M e m o r y R e c o n s o l i d a t i o n + C o r r e c t i v e R e l a t i o n a l E x p e r i e n c e = R e a l C h a n g e
You’ve prayed. You know the verses. You are obedient. You have self-discipline, yet you still wake up anxious and ashamed. You quietly wonder if you are doing faith wrong, so you try harder, and it gets worse. Or you go through the motions and secretly suffer, or slowly disengage from faith (either overtly or covertly) because what you’ve been taught should work…isn’t.
What if the problem isn’t your faith—the outdated model of change you’re following is.
Most people were taught that deep, lasting change happens through effort: try harder, use more willpower, apply the correct technique more consistently. Others believe that insight or more information will change you.
Still others focus on changing faulty thinking or discovering the “why” of fear, shame, and dysfunctional relationship patterns, hoping they will disappear.
Many Christians were taught another, more subtle version – spiritualize it: pray harder, read the Bible more, be more obedient, sacrifice more, be less selfish, wait on God to change you (“let go and let God”), or assume God will “fix it” out somehow.
These quietly become a way to avoid what feels too painful to face or requires too much time and hard work. Each of these contains a grain of truth when applied at the right time, within the proper context, and for the right situation. Yet under stress or over time, the same shame, fear, or dysfunctional relational patterns often return, as if none of the insight or behavior changes “stuck.” That’s not because you’re weak, unspiritual, or resistant. It’s because the part of your brain that drives deep, lasting change isn’t primarily logical, it’s relational!
The Good News that Neuroscience Discovered
Over the last two decades, through the neuroscience revolution that began at the turn of the century, researchers clarified something profoundly hopeful and deeply compatible with biblical faith: the brain is not primarily a “thinking machine.” It is a social-emotional system designed to survive and thrive through relational experiences within a safe relationship.
Four significant discoveries are game-changers.
1. Your brain’s capacity for change extends well beyond previous assumptions.
For most of modern history, people assumed the brain was “set” early in life and did not change after adolescence. If you didn’t get what you needed as a child, you were basically stuck managing the damage for the rest of your life. But neuroscience overturned that assumption. The brain has neuroplasticity – capable of forming new neural pathways and new responses that delete the old – throughout life, even into older adulthood. That means the fear, shame, and negative impulses can change at the neural level.
Nowhere in the Bible does it say there is a point at which we stop growing and healing. Paul in particular assumes this when he says, “continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” (Philippians 2:12). This is what your brain learned. And what it learned can be updated.
2. The brain is driven by emotion from the bottom up, right to left.
Recent research emphasizes the crucial role of affect (emotion/feeling) over conscious thought, suggesting that emotional processes fundamentally organize our minds. As Daniel Hill (2025, p. 6) notes, there’s a growing consensus that “affect is primary.”
Alan Schore (2022, p. 2) supports this, stating that unconscious emotional processes are central to our sense of self. He highlights a “paradigm shift” in understanding, moving from a focus on conscious, left-brain cognition to the significance of unconscious, emotional, and relational functions rooted in the right brain, operating throughout a person’s life.
Your nervous system harbors what we term the Implicit Core Emotional Learnings (ICELs). These deep, internalized learnings shape your core self—encompassing your personality, identity, self-concept, sense of self, and self-esteem—by internalizing every relational experience across four key areas: your subjective feelings about yourself, others, the world, and God. The core self is the primary driver of all other aspects of your being. The subjective experiences of this core self are highly varied, with the example below being just one of potentially thousands.
Your feelings about yourself:
| Secure Beliefs | Insecure/Fearful Beliefs |
| “If I need something, I belong.” | “If I need something, I’ll be too much.” |
| “I am likable when I am different.” | “I am rejected.” |
| “I am valued.” | “I am not good enough.” |
| “I am competent and powerful.” | “I am weak and small.” |
Your feelings about others and relationships:
| Secure Beliefs | Insecure/Fearful Beliefs |
| “I can trust relationships.” | “It is scary to get too close.” |
| “I am okay being alone, bringing my frustrations to a relationship, or saying ‘no’” | “I always have to be connected to someone and have to be who they want me to be.” |
| “I am loved and respected by others when I fail.” | “Others pull away or try to ‘fix me’ when I fail.” |
| “I feel mutual in my relationships.” | “I feel one down to others and weak.” |
Your feelings about the “real” world:
| Secure Beliefs | Insecure/Fearful Beliefs |
| “The world is warm and inviting.” | “There are too many people, I just want to be alone.” |
| “It is okay to be different than the latest fashion.” | “I have to fit in to have relationships.” |
| “The world is okay with me being messy.” | “I have to be perfect and do what is right all the time.” |
| “The world is challenging, but I can handle it.” | “The world is a lot bigger than I am; it is scary out there. I am going to need a lot of help to make it.” |
Your feelings about God, Jesus, or the Holy Spirit:
| Secure Beliefs | Insecure/Fearful Beliefs |
| “God is very personal, warm, and does not impinge upon me.” | “God is distant or smothers me, and I feel overwhelmed.” |
| “God loves me being different, when I get angry, or saying ‘no’” | “I need to feel close to him every minute of the day, and that he likes me.” |
| “God loves me even when I screw up.” | “God is punitive, and I will pay for it when I sin.” |
| “God is very personal and like a friend.” | “God is holy, the ultimate authority, and I’d better not tick off.” |
Relational experiences shaped these, and where change must begin. The type of presence you have and the quality of the relationship you form with a person will give them new relational experiences to internalize, replacing these toxic ones.
Those inner expectations weren’t formed by logic.
Relational experiences formed them, and relational experiences will change them.
3. Focus on the root cause, not the symptoms.
Fortunately, the ICELS organize themselves around four Core Character Traits: Attachment, Separation, Integration, and Authority.
Core Character Traits (CCTs) are the structural foundations of our personality. When these are strong from earlier, healthy relational experiences, life’s demands are met successfully, which results in a flourishing life. When they aren’t, the deficits create distressing feelings, distorted thinking, and maladaptive relational patterns. When Core Character Traits are in deficit, distressing feelings, distorted thinking, and dysfunctional behaviors arise. Strengthen these, and all this goes away!
4. Memory Reconsolidation: The “Rewrite Mechanism” of Neurological Grace
The most significant breakthrough in neuroscience that finally explained precisely how the brain enables growth and healing is called Memory Reconsolidation (MR). Simply put, MR is the brain’s natural way of letting new experiences change or ‘update’ old memories. This process alters the actual brain wiring (neural encoding) of the memory and changes how that memory affects a person’s feelings and actions.
Before 1997, scientists had no objective evidence of a process within the brain that truly reverses learning. That changed with the discovery of Memory Reconsolidation in memory science. Neuroscientists now have scientific evidence for how the brain is designed to enable profound, fundamental change, which aligns with long-held spiritual teachings about Grace.
The brain changes when old emotional learnings are activated and then disconfirmed by new relational experiences – not by new insights, trying harder, moral effort, catharsis, emotional inspiration, coping strategies, or the repetition of better behaviors.
Corrective Relational Experiences: How to Trigger Neurological Grace
One of the most powerful ways to trigger the Memory Reconsolidation (MR) process is through Corrective Relational Experiences (CREs). A CRE facilitates MR in a simple three-step process that can easily be done in a conversation:
1. Someone opens up about an old fear or feeling of shame during a conversation. This usually happens because the person they are talking to has been very understanding and present, making them feel safe enough to share deep feelings. When this happens, it kicks off the first step of the process we call MR: the brain becomes open to change.
2. The listener’s sustained connection and surprising response to the situation initiate a process that dismantles the destructive “ICEL” dynamic. This connection actively cultivates a new, healthy substitute, thereby reinforcing the previously deficient “CCT.” This reinforcement effectively mitigates issues such as fear, shame, depression, addiction, and detrimental relationship patterns.
3. The person receiving the CRE begins to share how good it feels in the moment. The listener attunes and shares what it was like for them in this moment. The CRE gets further deepened.
A Corrective Relational Experience might sound like:
- You confess weakness – and are met with steady kindness instead of shame.
- You set a boundary – and are respected instead of punished.
- You show emotion – and someone stays present instead of leaving.
