seen for it rather than bullied or teased or called out for it. Would you tell us a little bit about that moment for you?

Chanchal Garg
Absolutely, yeah. I I used to love, still do, but don't practice it anymore, Indian classical dancing. I was learning from a local teacher, and the school talent show came up. This was in high school, I want to say my sophomore year. I decided to perform an Indian classical dance, and it was a nine-minute long dance. I went to a school that didn't have a lot of diversity. It was primarily white. People were not not aware of other cultures. Performing this felt like a pretty big risk.

At the same time, I was not one of those kids who was trying to abandon my heritage, as you said. I really loved my heritage. It was something I was trying to incorporate. I wanted to be both Indian and American. I didn't want to have to choose. I said, Okay, I'm going to bring this forward. Got into the talent show, went up there, performed, was so nervous, so, so nervous during this, and was pleasantly surprised afterwards with the cheers and the appreciation. And even for the entire week after I performed, got so many messages of appreciation of like, wow, your stamina was amazing. Your costume was amazing.

That was incredible. I can't believe you did that. All of these things. And it actually led me to take more risks to start to become more active in the choir and the drama and all of those kinds of things, which was really the highlight of my high school years. And so, yeah, I loved how bringing my culture and that performance aspect into my experience allowed for that to happen.

Brian Lee
Yeah. There's that reconciling, I don't know about you, but for me, it was always such this wrestling of growing up in my dad's Korean church, growing up in a family that spoke Korean at home. It was like we were each one-way translators where my parents would speak to us in Korean and we would respond in English. And there's a mental block for me. And I've heard J. S. Park is a Korean chaplain who's down in Tampa who writes about this a little bit. The Korean language for him has been blocked out because it was so bullied and traumatized as a kid of being made fun of and all these things. I have a mental block against learning how to speak Korean or understanding it. And I think that was part of it. And so for you, I'm interested to hear more about what it was like trying to straddle those two worlds outside of that talent show.

Could you talk about choir? You talk about sneaking a makeup bag. You talk about when you choose or choose not to wear your ethnic clothing at school, whether it's as a statement or as normal or any of these things, and then how that develops over time as you're growing up as well. What was that tension for you between those two things?

Chanchal Garg
Yeah, I was always trying to integrate. I was always trying, as you said, I remember for a while, like Palazzo were in style. If you look at a traditional Solvar chemise, there's these Palazzo pants that are a part of it. I would wear those to school and roll them up the way the kids did at school with maybe a longer tunic or something like that. I was always trying to incorporate these little things into my outfits as my own way of expression. It was honestly well received. I think the reason why is because I wore it with pride. The places where I really struggled was when my parents had this very narrow vision of who I needed to be to be Indian, and they weren't willing to recognize all the things that I was actually trying to do to express my Indian And so it was almost as if if you hang out with American friends, then you're not Indian enough. If you perform on stage, you're not Indian enough. If you complain too much, you're not Indian enough. If you voice your opinion too much, you're not Indian enough. All these different things. And they were in direct conflict with who I was as an American girl as well, because I was out in the world learning the American ways, learning these ideas around freedom and expression and all of these things.

'I couldn't do that in front of my, especially my father, and still be considered Indian. I think the place where I really tripped up was that I confused my loyalty to my culture and maybe even my religion as loyalty to my father. Because it's such a cultural norm that there is a head of the household in our culture, and Everybody has to tiptoe around that person. And it's almost as if that person gets upset, then there's a spiritual tragedy in the house. That's what it feels like. And so the unlearning of that has taken years, honestly.

Brian Lee
I believe it. You say it so well in the book that connecting always seem to require a betrayal of some part of myself. I thought that said it so clearly. And I think we so often, no matter what culture we grow up in, that as we begin to bump up against something different than us or what we are used to, that in that bid for connection to somebody, in bids for relationship, we end up betraying parts of ourselves. When I think what we're looking for and hoping for is some sense of integration.

Chanchal Garg
Absolutely.

Brian Lee
I think you said it somewhere earlier, this idea you kept trying, like you're saying, to bring these parts together, but you could never get them to coalesce.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. It wasn't because they couldn't coalesce, it was because of other people's definition of what they were. I exist. I'm a person. I am Indian and I am American, so it can exist. But it's these other people's definition, which I was chasing in terms of trying to get that validation, that made it really challenging.

Brian Lee
Yeah. Well, and you write this whole thing about not landing the role of Anita in West Side Story. And later finding out your teachers confiding that they wanted you for the role, but they're afraid of what your dad might think. And you're saying, at every juncture, I seem to have to choose, or someone else chose my identity for me. And identity is so huge, obviously, right? Yes. And so much of our life is lived out of pursuit of who am I really.

Chanchal Garg
That's right.

Brian Lee
And so much of your book centers around that identity and search, whether it's cultural or ethnic or religious or professional, any of these things. Where do you feel like you've arrived today?

Chanchal Garg
In terms of my identity? Yeah. Well, I think the most profound place that I've arrived in is that it's constantly evolving and that I don't have to necessarily define it at any one given point. At the same time, I think the other piece where I've arrived at is that my Indian-ness or my American-ness doesn't get to be defined by someone else. For instance, in terms of me being Indian, I've got an entire lineage and ancestry to prove that I'm Indian, so I don't have to behave in any one certain way to claim that identity. I get to take it and make it what I want it to be. And the same with my Americanness. I was born and raised in this country, so I get to take those values and turn them into what I want them to be. And so from that place, there's a collective identity, and then there's also an individual identity. I do identify as an Indian-American woman, and I take all the blessings of my ancestors and my lineage and use that as a force to the work that I want to do in the world.

Brian Lee
Yeah, I love it. I think there are so many people in our community who are trying to figure that simple line out is who am I without the definition or expectation of someone else? And so part of the reason I talk about the whole cultural heritage thing and learning to become aware of the environments we grow up in is because it informs so much of the way that we live. Like you said, if there's a rupture between me and my authority figure, it's like this whole spiritual thing is happening in the room or in the house or whatever it is. There's so much baked into a patriarchal culture and the deference that we show to the men or the leaders or the authorities. And in a lot of ways, it's such a set up for what we eventually encounter or endure later in life, and certainly part of your story. There was one section when you talk about Dee Dee coming, and just the specialness that is communicated in that whole passage, and the sense of reverence and awe. And then she says this, or sings this thing to you, this idea that we can't see God, but we can see and touch our guru, so he is at an even higher place.

And she's priming the pump for this thing when she sings that guru and God are standing together. So we think to ourselves, who should we pay respects to first? I sacrifice myself for my guru as he has shown me God. Tell me what that song did for your developing brain as... I think you were a teenager at the time, right? Yeah. And so earnestly devout and wanting to do the right thing. And it sets you up for this whole path later in life. What are you thinking when she's telling you this?

Chanchal Garg
Even hearing you say that right now, I'm like, Oh.

Brian Lee
Oh, I'm sorry.

Chanchal Garg
No, no, no. Not in that way. It's just like, Yeah, that That was big. Yeah. Like you said, as a teenager, I was so devout. I was so earnest. I wanted to do the right thing. Hearing her say that, it was like a prescription. It was like a permission slip to totally devote myself to somebody, to say, I surrender. Surrender is something that I still struggle with. When I was young, I did not struggle with it. It was like, Oh, my gosh, I get to do this. Now, Obviously, just given the history, there's a lot of struggle there. But it was a way in which I could give myself over to God. That was easy, that was accessible, that was right in front of me. It also reinforced this idea that it was outside of me. It just gave me so much comfort and ease. Now I can look back on it and be like, Yeah, because then I actually didn't have to do the work, right?

Brian Lee
Yeah.

Chanchal Garg
I could just give it over to somebody else. I don't think I realized that that's what I was doing at the time.

Brian Lee
Sure.

Chanchal Garg
So now I'm still sitting with this idea of what does surrender mean? And how do I incorporate my inner voice to that? And it's almost like there's a desire now to surrender myself to my inner voice, to my inner God, to my own inner spirituality. But there's so much to uncover to get to that inner voice, right? So that's the journey. But, yeah, it was profound. It was extremely profound. When she said that.

Brian Lee
It knocked me over when I read that. Yeah. Because you can feel the setup of what this is doing for you and to you. I think that's what so many of us experience in this weird membership of spiritual abuse that none of us ever wanted to be a part of, that language has been weaponized against us when we were in such devout, earnest pursuit of doing the right thing, just like you of wanting to honor and worship God with our whole being. And we think we're being guided by these spiritual leaders, and in the very process, we're being set up to be violated and harmed in the worst ways.

Chanchal Garg
Right.

Brian Lee
And so that phrase sets you on this whole path, and it sets you up to further submit to spiritual authorities or to seek out, because then eventually your dad takes you to meet his guru.

Chanchal Garg
That's right.

Brian Lee
Because you're insistent like, No, I have one. And he's going to take me to hers. But you still submit and defer to your dad. It's like, Okay, well, I'll meet this guy. And then he is the most magnetic, charismatic person who's got, I think you said hundreds of thousands, like a sea of followers. You say it over and over, the seas would just park for when he would walk through. And I can just imagine that seeing footage of gatherings in India and services. They're enormous. I don't How do you think people in Western society have a context for how big that is?

Chanchal Garg
It's true. I mean, there were at times over a million people in one setting. Oh, my gosh. So you would stand up, you'd be in the crowd, stand up, and you'd look out, and you can't see the end of the crowd. You can't even... And it's all around. It's incredible. It's incredible. And then when you look and you're like, Okay, I'm a part of this larger thing, it's hard to doubt at that point, right? Yeah.

Brian Lee
Out of curiosity, I just googled how many people fit in the largest US stadium. And it's telling me, whether it's right or wrong, that the largest stadium in the United States is Michigan Stadium with a capacity of 107,000 people.

Chanchal Garg
Wow.

Brian Lee
And so you're saying over 10 times that, but not organized in a stadium, but usually just out in the open or under these giant tents, right?

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. Yeah. And they weren't... I mean, obviously, the tent wouldn't cover everything. No, of course not. So it's like the tent would be a very, very small portion of this, but people would be... Because people would come from all over India to hear this man. And they would hold on to the speakers because there'd be speakers all around the city echoing this man's voice. And so people everywhere could hear. Yeah.

Brian Lee
And that, I think, is just to help give us an understanding of the context of how big and important this man was.

Chanchal Garg
Right.

Brian Lee
Not just to you, not just to your dad, but to your religion, to the culture, to the people, to the cities, to the whole country, and internationally, because people are traveling like you from all over the world to get to see this guy. That's right. And what a sense of honor it is when he chooses to just recognize you because you make that comment, just making the eye contact, oh, my gosh, he looked at me.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
And then to be in in the same physical room with him, whether it's at someone's house or your house, and then to be in a room. And all of these things, I think people who are listening understand that part of it. They may not get the enormity of it, but they get the sense of like, somebody saw me. Somebody important sees me. And then when our spirituality is tied up in all of that, and when it is something we so desperately want and so desperately desire and seek, and then it is absolutely twisted. Yeah. The devastation that comes afterwards, I think, is what, unfortunately, most of us understand and relate to. Yeah. And it's the aftermath that we're trying to deal with. You were so courageous in writing this down for other people. You could have very well dealt with it personally and kept it to yourself. Why are you choosing to write it down for us?

Chanchal Garg
Well, I know it's not an isolated story. I know it's not just my story. I work as an executive coach and as a facilitator. What I have seen, and I don't think this is just women, But what I have seen is that the underlying themes of my story are actually very universal. For sure, spiritual abuse, but even beyond that, like you said, all abuse is spiritual abuse. I think there's these narratives that so many of us carry that allow us to be in a position where we can be abused. A lot of these narratives are not even truly ours. I recognize we are all a product of the environment that we grew up in, for sure. I also believe from a spiritual perspective that there's a deeper version of us that can be born from uncertainty and quiet. Most of us aren't given the opportunity to ever know that or experience it. And so we live a life with these narratives that we've inherited, that we've learned, that we've absorbed from our parents, from our culture, from our school, from our organization, from our country, whatever it is. And we never truly get to see who we are.

And so I started to see this theme show up everywhere in my work, even in my own family. I also recognize this abuse gets to be perpetuated when there's silence, when there's this narrative that silence equals loyalty, that silence equals devotion, that tolerance equals devotion. I didn't want that to perpetuate in the larger society as well as in my family. And so that's why I wrote the book.

Brian Lee
In some ways, you told right away. And in other ways, it took you a long time to tell or talk about it, right? I mean, way back when you're 14 years old, there's a father's friend at the hotel office pulls you up in his lap, it tickles you, hugs you. It's like, this doesn't feel right. You try to tell your dad about it. It's like, oh, no, no, that's not what it was. Or the experience multiple times, always followed up with don't ever tell. First time, because this will ruin me. So it's like, oh, well, I don't want to do that to this revered figure. But then over and over again, It's like, Well, no one will believe you, a thing. And yet you recognize that you can't be the only one and that it's this systemic thing that is probably following him everywhere he goes. And there's this idea, like you're saying, this ability to verbalize or to put words to this idea that it is a systemic thing. It is not just a spiritual thing. It is not just an isolated thing. And so offering resources for people to be able to what?

What is your hope with the book that people will take away?

Chanchal Garg
My hope is that, number one, people will start to ask questions. They'll start to ask, is this... The first question that I asked myself, is this serving me? I came to that question just by... I was teaching a yoga class, so there's that whole story in the book. But I think that's the first thing. Is my practice, is my belief system serving me? And just allowing that question to marinate for a little bit and recognizing that, this sounds so cliché, but I think it's also so powerful that you actually have all the answers you need within you. Trust yourself. If there's even a minuscule amount of a doubt, follow it. I think that's the first thing, asking the questions and challenging some of these narratives around silence, around obedience, around sacrifice, and recognizing that we are also creations of God. If we are creations of God, then who are we to say that we need to be sacrificed? I guess I would say that that's one of the biggest messages that I hope people take away from this book. If they're struggling to speak up, know that sometimes it's not that you've necessarily lost your voice, but sometimes it's sitting in hiding because it's not safe to speak up yet.

But trust that it's still there. And if you're able to find even one person who feels safe, start with baby steps. Very, very slowly, because the minute you hear yourself say it and it can be received from someone who is safe, your courage will build.

Brian Lee
Yeah. It's a powerful story that you tell in the yoga studio because you're so used to asking the class, it's like, Hey, is this serving you? And then suddenly it slams back at you. I was like, I don't need this even serving me? And it makes me think of there's a common verse that I refer to that we call the second greatest commandment, which is love your neighbor as yourself. And it's that as yourself part that we so often completely miss, that we're so used to, like you're saying, the sacrifice, so used to the surrender towards others, so used to the ignoring my own needs to meet the needs of others or to serve God or whatever the language is that we use, that I often reflect on that part of the passage. If I don't know how to love myself, I cannot love others.

Chanchal Garg
Wow. And when you said that, you know what hit me? If you look at the language of self-compassion, we've reversed that commandment so much so. Yes. That now the language of self-compassion is to love yourself the way you would love someone else. It's mind-blowing.

Brian Lee
It is. Yeah. I say that because I imagine that some people who hear you saying that you have the resources and to trust yourself, and is this serving me, will immediately have this instinct like, Oh, that sounds really self-serving, or, Oh, that sounds so self-absorbed, and all these things. And it's like, no, it doesn't have to be that at all. And it's like you're saying that our definitions or concepts of self-compassion have become so twisted in our culture today. And when the call is like, if you want to love others well, you really do have to know how to love yourself.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. I mean, you can't give from an empty cup.

Brian Lee
Right. That's exactly it. And then it reminds me, like you said at the beginning, this whole idea of wrestling with the concept of surrender totally makes makes sense based on what you've been through, based on what we've all been through, because surrendering has been weaponized. This idea of like, well, do I give up? What do I give up? Because I'm used to giving up everything and look where it got me. I love the quote from your mother. She says, When you are living against your nature, it won't last. It has to change. And she says this to you over the phone while you're in London as a new wife. Tell us what those words did for you.

Chanchal Garg
So I was I was living in London in a very abusive marriage, and I had mostly given up because I had gotten married under the blessings of this guru. In my culture, divorce is very taboo. The idea that I could even see a possibility to live beyond this marriage, to me, in my mind at that time, would have brought disgrace onto this guru. And so I had given up on life, said, This is my destiny. My life is over. And I hadn't relayed too much to my mom because I didn't want her to worry. And so on this particular day, I think I just couldn't take it anymore. And so I must have said a few things. I don't even remember exactly what I said, but she could hear it in my voice. And she said to me, those words, If you're not living according to your nature, it can't last. It has to change. And hearing that, it rekindled a little bit of hope. Okay, so there is my nature matters. I think that's what it did for me. My nature matters. There's a purpose for that beyond just this marriage or pleasing someone else.

Yeah, I think just following that light is what led me out of that situation.

Brian Lee
Yeah, I'm so glad.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah, me too.

Brian Lee
Our position is that our very nature is beloved. It's why we're called broken to beloved. It's part of my own personal story that I over-identified with this identity of being broken for so long, for years. It's who I told myself I was. I'm damaged goods. Until I was able to recognize and reclaim a sense of belovedness, it's like, No, no, no. You were created out of of love. You were created in the image of God. You were created for whatever purpose it is, but it wasn't to be broken. And so brokenness may be something that happened to you, but belovedness is the core of who you are. And I think so often we do find ourselves living against our nature because we've over-identified with something else, or we've attached ourselves to something else, even if it's with good intentions, even if it is out of an earnest desire and devotion to God. However that gets expressed, I mean, is there a way for us without running into the brick wall, without hitting rock bottom, to see when that earnestness and devotion is somehow misled?

Chanchal Garg
It's a good question.

Brian Lee
I don't know if I have an answer. I'm just curious.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. I don't know. I think So what comes to me as you ask that question is I look at how I'm raising my own children.

Brian Lee
Yeah.

Chanchal Garg
And I still don't know because the way that I'm raising them is to ask the questions. Same. Is to be not doubtful, but just questioning when you're giving your own power away, when you're giving your own agency away. And also, I remember when my children When we're little, we used to do this little call and response thing where I would say, I love the God inside of me, and they would say it back to me, and I am brave, and I'm powerful, and I am loved, and all these things. It was very cute. But the reason that I did that was because I wanted them to recognize that when they're searching, it is within them. So I don't know if there's a place where you can be in this earnest pursuit externally and figure it out before you hit rock. I hope there is before you hit rock bottom. I mean, the only thing that I can say is if you can turn it internal, if you can turn it towards yourself, recognize you have the wisdom and doubt the doubt, because when you've been looking externally, it's very hard to trust yourself.

Brian Lee
Yeah.

Chanchal Garg
Like, know that. Yeah. Know that and do it anyway.

Brian Lee
Yeah, that's good. I think a lot of spiritual abuse in a Christian context is that people have been told and taught to doubt themselves because your heart is deceitful above all things gets quoted a lot, or who can know the mind of God, which is used to excuse all kinds of horrible behavior, right? And all of these different things, and I think you're nailing it when you say, anytime it's externalized, because if we truly believe that God is all powerful, then does he really need to be defended as strongly as you are defending him right now? If God really does live within us, why are we being constantly forced to look to an external authority? And I think it's a lot of those things, like you're saying, to be able to hold on to that sense of agency. And anytime that we are told that we have to do these things in order to please God, or in order to worship him, or to revere, or whatever, and it gets, especially when it gets pointed to a person or a personality, is where it starts to get really dangerous.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
Let's talk about the wisdom of your body, because I love this whole section. And I'm very much into embodied practices, because, again, there's What we often call the heresy of Gnosticism, this old Greek philosophy that the body is separate from the spirit, and only the spirit is good and the body is bad. Yeah. And I love that you say, The wisdom of my body, however, once faint, had grown too loud to ignore. And I was finally learning how to listen. And we reference that question, is my practice serving me? No. And this tidal wave of truth came crashing in. Tell us about that moment for you, because there's so much of the book I feel like you keep talking about how much you were ignoring these impulses and things that you were noticing but kept pushing away.

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
So tell us about that moment where it finally came crashing.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. I think it was gradual. And then in that moment, it was the crashing. But in my culture as well, we're told that you are not your body. You are the spirit inside your body. I definitely resonate with that teaching. And at the same time, there's value here, too. In the body. As I started practicing the physical practice of yoga, I started inhabiting my body. I remember I used to say, being able to move my pinkie toe on command is more than just a party trick. It's me actually living in my body. As I started to do that, I couldn't ignore the messages that my body was sending me if it was uncomfortable, if something didn't feel right. The thing is, your body knows what's present. Your mind is only focused on past experience. There's that adage, right? The body doesn't lie. As I started practicing, those messages became more and more and more evident. Then in In that moment, in that yoga class, I was also pregnant with my daughter.

I had started to learn, number one, to listen to my body in terms of just basic things. Am I tired? Am I hungry? Am I thirsty? How often do we ignore those kinds of things. So I started to listen to that. And then as I was pregnant, I felt such a connection to my child that even the discomfort of pregnancy started to have meaning. It started to be like, Okay, these are the needs of my child expressing themselves through my body. And so in that moment, it was almost like the message of my body was just so powerful. No, your practice is not serving you. And it was almost like my baby was also speaking like, You need to clean this up before I get here. I couldn't ignore that anymore. And it's like that adage, once you know, you know. You can't unknow it.

Brian Lee
Yeah. And you tell such a powerful story when you reenact moments in your IMPACT class.

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
I mean, talk about an embodied moment of reliving. Would you tell us about that moment for you?

Chanchal Garg
Yeah, that was so powerful. So I attended a full on self defense class. So it's where you actually have people dressed up as a regressors in full body padding and everything, and they come at you and you learn to actually physically fight them. The invitation on the second day of this class was to... You could reenact something that had happened in your class. You could create a scenario that you were afraid of, what have you. I decided to reenact the moment of the first time that this guru assaulted me. The person who was dressed up, and I told them the story, and I was floored at how well this person was able to embody my aggressor. It wasn't them who did it. It was actually just my perception. It was my processing. They came towards me, and it was the day before my first wedding. More about that in the book. Yes. They came towards me, and they were like, Oh, there you are. I've been looking for you. We sat down, and the way it unfolded is I told him, I was like, I'm really nervous about getting married. I'm a little scared. This person dressed up, they were like, Oh, yes, it's normal to be afraid.

Don't worry, I'm here. Why don't you lie down? And in that moment, I could not believe... Because this is me. This is like two years ago. I could not believe it. I was ready to lie down. I was like, Oh, my God. Have I not And in that moment, there's so much happening. I'm doubting myself. I'm like, What have you not learned? And at the same time, there's this impulse to lie down at the same time. And it was like, as I was feeling into this, it was almost like a light switch flipped. And very, very quietly, I said, no, I'm not going to do that. And it slowly got louder and louder and louder until I was able to get in this person's face and start screaming and beat the crap out of them.

Brian Lee
Yeah.

Chanchal Garg
And afterwards, I remember sitting there thinking to myself, How is it that I could have been so ready to lie down I was doubting myself. Have I really learned? Can I really trust myself still? And as I was in a conversation with a good friend of mine, and in that conversation, I realized, no, I actually had to go back to that self, who I was when I was ready to lie down and reprogram from there. I had to go back to that moment and find my strength, reclaim it in that moment, and then change the story. So it was such a powerful moment for me. Huge. Such a powerful moment.

Brian Lee
And you feel that. And I think there is so much shame wrapped up in all of this for us that no matter how much work we've done, no matter how much processing we do, that there will be those moments, hypothetical or real. Like the other day, I walked into a grocery store and thought I saw someone who looked like someone who I had no desire to see. My body instinctively shot in the other direction. And I didn't even wait around to find out if it was even that person. But my body had such a strong reaction in that moment. I was like, No, just going to go the other way. Even though there have been years of work behind buying that. And it was not even something related to my abuse. It was just someone who I just had no desire to see in a town where I hadn't been in a while. And so it makes sense. And so I think one of the things that I'm learning when we have these strong moments like that is to somehow shift ourselves away from this posture of shame. And this, again, comes from Dr. Alison Cook.

It's like to compassion, to self-compassion, like you talked about earlier, it's like, of course you did that.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
Of course you had. Look at everything you've been through. Look at what you experienced. Of course you still felt that. And you chose something different this time. It didn't stay there. Absolutely. And it wasn't something that I'm doing a postmortem on a week or a month or a year after. It just took seconds the time. And even if it was a whisper, you were able to say no.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah. It's so important. It's so important to give ourselves that compassion, as you said, and grace, given what we've been through, because it's not just growth. I mean, it is truly transformation. To be in a space where you can give your power away like that and turn it around. It's no small feat. I really appreciate your naming that because I think it's hard to remember at times.

Brian Lee
It is. It is. And especially in those moments, because it's so much easier to default to shame.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
Especially when we've grown up in contexts like we have, because it's the water we swim in.

Chanchal Garg
That's right.

Brian Lee
Why would I not just heap more shame on myself? Because this is the way of the world.

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
And so it is such a gift that you are giving to both yourself and to your children to say that shame is not the way that we're going to choose.

Chanchal Garg
Yes. Thank you. That's right.

Brian Lee
The work that you do and that you experience with the Stanford Business School training groups sounds a lot like what we do in our cohorts, that we get to share our stories in a way that we have agency over how that story is told and in the way that people are responding emotionally and empathetically. They're not trying to fix our problems. They're not trying to question our decisions. It's just like, oh, my gosh, I'm so sorry. Or that one person responding to you is like, I could feel how tender that was for you. And I'm imagining how powerful it must be to be here in the country of ancestors.

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
I love Love that moment. What are those groups doing for you?

Chanchal Garg
Yes. So when you can be in community with others and be received fully without trying to be fixed, without being told what to do, and without being expected to tell others what to do or to offer advice, you just get to be as you are are and be received is immensely powerful. I do this work actually with leaders, like professional leaders. And even in leadership spaces, There is such a drive to show up in a very prescriptive way. Whereas leadership is not prescriptive. Leadership is very personal. There are not the seven ways of leadership. I mean, yes, I get that, but you know what I mean? It's very personal expression of who we are. And so these spaces allow for that expression to come through so that people can gain confidence in their own personal style of leadership and bring that out into the world in a much more authentic and real way. The goal of these groups is to bring more humanity to leadership. I don't think you can ever remove power dynamics because it's a force of nature. Sure. However, I think they are there to create an awareness of power dynamics so that power, even though it exists and we cannot deny that, but to use power with wisdom, to not dominate, but to empower others.

And so that's what these groups are about. Right now, I'm in the process of creating a group this October, it's actually for women, where we not only T-group, which is this group work that I'm naming, but we also start to explore identity in terms of lineage, in terms of ancestry, and all of those things to really start to shine a light on what are these narratives that we're carrying that are in the way of us and who we really are and who we want to be out in the world. Yeah.

Brian Lee
I love that. I want to close with one more question, and it's this idea, I've read so many powerful stories about the power of a name. I just read The Neverending Story, which I never realized was a book, but another book I read, we kept referencing. I was like, Wait, it's a book? I need to go read it. There's another series that we love called The Wingfeather Saga that talks a lot about the power of names or not having a name. And you talk so much, and I I kept... Honestly, three quarters of the book, I kept getting confused and turning to the title page. I was like, this is not like, why does she keep getting called? All these other things about the weight of your name?

Chanchal Garg
Yes.

Brian Lee
The one that your parents gave you, the one that this guru gave you, And in the process of receiving this new name, which I loved reading about. Tell us about that process for you.

Chanchal Garg
So my birth name was Nirmal, which was given, sort of half by my grandfather, half by my mom. And that name means pure. It means pure and untouched. And growing up, the message I got was that I needed to hold on to my purity. When I tried to get help to hold on to that purity, I didn't get that help. I learned really early on that it was going to be up to me to hold on to my purity. I had no idea how to do it because when I spoke up, no one listened. So fast forward, I was about, I think, 17 or 18 years old. I had been in this community of this guru for, I want to say, a year or two at that point. He had been giving people new names, and I really wanted to do that. I went to him asking for a new name. It took him a while to give it. It's almost almost like he needed to sit with it or something like that. When he finally gave me my name, he said, Gangotri. That is such a heavy name. At first, I was just like, Oh, my gosh.

I don't even know how to receive that. But then he's like, No, you don't need to take it if you don't want to. I was like, No, no. How could I reject something that you've given me? So I took the name. Gangotri is the name of a glacier in India, in the Himalayas, that is the origin of the Ganges River. There's so much religious significance given to this glacier. There's a lot of Holiness around it, and it's a glacier. It's a non-moving hunk of ice. And so fast forward, I extricate myself from this community. It's been almost 10 years, and I've extricated myself from so many things. I tell in the book the story of how I changed the tattoos that he gave me. I've left the community. I've gotten a new group of friends, all these things, but I'm still holding on to this name. I want a new name, but I also don't want to just pick a new name willy-nilly, something that maybe people can pronounce or something like that. I end up going to this ayahuasca ceremony. And in the ceremony, I have two intentions. One is to meet my grandmother, who I never met, who died actually when my mother was one year old, and to get a new I go in knowing that, okay, I could have this intention.

It might happen today. It might happen 10 years from now. I don't know. I'm willing to wait. I was extremely fortunate in that in my experience, my grandmother actually showed up, and she gave me this new name, Chanchal, which means playful. It means almost unstable like the wind, which is the exact opposite of Gangotri. At At first when she gave me the name, I was like, That's weird. I almost didn't like it. But as I sat with it and as I started to do research just on the origin of the name and what it means, it just felt more and more like who I was. I took it on, and I've been so grateful for it ever since. It's been a process to let others know people have been very uncomfortable with adopting a new name that I chose versus this guru chose. When the guru chose it, it was everybody's like, Oh, my gosh, how amazing. We've got to make sure that that happens. And now it's been three years since I changed my name to Chanchal, and there are still people who refer to me as Gangotri.

Brian Lee
Sure. Well, and you write even about that, about people responding or making it about them rather than you. And aversion to your name strengthens your resolve to embrace who you are. And I love the journey that you take, physically, physically and metaphorically to go back home to search out your grandmother's home and family and the validation that you get. Is it from her youngest sister that you meet who says she gave me the same name?

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
I just love that moment.

Chanchal Garg
Yeah.

Brian Lee
So thank you. There is so much power in a name. Yes. And even when it's something that's uncomfortable for us to wrestle with, there's also something that is settling in finally owning it. So true. And so I think whatever that name is, and again, I talk about that core identity as beloved, which I'm still trying to put on and own.

Chanchal Garg
I love that.

Brian Lee
But for people who have experienced what we've experienced or been through whatever their version of it is to recognize that maybe a name that someone else gave you isn't really who you are, that there's something truer underneath all of that that is more core to what you're trying to live Chanchal, I'm so grateful for your time. Is there anything else that you would want to share that we haven't gotten to?

Chanchal Garg
Well, I guess I hope that the book resonates. I would love for folks to get out there and read it, and you can go to my website and send me an email Let me know what resonates. I'd love to hear about other people's experiences. That's the main focus of the book. I hope that it touches a place that allows others to see the of who they really are. Yeah.

Brian Lee
Well, I love the title and subtitle, Unearthed: The Lies We Carry and the Truths They Bury. Get it wherever books are sold. We'll provide links in the show notes. And it may not be for everyone, but what I so appreciate it is it will be really easy for people in a Christian culture to just reject it outright. It's like, oh, well, this is a story about a different religion or a different faith. And I don't want to. It's like, there are so many things in common. Yeah. And there's so many common experiences. And there's so much to learn about a culture outside of mine, even though I come from an Asian one to come from a South Asian one, right? Or a different... There are so many different flavors and varieties of the ways that we experience while also having things in common. I think it's a beautiful reminder of how much we share rather than what divides us or makes us different.

And I'm so grateful to learn from your experience of healing and your experience of being able to tell the truth of what happened to you and to have it received is such a beautiful thing that moves us forward, that that gets to get carried forth towards the next generations of our kids. And after, it was like, Hey, this is how we're going to change things because this is how things were done. And this is what I lived through that I do not want you to experience, so we're going to do it differently.

Chanchal Garg
That's right. Yes.

Brian Lee
Chanchal, where can people find you or connect with you?

Chanchal Garg
Yes. So my website, chanchalgarg.com. I would love to get an email from you if any of this has resonated, but you can find all the links there to reach out.

Brian Lee
Yeah. Thanks so much for taking time with us today.

Chanchal Garg
Thank you for having me, Brian. This was wonderful.

Brian Lee
Wasn't that a great conversation? I loved the sense of compassion and openness that we honestly both had towards each other. If you enjoyed it as much as I did, be sure to follow Chanchal and say thanks for being on the show. You can find links in all the things in the show notes.

Coming up on the show, we have Hunter Mobley, Dr. Arielle Schwartz, and more. Subscribe or follow the show to get new episodes automatically. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review or share with your friends. It really helps us to grow and continue providing quality content for you. And a special thank you to our listeners who make the show possible through their financial support. If you find the show valuable, consider donating today at brokentobeloved.org/support or at the link in the show notes.

This episode was hosted and executive-produced by me, Brian Lee, editing by Heidi Critz and post-production by Lisa Carnegis. Thanks for taking the time out of your day to listen. I hope it's been helpful. Here's to moving toward healing and wholeness together. I'll see you next time.