Latest / The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast / Freedom From the False Identity | a conversation with Jenny Donnelly

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Freedom From the False Identity | a conversation with Jenny Donnelly · The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast

• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Amy Wicks, and I love to talk about the gospel message your heart was created to hear.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: All things Enneagram and helping you be confident that you are the best mom for your kids.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a mountain mama who somehow ended up on a cul-de-sac in the Medwest.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: I was alone and without family or community.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: But the Lord, He didn't let me stay there.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: He helped me turn my broken-hearted moment into a wholehearted decision to get intentional with my faith, my marriage, and my kids.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: I share broken-hearted perspective with story, but with wholehearted purpose and plans so you can live a life full of confidence and abundance.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: Think of this podcast as your on-the-go mom pal, mixed with a little bit of Enneagram coaching.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: So get to that pile of laundry or hit the treadmill or load up the kids in the car for that grocery run.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: And be ready to be encouraged and challenged while you listen.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is the Simply Wholehearted Podcast.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I would like to invite you to a conversation rich in perspective and wisdom to remind you to shift your paradigm, remember your purpose, and walk away with a plan that you can implement today.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Jenny Donnelly's new book, Still, Seven Ways to Find Calm in the Chaos, provides practical guidance for discovering the inner stillness available to all believers in Christ.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Even the most tired moms of toddlers and newborns.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Jenny's a passionate Enneagram aide, and she is challenging us all to reevaluate our measurements of success, to break free from our false identity, and rediscover rest in every season of life.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Motherhood is one of the biggest and most challenging roles we will ever hold.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you'll take a listen to the life-giving words Jenny is sharing with us today.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now, while these last months have seemed longer than normal, I also can't believe that we are past the halfway mark of May, and that summer is just around the corner.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: With these last months of school done at home, do you need your summer to look different than your school year?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Is your entertainment, are your camped employments going to be limited these summer months?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Are you dreading the no-scheduled long days sibling fighting boredom constant eating in crazy messy house all summer long?
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Will you need my Simply Summer Plan to put into action the unplugged and purposeful connection that you desire with your kids?
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: My Simply Summer video guide series walks you through the five-step planning process that I have personally used for the last 11 summers with my kids.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: I help you break down the next three months so you can help your kids form lifelong habits while getting more done for you.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: I've created and shared all my colorful and easy-to-use templates that are ready to print and customize for your needs.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: In short, the Simply Summer self-paced video series guides you through determining what your kids want to do, what you want your kids to do, and what they need to do.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then you can create a system of rewards that connect your family in meaningful ways all summer long.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: So, how about instead of counting down the minutes until next school year, you can make the minutes count with your kids this summer.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: Check out the show notes for more information or go to simplyholhearted.com and you'll see all the information there on the homepage.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Also, stay tuned because after this conversation, I have an important announcement about the next few months.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Now, let's jump right into this conversation with Jenny Donnelly.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_02: And yet it doesn't, it's like it's just faith.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_02: If God calls me to do something, I don't do things for the sake of adventure.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: Gotcha.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's not the motivator.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like God calls me out to do something.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: I just know that that's the most fulfilling life is to follow him.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_02: So good.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm not one that's like, let's go do something wild today.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's like, eh, you know.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: What motivates you?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: What gets you up in the morning besides your kids and husband and the retreat center?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: Kingdom purpose.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, for sure.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_02: Just being on mission.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: Just, you know, it's it's when I turned 40, I just had a I'm 45 now, but when I turned 40, I I had a real live, like the vision I had was I was going straight down a track, you know, like a regular running track.
• 5:01
  unknown: Okay.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: And I was going straight, and all of a sudden I saw myself curving.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, wait, what's that?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And then it was like, you're turning around, you're going home.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, it takes a while to get around that end, right?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: But I was like, okay.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_02: So it was just kind of like, you know, my husband and I were pastoring at a church for a while, kind of trying to live out our calling over there.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_02: And really what we were supposed to be doing was plant our own church.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, we just got really serious about what God's calling us to do.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_02: So when I was 41, we planted a church um, you know, in town and did all the messy things and made people mad and all the stuff that comes with following God's calling.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_02: And so, yes, we have a church, um, the retreat center.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's it's you know, we're just trying to, we're just doing what God says to do because it's like, you know, this life is pretty quick, things are moving pretty fast.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: And so you just want to get to the end of your life and go, you know, I didn't bury anything in the ground.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we just we just did the best we could with what we had, throw perfection out the window and just go, you know.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's so good.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: I I heard someone talking about the parable of the talents the other day, and I thought it was really fascinating because they pointed out, which is often my question, Jesus didn't share an analogy of someone that he gave talents to and they did something with it, and it didn't have the outcome they wanted or they thought.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's so interesting.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it might be a Western mindset.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't completely dissected it, but it was only the three differences that someone chose to do nothing with it and buried it, and then the other two just did something with it and they got, you know, double major.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: So uh for us, I think when we're looking at, okay, what should we do?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Stepping out of faith, all that sort of stuff, it's usually like, well, then what's the outcome going to be?
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: Can I have a guaranteed result?
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: Or if we get to the end of it and it doesn't have the result that we thought, we go, oh, it was a waste.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: I must have not stepped out of faith.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: When really the Lord didn't use that illustration, and therefore I think it's almost null and void and just a mindset that we often uh try to tack on to our steps of faith.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_02: Well, the the world we live in, the culture we live in, it it's defined success for us.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: It's how big is your bank account?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_02: What do you look like?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: Are you better than the other people?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's just a lot of comparison, there's a lot of, you know, our our our culture defines success for us from the world.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, that's why the scripture says do not be conformed by the world, but be transformed by the reino and of our mind.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: Because if we drift into the world standard for what success is, then we are going to have anxiety because we there's always gonna be somebody that has more money, more success, more this, more that.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, it's this hamster will thing.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_02: And so um I had to define what success was for me several years ago, um, especially because we were running a business, we had a lot of financial success in our business, and yet God was also saying, Okay, you're planning to church, we're doing ministry, we're doing all these things that don't earn money, really, quite honestly.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you're you're the one sewing money into it, and you're the one um doing things for the invisible crown that you know it's invisible to us now, but it's very real um in eternity.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_02: But um, but the but anyway, to kind of boil it down, the Lord and I just you know, I just was like, you know what, success to me is obedience, where I'm just what you know, I'm spirit led, and what the spirit says to do, that's what we do.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_02: The results of what I think it should look like, you know, just let go of that.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: Because if you take if you follow the Lord, you follow him and have a relationship with him, and you have intimacy and you know, just a real friendship, then that is everything.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_02: That is success in my mind.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: And so um we think we we think we know what a good result looks like.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_02: And in reality, um, you know, are we even capable of defining what success looks like on the outcome side of things, you know?
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I just let that go and just you know what, I'm just fulfilled.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: My fulfillment doesn't come from my outcomes anymore, really.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's so good.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's where I'd really like to get because it's just disappointing to make to base it on this perceived outcome because the matric of heaven is so widely different than what we look to here on earth.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it does leave us really disappointed and and lacking and wanting.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: And when we put all of our efforts into trying to measure it and you know, equate it to something tangible, it it we really come up open uh empty-handed more often than that.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we come up disappointed or we come up feeling like we're not good enough or we've wasted our life.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_02: You know, those types of things can hit us and um and even uh even evaluating like you know, when I when I was in business for so long and I I helped people in business and I discipled people and that kind of thing, and and you have people that like their life doesn't turn out great, and you tried everything to help them, and then there's other people who are just prospering and multiplying and fruit is coming out of them, and the Lord told me, you know, because I would feel so bad for people who what could I what else can I do for them?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, and he said, Well, if you take credit for their failure, then you are also taking credit for people's success.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, Oh, I can't touch that.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to touch that.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, First Corinthians 3, 6 became one of my life verses, and it's you know, one man plants, another man waters, but only God gives the increase.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: And so I was like, Okay, I'll just plant water, and God, you get to decide what is what becomes fruitful in my life, but I just want to be found faithful to planting and watering, and then let him decide what so good.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was just in that passage.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with a Bible study fellowship, and we were going through Acts and Apostles, and that is where I was sitting a lot because I did just turn 40 last year, and there's been a few, you know, words of encouragement about this year being a year of growth and harvest.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: And man, of course, I would love to define what exactly that means, but I believe the Lord has had me hold on to 1 Corinthians 3, 16 of just just keep planting, just keep watering and and walk it out with me.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, whatever comes about, you have to remember that it's it's his his glory uh and not your own.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I have this um well, maybe, maybe I mean it's in the word, so I guess controversial might not be the right word for it, but um, you know the scripture that our deeds are as filthy rags.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_02: You know that scripture.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's right.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: So you know, I used to think, oh yeah, our deeds compared to God are just gross, you know.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's in James, right?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Comparing our our faith and our deeds.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, and what the Lord shared with me was he's like, No, back this up.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: What's a filthy rag?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that's a menstrual cycle.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: So what's a menstrual cycle?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_02: A menstrual cycle is um an egg that didn't get fertilized, so it doesn't carry life.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_02: And so what he showed me was my deeds alone don't carry life.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_02: But when he fertilizes it, when he breathes on it, there's fruit.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_02: So our deeds are not the only equation, you know.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, we're like, hey, God, um, I'm just gonna do XYZ.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_02: And if God doesn't breathe on it, it's not gonna carry life.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, he just shared with me that it's kind of like, you know, every month, you know, there's an egg that comes out of a you know, healthy reproductive system of a female, and so here we are, we're just doing our deeds, you know.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: But when God breathes on it, it gets fertilized and then it carries life with it.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's it's our deeds plus the breath of God, yes, plus his spirit on something.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so I let myself off the hook.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I have ideas sometimes, I'm like, oh, I want to do this, and I do it, and it flat lines, and it's like that's okay.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_02: Let it be an unfertilized um, you know, deed.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's fine.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: But Lord, what do you what are we doing?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: Let me just and so it's like you just can't get caught up in that didn't work, and now I'm a loser, and you know, it's like, no, it's just God didn't breathe on it for whatever reason, and now we just just keep moving, just keep seeing because he'll breathe, he's gonna breathe on something, but we definitely don't want to just go off in our own little direction.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, we want to say, God, what are you breathing on?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_02: Because we do want life.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_02: Amen.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, yeah, I just I just try to stay tuned to what he's doing and what he's calling me to do, and it's pretty risky, pretty risky because he'll ask me to do things.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: I'm thinking, that's crazy.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: That's a crazy idea.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_02: But when he breathes on it, that's where that fulfillment comes and the fruit, you know, and the harvest comes that way.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Jen, I think we could just drop the mic and push stop and because my mind's exploding.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot to unpack there.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I know I'm gonna go back and listen and take some notes because that's really, really profound.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: I think, especially for us moms, whether we have a vision outside of our home for ministry or for business or anything else, because motherhood is constant sewing into the unseen and where we have no idea what it is if it's going to amount to anything.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: We don't know if we're gonna see multiplication, we don't know if we're gonna see good harvest.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: We just are required to sow and sow and sow and water and water and water.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the reminder that even in motherhood, which we assume we should just be able to do out of our own strength, we need to be met by the Holy Spirit daily in order to walk in plant and water according to his will.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, that's right.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I think, well, one of the things I do is help people find their true identity, but we have to look at our false identity first.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_02: And our false identity is rooted in our deepest fears, and so the way we behave falsely is because we are trying to avoid the thing that we're afraid of.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_02: And what I found out when I really decided to face my fears, sit down with fear and go, hi, what are you presenting today?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_02: Those, yep, those fears were very much attached to um my children.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I thought, but really, what they were attached to was myself, and so the greatest letting go of my life has been giving my children over to God, and because what I want to do is control.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: That's what my flesh wants to do, is I am gonna make sure that this whole thing works out, that you work out, that you and and really I remember I was on my spin bike.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know why God talks me while I'm on my spin bike, but it's a good place.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_02: Probably because I'm weak and tired and listening.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: Listening.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: And um, I just remember going, God, I just I just don't like, you know, the teenage years.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: And it was, you know, the first my my oldest was going through her first hormone season, and I'm like, what is happening and what's wrong with me?
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, and the Lord just very gently said to me, You need to get over yourself.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, Uh oh.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_02: He's like, You're really making this about you, and the root of this is your own unresolved trauma.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_02: And basically, you need to this is a signal that you need to go back and do some heart work for you because what you're doing is your fear that your child was going to experience the things you experienced, and now your parenting is this overcompensating thing that's driven, you know, it's like fear-based parenting.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like, let's write that book, right?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so so it's like, okay, Lord, so this is more about my heart than it is where she is, and so Lord, you're a really great dad, and so I'm asking you, Lord, to um do things in her heart that I can't possibly do for her, or even pretend that I can.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm just gonna back away and continue letting you parent me.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so that was that was pretty intense a couple years for me.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because my upbringing was you know, my mom being married three times, my dad being married four times.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_02: I had lots of reasons why I would be troubled when I got to college.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_02: And for sure, when my teenager felt troubled, it did not fit my formula.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_02: Wait a minute, you are in a household of two parents that love Jesus, that are sold out, that tell you you're beautiful, that pour into you.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I'm like, I have good seed, there's been good water and good seed.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_02: How in the world are you having those thoughts?
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so my world was crashed because, see, I thought if I just did all the right things, I could save her from the environment I was raised in.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_02: And the Lord's like, listen, she's in the world just like you, and this world is full of trouble and sorrow.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_02: And the best place for you, Jenny, as a mom is on your face.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_02: So I just started getting quiet and more quiet in my parenting.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, just backed off the control and got in my prayer closet and I started interceding for her.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm telling you, there was such a fast turnaround.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_02: It was like, man, that's amazing.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_02: And so the other four kids have been a lot easier, but that first one was pretty.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_02: It was pretty intense.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Those first ones.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what I think is fascinating for someone who is not well versed in the Enneagram.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: You just talked about Enneagram work, the coaching work that I do with moms.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: We a lot of times the moms will come to me, help me get along with my kids better, help me figure out my kids.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And as you know, the invitation that the Lord is usually offering to us as moms is no, let's let's go back and revisit your past.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: Let's uncover those greatest fears.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: Let's uncover that childhood experience and figure out why those fears are there, or why the lens that you have on your childhood experience is what it is.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because that will help you understand then the lens you have in your greatest fear towards your kids and for your kids.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: Because most often our kids have a completely different set of lenses than we do.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: And we need to figure out ours before we try to figure out theirs.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I I think it's but the control issue that's systemic for motherhood.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's the core issue for every single type in one form or fashion.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's usually carried out differently.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: I I have a group in my living room every week, a group of moms, and they're all from my church and they're all, you know, 10, 15 years younger than me, roughly, early childhood, you know, season.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: And again and again when we talk about different topics every week, we always come back to that subject about how can we just release a little bit more release control, either of our household, of our kids, of the fears, you know, even our comfort so that way we can be sowing better and you know, planting and watering and all of that.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: But I I think that's remarkable that the just the testimony of you going and getting on your knees and being able to reap those harvest of prayers that really it was nothing about what you did except for it was surrender.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: And in the surrender, the Lord met you.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: And what I found out was my doing actually not only didn't help, but made it worse.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's like popping a zit.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_02: Like maybe we should just leave that alone.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: Leave it alone a little bit.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so I started just taking note of how's it working for you, Jenny?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_02: How's this how's this going?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_02: Is it her stubbornness against me, or is it my stubbornness against God?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I believe that toddlers and teenagers.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: Are both designed to help us die a little bit more.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: Teenage and three teenagers are about to look at the rings and their girls and then have a boy who's about to be tall and five.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you what, it is um raised by fire.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think the taller years were hard because there was 33 and a half years and it felt like I never caught my breath for a long time.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: But now that we're entering into this, it's a different tired, but it's tired.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of focus, a lot of concentration that goes into it.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_02: The shift that I had to make, well, first of all, finding my own identity.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_02: And um, you know, identity as daughter, of course, you know, we we start there and not, you know, I'm not the do love it of Christ, I'm the beloved of Christ.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_02: Be loved.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_02: The Lord walked me through my job description was to be loved and to absorb love and to not just in an intellectual way.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I just had to fess up.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, Lord, I don't, I really don't know why you love me this much.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_02: I know the Bible says it, and I'm supposed to believe it by faith, but I want to actually experientially have a revelation of the depth of your love.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_02: You know, what you did on the cross, that's a lot of love right there.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_02: That's a lot of um, that's that's just a that's a huge gift.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_02: So the Lord was like, okay, let's get started, you know.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_02: And that was about a three or four year process of me, I mean, just going through a huge love revolution.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: And then um my identity out of that, you know, he started talking to me and giving me names for who I am, and um like Firestarter and Heartmender, and he started giving me names and God will do that thing, but it asks.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so what happened was as I became more whole and um was not afraid of my wounds, it was not afraid of my fears, and just took these fears to the Lord, knowing that they're lies, knowing that they're dis they're deception, but knowing that they feel real, they all feel real, fears feel real, your own do anyway.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_02: And so you take them before the Lord, and then you get this new identity.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's like my daughter, um, I was on the phone with her yesterday, she called me from her high school, actually, she was texting me, and I could tell she was like in a panic.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_02: She was in like this state of like panicking, and that is when I had to come to her in my identity.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a heartmender and I'm a um I'm a fire starter and I'm a kingdom builder.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I just I I felt that the listeners, I want to give you permission to be a minister.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because I am a mother, but sometimes mothers, there's a time to be mom, and then there's a time to be a minister.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: And so I just um I said, I know you're in class, so you can't call me, but I texted her and I said, right now I'm praying for you, and you're gonna feel a wave of God's love right this second.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_02: And I was in my car in a parking lot and I just began to pray.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_02: I said, God, this just hit her right now.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_02: She needs your love, she needs your care.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_02: And then um, she texted me back, you know, a few minutes later and said, I love you, mom.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_02: And I could tell it just all came to a to a stop.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_02: But just become the minister, become the intercessor, become the pastor, become the apostle, become the evangelist, and you know, become the teacher, do um, become the prophet.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I prophesy to my kids and say, This is what I see for you.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_02: As much as you're going through what you're going through, this is what I see for you.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: This is the picture that God has showed me for you.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_02: And she was super stressed out about her anatomy class and it was throwing her over the edge.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, you know what, Hannah?
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_02: You are not your grades.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I do we want you to get great, good grades?
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_02: Of course we do, but that is not your identity.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and so this doesn't matter as much as you think it does.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I just want to bless you, and God's love for you is what matters, that you are aware of his love, and that's what's gonna come crashing into you right now.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: You're gonna feel it.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: You're gonna feel it, you know.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_02: And so I just kind of felt like this is a this isn't this is a place where we step up.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_02: We gotta step up and become the ministers.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not our youth pastor's job, it is not our pastor's job.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: And you know what?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_02: Our husbands, this is great if they do this, but women tend to be more sensitive.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: We tend to go, you know, I know when my kids are going through trouble before my husband does.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_02: He's like, What?
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_02: What's going on?
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_02: What's wrong?
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, he's a great dad, and he's doing what he's supposed to do and the protector and all that.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: But we're we're a little more in tune with our heart.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: So and we got the sixth sense, it just is innate to us.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_02: It is.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_02: We've smelled trouble before it's really bad.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_02: And so, um, anyway, just ministering to your children and taking on that anointing because who else other than mom and dad get the anointing?
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and God does that when when you start ministering to your kids, the anointing breaks yokes, and here it comes, you know, and you get to step into that role.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: It's not about qualification, it's not about well, I don't know what I'm doing as a minister.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, you do, because it's grafted into you.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: Because God would not give a child to a person that he wasn't willing to give the anointing to.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_02: So, anyway, just want to just high-five all the moms out there and say, go minister, go be, go be the good news to your children and um maybe, maybe lighten up a little bit.
• 27:15
  unknown: Yeah.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then, you know, I'm I'm I found out that I was a little more compassionate to my kids in my church than my own.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_02: And that's when I was like, wait a minute, there's something wrong with that.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_02: I need to carry the same grace.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, I've had to work myself into what I'm saying right now and just kind of give myself permission to minister.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_02: But it is a higher calling.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: I I mean, motherhood is a huge calling.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_02: But ministering to your children and being their um being their shepherd is such a privilege, but we're also equipped.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: God's equipped us all.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_00: The old adage that is usually spoken to leaders is that he's not going to call you to do what he won't equip you for.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that can impact mom's the greatest because we need to hear that together.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: So it's obvious that you have some hardfought wisdom in motherhood and a little open life in the bottom.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious to know we have a little bit of idea of what your broken-hearted mom may have been that we do the trade center and starting a church and ministry.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: But how about this book?
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because still, you know, finding peace in the middle of the chaos.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: How do you do that with five kids?
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: How do you do that when you're sharing life with all of these other families and you're doing all that you're doing?
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_02: Well, my journey started quite a long time ago.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, really, it was when I crashed and burned in college.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I do share my testimony in the book, and it's just the raw, real deal.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's nothing, nothing hiding.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_02: It's just the it's just the real thing.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_02: And in that time of my life, I was looking for love because we are built for love.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_02: We are we are engineered by our creator to be intimate with somebody who will love us deeply and purely.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_02: The problem is, is that sometimes we have to run into um a love that is tainted and is manipulative or just not the pure love that God gives us because we're we're just searching, desperate, hungry, thirsty.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_02: And so that was me.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_02: And especially growing up with a in a broken home, saw my dad once a year.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, it was like, who is going to love me?
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: I am absolutely dying not having somebody love me.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: So that led me down um uh a trail that eventually I ended up um getting married.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_02: And then in my very early first year of being married, there were symptoms that I was like, wait a minute, what's wrong with me?
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_02: And what happened was I thought once I had a man who loved me and I got married, everything would just be great.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I married a man who loves Jesus, who's so good to me, who's so kind, really truly my prince terming.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: And yet, here I was um argumentative, full of strife, um, irritable, feeling like very rejected by little things that he would do or not do.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_02: And I found myself in moments of an outburst, like my the first chapter of the book, I talk about sitting on the edge of my bed.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_02: Very successful businesswoman, by the way, but I'm on sitting on the edge of my bed, and there's a there's a pile of tangled hangers.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_02: I could not put away these hangers, I felt so overwhelmed by it.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I knew these little, these little moments of total overwhelmed, total anxiety.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a loser.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_02: Like I just was wrestling myself so much.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I didn't realize what was really happening, but I knew something was wrong.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: The Lord brought me to, he just started just leading me into healing, inner level healing, um, started dealing with my father wound, started just cleaning me up.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_02: I had just been through a lot that I was in complete denial of.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_02: I was the girl that was like, I'm fine, my past made me better, I'm great.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I didn't realize I was this wounded until these things manifested.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I can't put away hangers, I can't do the dishes, like I looked at a sink full of dishes and I was frozen.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_02: You know, things that were very easy became very hard for me.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um so anyway, uh the Lord brought me into a prayer setting, and I had a piece of paper out, a blank piece of paper, and he said, Start praying.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I took a pen and started swirling it around in a circle, and I realized I was drawing a tornado.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: And he said to me, Um, your paradigm of work and rest is inaccurate.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_02: You always think, Oh, okay, well, after this project, because I was really good at projects, I was really good at deadlines, very good at like, okay, I'm gonna get through this, get to the weekend, then Tuesday.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_02: Once this is over, Wednesday will be the day I'll get to this kind of land.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_02: And he said, Do you have you noticed that that's how you've been living a very long time?
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_02: And yet, as soon as one storm is leaving, another one's already come in.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_02: So this is a fantasy.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_02: So I was living in this fantasy of a heart at relief would be one where there wasn't pressure.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_02: In my mind, somehow life was gonna let up.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: And he was basically like, Jenny, it's not gonna let up ever, ever, it's not letting up.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so he said to me, I am in the middle of that tornado where everything is perfectly still.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: I'll meet you there.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember going, Okay, uh, where'd you go?
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_02: Like, where are you?
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_02: And he was like, I've said what I need to say, come find me.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: So, what happened at that point was I knew that he was inviting me into a journey of finding calm when everything around me was in disarray.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_02: And he's basically like, I want you to get out of the swirling outside thing and putting up with it.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I want you to come to a place where you can be in the middle of things going well, things going terribly, you can be in the middle of deadlines, you can be in the middle of kids waking up in the middle of the night and throwing up all over your bed, because we all know that happens as a mom.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: You can be in the middle of these things, and your heart and your mind are at total rest.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_02: Well, this was about a 10-year process.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: I wish it was 10 days, but it wasn't.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_02: 10-year process.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: And I found myself living my life in complete joy and peace for the first time.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't put on the shelf, it wasn't put onto a vacation, it wasn't like on Friday when my work is over.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: No, it was like I am actually living in the present, living in joy, living in peace right here, right now.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, that makes you want to tell the world.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_02: Like, you have got to know it's euphoric.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: So that's really what this book is about.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_02: It's about, and and when he told me to write the book, I was like, How did I get here?
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_02: You're gonna have to remind me what because I don't know how I got here.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_02: And it was such a it was such a deep work he did in me.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_02: I was skeptical that it could actually be put on paper because it was in my heart, and it was such a it's like, how do you explain raising kids and childbirth?
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, how do you explain all that?
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so anyway, he just helped me.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_02: He helped me put it on paper, and and I'm getting reports of people who are like, I am finding relief.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, well, thank God.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't know if that could be done through, you know, writing on paper, but um, I just want to bless everybody who feels like they're living in so much pressure that you can't enjoy your life.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the Lord has grace in the middle of so much chaos.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_02: He has a present grace that will make you feel like, wait a minute, I don't have to use food to numb myself.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have to use sleeping.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_02: See, I used to sleep a lot.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_02: I used to use sleep.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I tried to find sleep as much as I could, the more kids you have, the less that's possible.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_02: That's like impossible.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_02: Totally great.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: So, anyway, it's just it's really about letting go of all of our binkies and picking up the presence and hosting the presence of the Spirit of God and him just going, eh, it's okay.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_02: But wait, look at her.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_02: She's she's having a panic attack.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_02: She's my you know, my teenager.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_02: And he's like, I got it.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and so it's this deep, deep, deep trust in the father.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_02: That's and and and I do want to say this, and I am I'm kind of talking long-winded here, so I apologize for that.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: But um, I I want to point out here that rest isn't I'm not talking about the action of resting.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not talking about the behavior of resting because that's where I was messed up.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, well, how do you rest when you have a church and now you know recreation, and now I have, you know, how do you rest?
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_02: You don't, you know, um, you don't even get a full night's sleep without a kid jumping in your bed.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_02: So this doesn't make any sense, right?
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, or my rest is narrowed down to one vacation I take a year, and I have to live for that.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_02: And then when I come home, I have to get back to the grind.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_02: You know, that's like I just can't stand that.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_02: So what the Lord shared with me is, and this is the biggest thing, is that rest is a place, it's a realm.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_02: And in Hebrews four, go read that in the Passion Translation.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_02: I like the I like all the translations, but the passion's so good.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm right there right now.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: So good.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: Chapter four of Hebrews talks about the faith, rest realm, and it is where the Israelites were promised to live, and it says they lingered and they did not enter it because of doubt and unbelief.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_02: Doubt and unbelief kept them from entering.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: We think of the promised land as the grapes, the milk and honey, the lush land, which is the promised land.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_02: But in Hebrews 4, it's like it's actually a place where you get to rest inwardly, where you're not waiting for manna to show up every morning.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like, will it be there?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_02: Oh God, are you gonna be there?
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and so it's not sitting on the edge in anxiety, but it's like, God has my life.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's okay.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_02: It's okay.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_02: We lost our business of 20 years, and it's like, I didn't want to go to zero income.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_02: That was weird, you know.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_02: But my business was not my source.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_02: God was my source.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_02: So God didn't go anywhere.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: He's like, I'm still here, you know.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: So he is allowing us to weather really big storms, but it's like, God, as long as you don't go anywhere, I'm fine.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_02: I'm fine.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_02: You've got this.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_02: You're not indifferent about my life.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_02: You are not indifferent about my energy level.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_02: You know, yesterday I laid hands on myself and said, Lord, I need more energy today.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_02: I need you to fill me up with energy.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: I'm ministering.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_02: We say minister to your own self, you know, right, right.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_02: Minister to yourself.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_02: But God wants to.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_02: He wants to be our peace.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_02: He says, Pete, he said, He is our portion.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_02: He's he is the Prince of Peace.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, all of this intellectually sounds great and inspiring, but we need to practice it.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_02: And that that's why I wrote the book, The Seven Ways that he, and there's probably a million, how to get into peace, but he showed me seven ways to get there.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, I think what you you point out in a lot of that is just that we have kind of drained ourselves and our our Western mindset and the way we work, is that we keep working towards that big moment, whether it's the Sunday weekly thing, which is super important.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a big advocate of Sabbath rest.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: But it tends to be we're just gonna get to the weekend, we're just gonna get to the teaching, we're just gonna get to this moment, and I can finally write about what you point out.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think especially as a mom that we're awakening, is you will you will never get to that moment that we're gonna put another place to do things that are really hard in your out of your routine and out of your normal and you might be in a beautiful surrounding, but you've got all the same challenges.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_00: So we we wait for this elusive moment that is just not gonna happen.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so we have to find ourselves in a place of of what does it look like to walk in every day and carry that with us.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you've known that really well in some of these.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: So you said the, you know, you've start with us the biggest takeaway.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I know that my friends are gonna want to re-listen, and we certainly have a pen and paper for a lot of the trade-bombs I think that you threw at us today.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_00: But if you could give us a little sneak peek before we get our hands on your book, maybe the next three things that the Lord showed you, what we can begin to practice today to walk in that daily rest.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_02: So the first way that I talk about is lean.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_02: And this is so simple.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes the simplest things we miss, but I God gets simple with me.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_02: When he comes to me and gives me something, it's like, well, that was a lot simpler than I was gonna make it.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so and he's like, Yeah, that's exactly my exactly it.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: My yoke is easy, my burden is light.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_02: Like, wow, that's a lot better than I was gonna what I was gonna come up with.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I talk about leaning.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I this came from a moment where I jumped up out of my chair.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_02: I was praying one morning before my kids got up and I heard the baby crying.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_02: So I jumped up out of my chair and I jumped up so quick that the blood left my head.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_02: And so I was like, whoa.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_02: And so I reached out to the bookcase and I was like, I'm gonna fall over unless I grab this bookcase.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_02: And the Lord spoke to me in that, and he just said, Um, you know, life throws people dizzy spells, whether it's my kid left their lunch on the counter for the third time, and now I'm having to get in the car and I have to go take the lunch, and this wasn't my plan, you know, you can have that or a dizzy spell of losing somebody really close to you, like huge dizzy spell, huge knock knockout.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_02: So, what he told me is, you know, life throws us these suddenly things that we don't see coming, and we will reach out for something to lean on.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_02: It might be food, it might be irritability, it might be mean words, it might be sleep, it might be disassociation.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_02: I just escape and I'm all of a sudden, whoop, I'm gone.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_02: No one's home.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's a lot of different ways, things that we did when we were children to cope with stress, and we're probably still doing some of them.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um so becoming super aware of ourselves, man, gotta be so aware.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the awareness has to be huge.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_02: So, but this leaning thing, I'll give an example.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_02: Um two months ago, a very close family friend really my my kid's second mom, she passed away suddenly in her sleep, and you know, got the phone call the next morning, and you're just you can't even believe it.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_02: Well, her family asked my husband and I to do the memorial service, and my spirit was like, absolutely, that's the greatest honor.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_02: And my flesh was like, No, we're not doing this, you know.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_02: So I got to distract myself for a couple weeks getting ready for the memorial service, and we hosted it here at our retreat center in our chapel, and you know, that was all great, and you know, distracting myself with the stuff you have to do.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_02: Well, um, the day before the memorial service, I was in my bathroom and it was like it was like, okay, I can't distract myself anymore.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_02: This is really happening.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna have to stand up in front of a whole bunch of people, and I don't want to do this, Lord, because what happens is there's this thing that says you need to perform, right?
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_02: You need to perform for people, make them pleased with how you do this.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_02: And I think moms have a lot of performance pressure.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, it's like, you know, act well, you're supposed to act at the baseball game with the kids, with the other moms, and you know, all that stuff is just it's just not it's just not good.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_02: And so anyway, I was like, okay, Lord, walk me through this.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I I've probably read my book.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I have.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: I've I've read it more than anybody else.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure it's my handbook.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_02: And so I'm, you know, just two months ago, this is this is um, you know, this is af this is right before my book was released, two, two years after I wrote it, actually.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_02: So I know this stuff, but I was like, okay, Lord, what are we what am I doing again?
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: Because I don't want to do this.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_02: I I want to know this is horrible.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_02: I do not want to do this memorial service.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_02: And my flesh was just that fear came up, you know, and he just said, lean.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_02: Right back to the first way in the book.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, Okay.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_02: And then he said, Literally lean against the cabinet right now.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_02: So I put both my hands out and I leaned against the cabinet.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_02: I put all of my weight on the cabinet, and he said, This is me.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_02: I'm immovable.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_02: And he told me, now close your eyes and memorize this posture.
• 43:25
  unknown: Wow.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_02: Memorize this.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so I just closed my eyes and I just saw myself in the chapel, saw myself with all those people grieving, saw myself with the microphone, saw myself, and it was like, that's what I'm doing.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_02: This is what I'm gonna be doing, is I'm going to be leaning on God, not performing, not holding, you know, and he basically said, You do not have to hold yourself up.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_02: And it was like I didn't move that position until I had it memorized in my body, soul, and spirit.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_02: And I've done it several times since.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_02: And so, moms, what you can do is when you take a shower, I just recommend that.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: Is lean up against the wall of the shower.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, usually God speaks to us really good with water.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, it's so true.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_02: It's very, very common.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so lean up against it, put your weight on the wall, or put your hands out, you know, against the wall and just close your eyes and let the Lord minister to you that that is your posture for the day.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_02: That's your posture for the day.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_02: So when that thing happens that you're like, oh, I didn't see that coming, you know, the washer breaks, or you know, the stuff, it's just the stuff, you know, that can just throw us off.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_02: And and it's like, even if something doesn't go wrong, that's a pretty good posture.
• 44:39
  unknown: Yeah.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_02: So now it's like I don't have to hold myself up.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, just think, you don't have to hold yourself up.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_02: Like right then and there, I'm like, oh, this is gonna be a good day.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have to hold myself up.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_02: So that is that's one, and then every single chapter is a it's practical.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_02: It's practical in that sense.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_00: But I I like that one because it's really fast and it's it's just such a great word picture that we can carry around with us.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_02: We can physically practice it.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_02: So, and I'm not in rest 24-7 now, but the most important thing is that you know when you're not right.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_00: You have the rumble strip in place, so you know, oh, okay, I'm I'm going off, I'm veering off on my own, I'm doing it out of my own strength.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: Let's get back on this this growth track, which is running alongside with the Lord.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_02: And there's no condemnation in Christ, there's none.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_02: There's always, I tell people, you know, how many times have they taken an exit off a freeway?
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm just suddenly, where am I?
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_02: Wait, shoot, I took the wrong exit.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_02: Autopilot.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: So what I'm doing immediately is finding the on-ramp.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and it's always an on-ramp.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_02: There's no guilt.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_02: There's no like, oh my gosh, I'm so terrible at this, you know.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, no, Lord, can you get me back on to the freeway of rest?
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_02: I'm just here in this weird neighborhood, I don't even know where I'm at right now, and he'll get you right back on.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_02: So that's that's another chapter as well, as I talk about how just to get right back on without guilt and shame and um, you know, diminishing yourself and just get back on.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's no big deal.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_02: So good.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_00: The last two before we we wrap things up and sign off, just because us moms, we need it, especially the summertime.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: Summertime is full of twists and turns and curveballs and things not going how we want, and thinking, longing for those days where we could sit by the pool and do nothing that are long gone and far away.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_02: The thing is, is that you know, you remember the story of the Israelites in the wilderness, and that was, you know, they were out of Egypt, they were free, they were not slaves anymore, but they were in they were in um just enough mode, you know, just enough food for the day.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_02: So that manna expired by the end of the day.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_02: They had to, by faith, kind of peek out of their tent and go, is it there again?
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_02: Are we are we gonna starve to death, you know?
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, you know, the Lord wants us living in abundance, right?
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_02: Where we're not worried, that kind of thing.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_02: But they learned something so great in the wilderness, which was to um daily expect a daily provision.
• 47:14
  SPEAKER_02: And this is how this is how the Lord downloaded grace to me.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I am futuristic, that is one of my giftings.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_02: I'm very futuristic, and really our weaknesses, our strength gone bad.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_02: So I used to live in the future a lot, meaning I'm now thinking about the thing I need to do, yeah, even the thing that God called me to, and I'm I'm ahead.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm living out a moment ahead of time, and it's feeling like pressure, it's feeling like uh, and all of a sudden I'm dreading, right?
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_02: And it could be something I'm actually gifted at doing or want to do, right?
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_02: But when I play it in my head, and it's not today, but it's too far in the future, then I I I caught on to something here.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_02: I am I'm trying to take today's grace and put it in tomorrow's race, and it doesn't work that way.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's like manna.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_02: So, what the Lord shared with me is you will have eggs the exact amount of grace, and I don't mean mercy.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of people mix grace and mercy up.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yep, grace is supernatural empowerment.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_02: So I need supernatural empowerment, I need a I need a superwoman on the inside of me.
• 48:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I need Jesus doing something extra special that I don't have, and that is grace.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's his ability to say, guess what we're gonna do right now?
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, it's like you look back any part of your life and you go, How did I do that?
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_02: How did I get through college?
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_02: How did I, how did I raise, you know, I look at my friends now that have newborns, and I'm like, How did I do that friends?
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_02: Because of grace, because God gave you the portion of supernatural empowerment you needed in the moment.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_02: So what he has taught me is today is the very best day of your life.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_02: It's the most important day of your life because it's the only day you're in.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: And so whether it's sitting by the pool, whether it's um, you know, remodeling a house, whether it's like one summer, my husband and I went to move from one house to the other, and the deal fell apart in the move to the other house.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_02: And we were, we literally went on blow-up beds with all of our children.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_02: I was pregnant from like friends' houses because we had no idea when this was all gonna end.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_02: It was four months.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_02: Four months, four months.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_02: It was my summer, and that when Laura was teaching me about how to be happy on a blowout bed, how to be happy when the blowout bed popped, like uh stretching season.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: And so I guess what I want to do to answer your question is like, you know, whether it's summer, winter, fall, spring, night, morning, I would just say, Lord, can you help me be present in the present grace?
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_02: There's a present soup, like like I don't have the grace to do what tomorrow requires of me.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have that grace because that's grace for tomorrow.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_02: So the only grace I have is the manna that showed up today.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_02: And so whatever God is asking me to do today, there is grace for it, there's supernatural empowerment for it.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_02: So that means that if somebody's feeling pressure from their life or feeling like, oh my gosh, my kids are gonna be home all day.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_02: Guess what?
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_02: God is gonna give you more grace, he's gonna give you a grace that you don't have when they're at school.
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_02: You don't have to have the grace to take care of your kids when they're not in your house.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_02: He's gonna give it to you.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_02: He's such a good father.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_02: He gives you the portion that you need.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_02: And and the striving is when we think we have to pull it from ourselves.
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_02: And you know what happens is we hit empty, we hit an empty tank, and then we're and then we're using irritability to try to get, and I c I talk about false fuel in my book.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_02: We all have a false fuel, it's irritability, it's it's whatever.
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's the thing that we we use to try to muster up some sense of energy that's not a true source of grace.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_02: So it just has to be a supernatural empowerment.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_02: And he, you know, it's like, hey, plug me in, plug me in, Jesus.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_02: I need it today, and he will, and he does anyway.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_02: He really does.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_02: So I are saying, Yeah, go ahead.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_00: No, every hour, just you know, we're we we need to do that.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, we're gonna run out by 10 o'clock and we need it, we need it to last us till eight.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, we do.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_02: And if you and if you're and I've been there before where I'm like, oh no, it's only four.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_02: We have three hours.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_02: So, what I do is I stop daydreaming about bedtime.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_02: Pull your mind back to the present.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like if the kids are out riding their bike and you're out there on the step, you know, and you're so exhausted and you're thinking about bedtime.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_02: If you think about bedtime, you're gonna bit get more exhausted.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_02: So pull your mind back to the present grace.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: And there's a portion right then and there that you've been graced to handle that moment, but you haven't been graced to handle bedtime because bedtime's not for three hours.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_02: That grace will show up in three hours.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_02: So I love what you're saying, Amy, about hour by hour because it truly, truly, truly, truly is.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_02: And it's such a good way to live.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_02: It makes you really enjoy your life.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_02: If you can tap into the present moment, and there's breathing techniques that can that can cause people to be present.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, if your mind gets outside of now, start just what I tell people is do like 20 breaths, stop and breathe 20 times, really, really deeply, and listen to your own breath.
• 52:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know why it is, but it pulls your mind back to the present moment.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_02: So there's some techniques like that to use.
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's good.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Jenny, you have been full of truth bomb.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_00: So much wisdom, so much wisdom for the leader, so much wisdom for the mama.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: Really, anybody listening in today is going to be able to glean.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm fascinated and I'm I'm fascinated enough to go, I need to find out more about Jenny.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll be definitely sharing all the ways that we can not only follow you, but of course get your book because I think this might need to move to the top of the pile for most mommas as they head into summer.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, because it's not just a summer thing.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_00: It is let's read it this summer, let's really get these truths that you uh have shared over a thought hard fought experience.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just, you know, nice ideas that you're sharing with the rest of us.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_00: You've lived this this is what you're continuing to refer to and live through.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_00: And um I just really appreciate that.
• 53:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I appreciate you taking the time to share it with us and and not only in the written word, but with us today through interview and conversation.
• 53:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's been a blessing to me for sure.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's been so so great to talk with you.
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_00: Do you feel properly challenged?
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_00: You can get Jenny's book still, The Seven Ways to Find Calm in the Chaos, on Amazon now.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I would love it if you give her a follow on Instagram and send her a direct message to let her know what you've learned from this conversation.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_00: I learned a lot.
• 54:08
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, my conversation with Jenny and many others behind the scenes has led me to make the decision to pause the podcast for the summer months.
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: I love the conversations I get to have.
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, a podcast is one of my most favorite things.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_00: But there is so much more that I want to offer you.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna take these next couple of months with my kids to not only have fun creating our Simply Summer, but to also get still to hear the direction the Lord wants to take for this podcast and all the things Simply Wholehearted has to offer.
• 54:42
  SPEAKER_00: As I've continued to grow in self-awareness, I've come to realize that in my desire to do all the things, I have not done a few things as well as I could.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_00: This has led me to get close to the edge of being spread too thin.
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna choose to pull myself back.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: But as I take a break from the airwaves, I'll still be on the socials, and most importantly, sharing a weekly email to my Simply Wholehearted VIPs.
• 55:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's super easy to get on that list and receive some tips for the summer months with your kids.
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_00: Head to simply wholehearted.com to get the free Simply Summer template and to stay up to date with the community.
• 55:21
  SPEAKER_00: And if you know a mom who could use some encouragement during the summer, share this conversation with her to let her know that you're thinking of her and that she would be welcome to join this community.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_00: Be sure you're subscribed so you can listen to any of the 156 episodes that are rich with amazing conversations.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_00: Plus, you won't want to miss all the new podcasts coming out in season 12 of the podcast.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_00: So until next time, let's pursue perspective, purpose, and plans for us simply wholehearted life.