From the Garden to the Heart – Our Desires and the Cost of Avoiding Truth
- Feb 9
- 5 min read
Updated: Feb 11
Margo Thompson is a Social Work professional, Educator, and CEO of Complete Care & Wellness Clinic. In her upcoming book, The Psychology of a Broken Heart, she offers a clinical and faith-rooted approach to healing emotional pain–bringing hope, clarity, and lasting change for individuals and generations to come
There’s a saying that a broken clock is right twice a day, and I believe the same holds true for people. During one of the more meaningful conversations with someone I was once close with, a thought was shared that shifted my entire understanding of desire, accountability, and heartbreak: In the beginning, what if Adam and Eve’s downfall wasn’t simply about eating fruit, but about the introduction of untethered desires into the human heart?
At first, the idea felt radical. Then it felt revelatory.
What if the forbidden fruit was not about hunger, but about desire, and an unguarded conceptualization of sexual gratification outside of covenant?
Desire was never the problem
Eve was not evil. Adam was not absent in body, but perhaps absent in his understanding of his responsibility to protect.
Eve experienced something new: attention, curiosity, intrigue. The serpent slithered freely around her, infiltrated her, and spoke to her when Adam did not. And without wisdom, desire crossed into disobedience.
The desire itself was not sinful. The mismanagement of her desire was.
And when confronted, Adam and Eve were given the opportunity to repent, to tell the truth, and take accountability. But instead, they deflected. They placed blame. They avoided responsibility toward God and toward one another.
That pattern, avoidance instead of accountability, did not end in the garden. It followed humanity into relationships, intimacy, and love.
When sex becomes therapy: Genital counselling
In my book, The Psychology of a Broken Heart, I introduce the term and concept of Genital Counselling.
Genital Counselling is the use of sex, consciously or unconsciously, to soothe emotional pain that was never meant to be treated physically. It is the attempt to heal abandonment, rejection, neglect, betrayal, or lack of genuine attention through sexual connection.
It looks like:
Getting “under someone” to get over someone
Using sex to regulate anxiety, loneliness, or fear of abandonment
Mistaking sexual access for emotional intimacy
Believing that being desired sexually means being valued
From a clinical lens, this is a trauma response. From a faith lens, it is a misguided and harmful reliance.
Sex becomes the language for emotions we were never taught how to express. The body becomes the playing field to perpetuate wounds that originated in the soul.
Even within marriage, sex cannot repair emotional discordance when it is used as a substitute for communication, safety, and truth. It may provide temporary relief and excitement, but it never produces lasting healing.
Soul ties: The ties that bind
This is where soul ties enter the conversation.
A soul tie is not simply a spiritual concept, it is also psychological and neurological. When intimacy occurs without emotional safety, honesty, or covenant, the bond that forms often feeds unresolved trauma rather than connection.
In the book, I explain that soul ties can form through:
Sexual intimacy without emotional maturity
Trauma bonding, a connection that is rooted in familiar and/or shared trauma
Relationships shaped by survival instead of authenticity
Repeated exposure and a persistent pull toward unsafe or toxic attachment
These ties can feel intense, consuming, even “fated.” But intensity is not intimacy, and familiarity does not always equal safety.
What makes soul ties so difficult to break is that they often reinforce the very wounds we’re trying to heal. We stay attached not because the relationship is healthy, but because it mirrors something unresolved within us.
This is why broken hearts often confuse longing with love and attachment with alignment.
The garden revisited: Avoidance, not desire, was the downfall
When revisiting the story of Adam and Eve through this lens, a deeper truth emerges. The issue was not curiosity, sexuality, or desire. It was avoidance of responsibility and a lack of foresight into the consequences, blinded by passion.
Eve was drawn in by the serpent’s words. Eve enjoyed the attention without discernment. Adam desired to please Eve. Adam failed to protect. Both avoided the truth when confronted.
This mirrors what we see in modern relationships:
Desire without boundaries
Intimacy without accountability
Sex without emotional safety or true covenant
Connection without truth
As discussed in my previous article, broken hearts often confuse desire for connection, which then results in spiritual, physical, emotional, and psychological confusion.
Healing requires truth, not shame
Healing does not begin with abstinence alone. It begins with understanding.
Jesus did not come to shame desire. He came to restore order. He came through a woman to redeem Eve’s wounds for women. Joseph’s obedience, as Jesus’ surrogate earthly father, models what covering truly looks like for men: presence, responsibility, and restraint.
Healing requires telling the truth, not just about what we did, but why we did it.
As I write in The Psychology of a Broken Heart, the pain we are unwilling to transform is the pain we transmit, through our relationships, our choices, and our bodies.
Your heart is a weapon: Guard it and use it wisely
Just as words can heal or harm, the heart also carries this power. How we love matters. Why we love matters. And who we give ourselves to, emotionally, physically, and spiritually, matters.
Since the fall, lust has been confused for love, and our free will has been mistaken and perpetuated as wisdom. Thankfully, healing restores discernment. It teaches us to manage desire rather than be mastered by it.
Call to action
If you recognize patterns of Genital Counselling, trauma bonding, or soul ties in your own life, The Psychology of a Broken Heart offers a faith-based, trauma-informed pathway to understanding and healing at the root. Available now on Amazon.
Healing doesn’t start with behavior. It starts with truth. It’s time to evolve.
Read more from Margo Monique Thompson
Margo Monique Thompson, Relationship and Personal Growth Strategist
Margo Thompson is the CEO of Complete Care & Wellness Counselling Clinic (CCWC), a Social Work professional, post-secondary Educator, personal development Counsellor, and author of the upcoming book The Psychology of a Broken Heart. With over 18 years of experience in Child Welfare, Education, Mental Health, and Wellness, she is known for her compassionate,
faith-rooted approach to trauma recovery, emotional well-being, and relationships. Her insight blends formal training in Social Work and Psychology with lived experience, overcoming early adversity, nearly two decades of marriage, and raising five children with love and intention.
At CCWC, Margo leads a multidisciplinary team delivering integrated, person-centered care through Counselling, Wellness, and family services. She is especially passionate about helping others move through pain with clarity and purpose, while fostering safe, accessible spaces for healing. In her upcoming book, she gives voice to emotional wounds that often go unspoken, confronting stigma, tracing trauma to its roots, and guiding readers toward lasting transformation through the combined lens of Psychotherapy and faith-based healing.
