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Hope in the Hard: The Practice of Letting it Be (Unresolved) · Parenting Through The Hard

• 0:07
  Hey, it's Angie. Before I say anything else,
• 0:11
  I want to give you a little context for today. Last week,
• 0:16
  I shared a longer episode about loving a child
• 0:20
  through addiction, about letting go without giving
• 0:24
  up, and what it means to. To stay connected without
• 0:28
  trying to control the outcome.
• 0:31
  And if I'm honest, that conversation didn't
• 0:35
  end when I stopped recording. This. Hope in the hard
• 0:39
  segment is really a continuation of that.
• 0:43
  Not from a place of clarity, but from the questions
• 0:48
  that just kind of lingered afterwards.
• 0:50
  Because once you stop rescuing,
• 0:54
  once you stop managing,
• 0:57
  you're left sitting with a lot you don't
• 1:00
  know what to do with yet. And that's where I am
• 1:04
  today. So before I say anything else,
• 1:07
  I want to name this. Honestly,
• 1:11
  I'm not recording today from a place
• 1:15
  of answers. I'm reporting live from
• 1:19
  the middle of the hard. And I guess I just wanted
• 1:23
  to say that out loud because I think that we carry this quiet
• 1:28
  assumption with us that if someone has a podcast or if
• 1:33
  they wrote a book or if they have a following of any kind, they must
• 1:37
  have answers. Like somehow visibility
• 1:41
  means resolution, like sharing hope
• 1:45
  means having it all figured out.
• 1:49
  And I guess I just want to take this opportunity to gently say,
• 1:53
  that just isn't true.
• 1:56
  Having a microphone doesn't mean I have clarity.
• 2:01
  It just means I'm willing to tell the truth while I'm still
• 2:05
  living inside it. And right now, I am
• 2:08
  very much inside it.
• 2:14
  There's a phrase that's been coming up for me lately.
• 2:18
  Let it be. Let it be.
• 2:23
  And in this kind of parenting, I know that letting it
• 2:27
  be doesn't mean peace or acceptance.
• 2:32
  Letting it be means not chasing every crisis.
• 2:37
  It means not trying to manage what I can't control.
• 2:41
  It means letting my child carry consequences that I
• 2:46
  wish I could take from them. And that kind of
• 2:49
  letting it be, it doesn't happen in my
• 2:53
  head. It happens in my body.
• 2:56
  If I'm honest, letting it be doesn't
• 3:01
  feel holy. It feels uncomfortable.
• 3:05
  It feels like restraint. It feels like standing
• 3:10
  still when everything in me wants to move.
• 3:14
  And if you're in a place right now that feels
• 3:19
  unresolved, I want you to hear this clearly today.
• 3:25
  Unresolved doesn't mean you're missing something.
• 3:29
  It means that this. Whatever we're in right now,
• 3:34
  that this isn't finished yet. It means you're standing
• 3:38
  in the very important part of the process.
• 3:44
  For me, this shows up in small, everyday moments,
• 3:49
  like a message comes through. It's another truth
• 3:53
  that I wasn't prepared for. And suddenly I'm
• 3:57
  holding something I don't know what to do with.
• 4:01
  And my body reacts instantly. My chest tightens,
• 4:05
  my thoughts start racing. And I feel that urge to
• 4:09
  jump in, to ask more questions, to offer more solutions,
• 4:13
  to make sure that nothing goes wrong.
• 4:17
  And sometimes I don't.
• 4:22
  Not because I don't care, not because I've checked out,
• 4:26
  but because I'm trying, and I mean trying,
• 4:30
  to notice the difference between love and
• 4:34
  panic. And I'll be honest, that line
• 4:38
  isn't always clear to me. See,
• 4:42
  right now, letting it be feels like sitting with my hands
• 4:47
  clenched in my lap. It feels like holding back
• 4:51
  words that feel urgent. It feels like trusting
• 4:54
  God with something I still want control over desperately.
• 4:59
  And I. I don't like how exposed that makes me
• 5:03
  feel. There's a fear underneath all of this
• 5:07
  that I'm. I'm still trying to name the
• 5:12
  fear that if I let something be,
• 5:15
  I'm abandoning my child.
• 5:19
  And that fear is loud. It whispers lies to
• 5:24
  me, saying love always acts quickly. Or that
• 5:28
  good parents don't wait, or that silence equals
• 5:32
  failure. And even as I say that out loud, I can
• 5:36
  feel how much pressure that puts on my heart.
• 5:41
  So this is where I am right now.
• 5:45
  Still unsure. Still waiting.
• 5:49
  Still loving. Not everything
• 5:53
  unresolved is unhealthy. Not every
• 5:58
  pause is avoidance. Not every unanswered
• 6:03
  question needs immediate action.
• 6:07
  Some things. Some things, they need space before
• 6:11
  they make sense. You know, some. Some growth happens
• 6:15
  underground. Some trust is formed
• 6:19
  by just staying, not fixing.
• 6:23
  And I don't think that we talk about that enough.
• 6:27
  We rush ourselves and each other. I know I'm guilty of
• 6:31
  doing this with my friends. We rush ourselves
• 6:35
  towards answers, towards certainty, towards closure.
• 6:40
  But maybe unresolved doesn't mean broken, you guys.
• 6:44
  Maybe. Maybe unresolved means becoming.
• 6:51
  I don't have a takeaway for you today. I don't have steps
• 6:56
  or clarity. I just want you to know this.
• 6:59
  If you are loving someone and trying to stay
• 7:03
  present without controlling the outcome, and it feels awkward
• 7:08
  and heavy and unfinished,
• 7:12
  you are not doing it wrong.
• 7:15
  You might actually be doing some of the bravest work
• 7:20
  there is.
• 7:23
  Before we go, I need to pray.
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  Not a tidy prayer, just. Just an honest one.
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  God, I am so tired of pretending
• 7:39
  that I know what I'm doing here. I hear you
• 7:42
  inviting me to let it be, but I don't trust myself
• 7:46
  to always know when that's faith and when
• 7:50
  it's fear. I don't like the waiting.
• 7:54
  I don't like the quiet. I don't
• 7:58
  like not knowing if I'm helping or I'm making
• 8:02
  things worse. There are moments,
• 8:05
  Lord, that I'm so afraid that if I don't step in that everything will
• 8:10
  fall apart. And there are moments that I'm afraid it
• 8:14
  already has. Father, I want to love well.
• 8:19
  And I don't want to lose myself in the process.
• 8:24
  I want to trust you, but I don't want to feel this exposed.
• 8:29
  So, God, would you meet me here? Not on the
• 8:33
  other side of answers, not once I figured it all out,
• 8:37
  but right in the middle of this tension. Would you.
• 8:40
  Would you meet me here? Would you help me to know when
• 8:45
  I'm supposed to speak and when I'm supposed
• 8:49
  to stay quiet? And would you help me wait without
• 8:54
  growing hard? And would you help me
• 8:58
  love without trying to manage the ending?
• 9:04
  And when I get it wrong? Because I will.
• 9:12
  Will you hold my child? And will you hold me?
• 9:16
  I don't need. I don't need to have everything resolved
• 9:20
  tonight. I just need to know that.
• 9:23
  That you are still here. That you are
• 9:27
  still here in the unresolved.
• 9:32
  Thank you, Lord. I pray
• 9:36
  these things in Jesus name. Amen.
• 9:40
  Before I go, I just want to say thank you.
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  Thank you for. For giving me the grace to process the
• 9:49
  things I'm still wrestling with in my heart.
• 9:52
  For making this a space that feels safe for me
• 9:56
  even when the answers aren't clear yet.
• 10:01
  That is not something that I take lightly.
• 10:06
  And with that, I guess I'll just say I'll
• 10:11
  meet you back here soon. And we're
• 10:16
  doing better than we think.