Family is complicated.
Even the people we love most can hurt us... and we can hurt them.
Sometimes it feels like the only way to protect yourself is to either run away from it all — or stuff everything down and pretend you’re fine.
We get it. Because we’ve lived it.
We’re Shae and Adrian Misiak — Catholic mentors and mental health professionals — doing the hard and beautiful work of healing family wounds while raising a family of our own.
If you’ve ever felt stuck between cutting off a parent to survive,
or staying quiet to keep the peace… we’re here to tell you: there’s another way.
And this podcast explores what that actually looks like.
Here are some of the themes you’ll hear us talk about:
the messy reality of family life
navigating difficult relationships with integrity
forgiveness that doesn’t ask you to forget the past
grief that doesn’t require you to shut down love
where and how God is working in the places that feel most broken
These episodes will meet you where you are and walk with you toward where God is inviting you to go.
You'll find honest conversations about becoming whole in real time, as we learn to love with both courage and compassion.
If you’re trying to build a healthier family than the one you came from,
or if you simply want to stop carrying all of this alone…
put us in your earbuds and listen along.
Walk with us as we explore what it takes to live the Third Way —
where joy is found, right alongside the hard and holy work of healing.
Why is it so hard to ask for help? Even when people are willing to give it?
In this episode, we sit with the hidden fear underneath self-reliance: What if having needs makes me a burden?
We talk about the difference between healthy independence and rigid self-reliance, why being helped can feel strangely unsafe, and how many of us learned to be capable, low-maintenance, and strong long before we learned how to receive.
This is a conversation about asking for help, receiving love, resentment, perfectionism, family culture, prayer, and the third way between isolated self-reliance and helpless dependence.
Connect with Us:
Learn more about Third Way Mentorship: adrianandshae.com (http://adrianandshae.com)
Send us a note: hello@adrianandshae.com (mailto:hello@adrianandshae.com)
Follow us on social: @adrianandshae
1 Jun 2026
"Where Are You?" Using Physical Space and Self-Awareness to Fight Better and Repair Faster
Every couple fights. But not every couple fights in a way that leads somewhere good. A big part of why has nothing to do with communication techniques or emotional intelligence. It has to do with where you are when conflict erupts.
In this follow-up to the previous episode, Shae and Adrian pick up the thread of Where Are You? and bring it into the messy, embodied reality of a real fight on a 30-mile bike ride with two kids in tow.
They unpack what that particular conflict taught them about the conditions that make repair possible and why most of us are trying to reconcile in environments that are working against us before we even open our mouths.
Whether you're married, in a serious relationship, or just trying to understand why you keep getting stuck in the same patterns, this episode will give you something concrete to reflect on: the space you're fighting in, the conditions you're creating (or not creating), and what it might mean to actually be found in the middle of it.
Connect with Us:
Learn more about Third Way Mentorship, including marital mentorship: adrianandshae.com (http://adrianandshae.com)
Send us a note: hello@adrianandshae.com (mailto:hello@adrianandshae.com)
Follow us on social: @adrianandshae
18 May 2026
"Where Are You?" What God's Question to Adam Taught Us About Repairing With Our Kids
What do a soaking-wet bathroom floor, a three-year-old's meltdown, and the first question God asks after the Fall have in common? In this episode, Shae and Adrian walk through a real rupture-and-repair moment with their son. From the chaos of a bath time blow-up to an unexpectedly tender conversation that left Adrian standing outside the door whispering something unprintable to himself. What started as a parenting story became a window into one of the most fundamental questions in all of huma...
10 Apr 2026
Is Tending to Yourself Sinful? Self-Love, Family Wounds, and the Catholic Case for Interior Attentiveness
Something one participant said near the end of their first group cohort stopped Shae and Adrian in their tracks: tending to the self doesn't just feel selfish — it feels sinful. In this episode, they unpack why that belief is so common, where it comes from, and why they believe the opposite is true: that interior attentiveness is not a detour from holiness but the very ground it grows from. In this episode: Why the fear that self-focus is sinful is so deeply formed — and why it masquerades as...
9 Mar 2026
Embracing Conflict in Marriage: The Power of Self-Gift and Vulnerability
Discover how fighting can be a gateway to deeper intimacy and growth in marriage. Shae and Adrian share raw stories, frameworks, and spiritual insights on how conflict, when approached with tenderness and self-awareness, transforms into a gift that reveals the true depth of love. In this episode: Why conflict is a normal and essential part of marriage, not the enemyHow childhood wounds and past experiences shape our reactions in disagreementsThe importance of vulnerability and raw honesty in ...
2 Feb 2026
Self-Reliance Is a House of Cards: Why “manifesting” can’t save you and what actually can
Self-reliance often begins as survival and slowly becomes a prison. In this episode of Living the Third Way, Shae and Adrian explore how self-reliance forms in families where it wasn’t safe to struggle, need help, or fail. What begins as a protective adaptation can quietly turn into a belief that you must carry life alone and that suffering means you’re doing something wrong. They examine how modern manifestation culture and New Thought spirituality reinforce this pattern by promising control...
7 Jan 2026
Self-Stewardship, Not Self-Improvement: What If This Year Is an Experiment?
The start of a new year often brings resolutions, pressure, and quiet disappointment when we don’t live up to our plans. But what if there’s a different way to begin? In this episode, we propose an alternative to self-improvement: self-stewardship. Rather than fixing or optimizing yourself, what if this year became an experiment — a chance to see whether caring for the self you’ve been given actually leads to more freedom, presence, and life? We explore what it looks like to tend to your inte...
22 Dec 2025
Healing From Within: What the Incarnation Teaches Us About Being Human
At Christmas, we celebrate a God who does not heal from a distance, but enters fully into our humanity. In this episode, we explore what the Incarnation reveals about the way real healing unfolds — not through bypassing emotion, body, or relationship, but through inhabiting them with truth and love. Drawing from Catholic anthropology and the Third Way framework, we reflect on why God chose flesh and blood, what that means for our nervous systems, our family relationships, and our longing for ...
12 Dec 2025
Advent, Waiting, and the Slow Work of Becoming Whole
Advent draws us into a kind of waiting that’s active, hopeful, and deeply human. In this episode, we explore how holy waiting mirrors the slow, interior work of healing — in ourselves, in our relationships, and within our families. We share how waiting became a core part of our own story: navigating old patterns, living in the tension of the “not yet,” and learning to trust that God works in hidden places long before change becomes visible. In this episode, we discuss: What Advent teaches us ...
19 Nov 2025
Inside the Story That Started Third Way Mentorship (plus some holiday survival tips!)
In this episode, we pull back the curtain on the real beginning of Third Way Mentorship — long before we ever had a name for it. We start with a simple question we get all the time: What is mentorship, and how did we end up doing this work? We share how daily accompaniment became not just a professional calling, but the very thing that transformed our lives, our marriage, and the way we relate to the people we love most. Inside this episode, we explore: • What mentorship actually is • H...
1 Nov 2025
Why We're Launching on All Saints Day: Communion, Community, and the Work of Healing
We launched on All Saints Day because we want the saints’ intercession over this work—and because their lives show us what integrated, grace-filled healing looks like. In this first conversation, we unpack the Communion of Saints, what healthy community is meant to give us (love, belonging, formation), and why so many of us feel isolated in a culture of dis-integration—often beginning in the family, the “cell of society.” We name the pain without getting stuck in blame. Adrian shares a person...
26 Oct 2025
Welcome to The Third Way
Torn between protecting your heart and staying close to the people you love? There’s another way — and it starts here. Join us to start healing family dysfunction by restoring order, finding freedom, and living in joy. This trailer introduces the Third Way — a path to wholeness right in the middle of the messy, beautiful work of family life.
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