Hi, this is Natalie Hoffman of Flying Free Now.com, and you're listening to the Flying Free

podcast, a support resource for women of faith looking for hope and healing from hidden

emotional and spiritual abuse. Welcome to episode 374 of the Flying Free Podcast.

I'm Natalie Hoffman, and I'm so glad that you're here.

If you are a woman of faith who looks like you have it all together on the outside,

but you feel lonely, confused, or small on the inside,

this episode is for you. Today we're going to start a new

series called High Functioning Women. Does that ring a bell? In this first episode, we're going to

talk about something that so many women, Christian women, live with for years, sometimes decades,

and they don't necessarily have the words

for it. We're going to talk about the loneliness of the perfect life. And I put perfect in quotes.

You know the life I'm talking about. The one that looks really good on paper, the one that people

at church prays, the one that your church might even hold up as an example.

And yet behind that polished exterior, you feel desperately alone.

Not just sad or unhappy. I mean soul alone. like nobody actually sees you.

I want to start first by defining what I mean when I say high-functioning Christian woman.

A high-functioning Christian woman is often competent, gifted, responsible, and capable. She can run a

business, teach a class, she can lead a ministry, she can juggle schedules and meals and homework,

church events, and everybody else's emotional needs. She's the one people call when something needs to get done. And in many

conservative patriarchal systems, she's also the woman who is expected to be, at the same time,

submissive, deferential, agreeable, and constantly available.

And that, my friend, is where the double life begins, because in public, she is impressive,

...