Latest / All Mom Does Podcast with Julie Lyles Carr / RAISING THEM WELL: How'd I Miss That with Cynthia Yanof (From the Archives)

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RAISING THEM WELL: How'd I Miss That with Cynthia Yanof (From the Archives) · All Mom Does Podcast with Julie Lyles Carr

0:01
Speaker 1: Purposely Your Life, God's Purpose listen at purposely dot com.
0:16
Speaker 2: Hey there, this is Julie Lyle's car, and this is
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Speaker 2: the Almum Dos podcast. We are on summertime, that's right,
0:23
Speaker 2: and during the summer is where usually during the podcast
0:26
Speaker 2: we take you back into the archives for some of
0:28
Speaker 2: our favorite episodes surrounding a particular topic, and this summer's
0:31
Speaker 2: topic is.
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Speaker 3: Raising them Well. I was so excited to have my
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Speaker 3: friend Cynthia Yanoff on the show where she really shared
0:39
Speaker 3: about how easy it can be to let some of
0:42
Speaker 3: the small moments pass us by way too easily. And
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Speaker 3: since you're in the middle of summer building a whole
0:47
Speaker 3: lot of small moments with your kids, this is the
0:49
Speaker 3: perfect listen to help you reorient what you want to
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Speaker 3: be paying attention to and what you want to just
0:55
Speaker 3: let go of.
0:59
Speaker 4: Oh my Yanis, thanks for having me and my puffer
1:02
Speaker 4: vest on because it got literally like under seventy degrees
1:06
Speaker 4: in Texas and we get hogwild around here, and so
1:08
Speaker 4: here in Dallas, I'm living up this day.
1:11
Speaker 5: That's a slight bit cool.
1:12
Speaker 3: Oh same here, I am wearing the sweater I get
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Speaker 3: to bust out once a year. I'm really happy about
1:18
Speaker 3: this very meaningful to me.
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Speaker 5: Nobody will kill our joy. Thank you. That's going to
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Speaker 5: wear our warm clothes for a day or.
1:26
Speaker 3: Two, I know, and we're going to feel so sassy.
1:28
Speaker 3: So here we are. Here, we are in our warm clothes.
1:30
Speaker 3: I am so happy to have you back on the
1:32
Speaker 3: podcast you have been on before, and we'll have Rebecca
1:35
Speaker 3: link that episode so that the listener, because I know
1:38
Speaker 3: they're going to fall in love with you, can go
1:39
Speaker 3: back and listen to that episode as well. Tell me
1:41
Speaker 3: a little bit about your story about getting into writing
1:44
Speaker 3: and podcasting and all of the things. How did that
1:47
Speaker 3: happen for you? Because everybody has such unique paths to
1:50
Speaker 3: land in some of these content spaces.
1:53
Speaker 4: Right, It's so interesting because I literally I have a
1:56
Speaker 4: lot of agree you guys. So I was one of
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Speaker 4: those that if you have kids like that are in
2:00
Speaker 4: high school, you know this going into college, everybody have
2:03
Speaker 4: to declare the major before they get there and what
2:05
Speaker 4: do you want to do? And everybody has these huge
2:07
Speaker 4: expectations of like you've got it figured out and you're
2:10
Speaker 4: like seventeen, and I am living proof of the fact,
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Speaker 4: like you don't have to know the Lord irons these
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Speaker 4: things out.
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Speaker 5: But I went to law school thought I wanted to
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Speaker 5: be a lawyer.
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Speaker 4: There were no lawyers in my family, Julie, and so
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Speaker 4: I didn't know what lawyers did. I thought ally McBeal
2:25
Speaker 4: or suits like that kind of thing. Like, I thought that's.
2:27
Speaker 5: What it was.
2:27
Speaker 4: And then weirdly I got to the law firm one
2:30
Speaker 4: day and I figured out that people the law firm
2:32
Speaker 4: they love something I hate, which is the law.
2:35
Speaker 5: And so that was a brude awakening.
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Speaker 4: So I practiced law for several many years, and then
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Speaker 4: over a period of time, the Lord kind of just
2:42
Speaker 4: changed the desires of my heart and moved me kind
2:45
Speaker 4: of into ministry and I worked for some Christian ministries.
2:48
Speaker 4: Started a podcast, which was crazy. I'm not technology savvy
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Speaker 4: at all, started a podcast. But here's the thing, guys.
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Speaker 4: A podcast is really just a deposition. You just ask questions,
2:59
Speaker 4: you listen, and.
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Speaker 5: You ask some more.
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Speaker 4: I know how to do a deposition because I used
3:02
Speaker 4: to be a lawyer, So that's kind of out. When
3:04
Speaker 4: and then yeah, the book again, I kind of joke
3:07
Speaker 4: about this, but never once did I say, hey, I
3:09
Speaker 4: think I'll write a book. Never once did anyone ever
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Speaker 4: in all my educations say she's a great writer. But
3:15
Speaker 4: the Lord, as only he can do, orchestrated that. And yeah,
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Speaker 4: so I was on last time for my first book,
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Speaker 4: Life is Messy, God Is Good, and then my new
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Speaker 4: one comes out February.
3:25
Speaker 5: How did I miss that?
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Speaker 4: And so I'm just really grateful that the Lord has
3:28
Speaker 4: given me the opportunity and my hope is to really
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Speaker 4: be real with people and approachable and hopefully very funny
3:34
Speaker 4: that we can just laugh at all the things.
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Speaker 5: So that's kind of a crooked path to doing what
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Speaker 5: I do now.
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Speaker 3: I love that, and I love the title of the
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Speaker 3: new book, how do I miss that? You say that
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Speaker 3: you walk the line that you were willing to talk
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Speaker 3: about some marghally inappropriate confessions, things that you never thought
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Speaker 3: that you would talk about, and you unpack in this book.
3:56
Speaker 3: I want to hear your perspective, because you know, there's
3:58
Speaker 3: been a lot of talk in recent years about how
4:01
Speaker 3: we need to be more vulnerable with each other, we
4:02
Speaker 3: need to be more open with each other, we need
4:04
Speaker 3: to be more authentic with each other. And then sometimes
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Speaker 3: we see people open their hearts, open their mouths, explain
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Speaker 3: some things that are going on in their lives and
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Speaker 3: deep concerns, worries, fears, histories, whatever, and we see people
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Speaker 3: clutch their pearls. So figure out how to be in
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Speaker 3: that position of being honest about our lives and also wise.
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Speaker 3: And what was the filter by which you began to say, Okay,
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Speaker 3: what am I going to talk about? How am I
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Speaker 3: going to talk about it? What makes the book? What
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Speaker 3: doesn't you know? How did you figure out that formula
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Speaker 3: for yourself?
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Speaker 4: Yeah, there's probably let's be really honest, Jillie, there's probably
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Speaker 4: things in that book that don't need to be in there.
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Speaker 4: Maybe my editor probably should have been like, oh, let's
4:48
Speaker 4: hang on to that one, cause I'm pretty I'm pretty
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Speaker 4: straightforward with what's going on. What you see is what
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Speaker 4: you get, And here's what I've figured out. And this
4:55
Speaker 4: is kind of my formula in life. If I'm going
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Speaker 4: to laugh about it later, then I need to laugh
4:59
Speaker 4: about it now. That's one of the things in parenting,
5:02
Speaker 4: especially if you're going to laugh about something in five years,
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Speaker 4: go ahead and laugh about it now. And if it's
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Speaker 4: something that's universal to most of us, like I think
5:09
Speaker 4: we can all kind of relate to certain things. If
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Speaker 4: you grew up in a Christian home, you can relate
5:14
Speaker 4: to the fact that you've chased after the Lord in
5:16
Speaker 4: the weirdest ways, you've been to the lock ins at church,
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Speaker 4: you've done all that, You've kissed the boy in the
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Speaker 4: back of the van on the ski trip, right, Like,
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Speaker 4: those are some universal things, but it's also universal that
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Speaker 4: we have hard questions and we've waited on God and
5:27
Speaker 4: we've seen him not show up.
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Speaker 5: And so I try to hit things that are universal.
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Speaker 4: To all of us, whether that's in our faith walk,
5:34
Speaker 4: whether that's in our parenting.
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Speaker 5: And yes, there's some things.
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Speaker 4: You know, my family did foster care and adoption, and
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Speaker 4: there's some hard places in that that I try to
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Speaker 4: hold back and spare some of that because there's another
5:45
Speaker 4: person involved, a little one of mine, that one day
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Speaker 4: will you know. It's his story to tell, not mine.
5:50
Speaker 4: But I do think in a culture where we are
5:53
Speaker 4: craving community, I'm asked to speak all over the country
5:57
Speaker 4: on friendship more than anything else. I'm some friendship expert,
6:01
Speaker 4: but I think that when we are craving community, then
6:04
Speaker 4: we have to learn authenticity. And there may be people
6:07
Speaker 4: that will clutch their pearls at your story, but I'm
6:09
Speaker 4: willing to say more often than not, they won't. And
6:12
Speaker 4: if those people that are the pearl clutchers, this just
6:14
Speaker 4: aren't your people.
6:15
Speaker 5: And that's okay.
6:16
Speaker 4: Get old enough like I am in my fifties to
6:18
Speaker 4: say that's okay. I'm not everybody's cup of tea. But
6:20
Speaker 4: there is a group of people that are going to
6:22
Speaker 4: circle you and surround you, and you're going to do
6:24
Speaker 4: the same for them.
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Speaker 5: And those are your people.
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Speaker 4: And you can set out the full story and they
6:29
Speaker 4: can take it, and with the Lord, he guides you
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Speaker 4: to those people. And so for me, it's just getting
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Speaker 4: to an age where I stopped caring about appearances. I
6:39
Speaker 4: care more about community, and I care more about people
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Speaker 4: seeing the miraculous and amazing things the Lord can do
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Speaker 4: in our lives if we'll just give them the chance
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Speaker 4: and stop trying to make everything so curated.
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Speaker 5: And so that's kind of where I land on it.
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Speaker 3: I love that I, like you, am in that age
6:55
Speaker 3: and stage of life, and it is amazing. I can
6:58
Speaker 3: look back and see me and Cynthia, not that I
7:00
Speaker 3: was ever homecoming queen, because I wasn't, but I went
7:04
Speaker 3: running for homecoming queens. They're my twenties and thirties, and
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Speaker 3: I wanted people to see my parenting a certain way,
7:11
Speaker 3: and wanted people to see my marriage a certain way,
7:13
Speaker 3: and wanted people to see, you know, all these different
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Speaker 3: things a certain way. And I often felt that that
7:18
Speaker 3: would be what would be most honoring to the Lord
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Speaker 3: if I could just you know, really pull it out
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Speaker 3: and dust it off and show it off the way
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Speaker 3: and look what the Lord has done. And there is
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Speaker 3: something that is very freeing about getting to a certain point.
7:32
Speaker 3: I find too that for me and a lot of
7:34
Speaker 3: my friendships, I felt like I've always been really thankful
7:38
Speaker 3: and really blessed to have some incredible friendships in my life.
7:42
Speaker 3: I'm finding that with some of those very same friends
7:44
Speaker 3: that we have been together through thick and thin for
7:46
Speaker 3: a lot of years. Now, Man, we're all just getting
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Speaker 3: a whole lot more like here. It is just a
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Speaker 3: beautiful thing.
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Speaker 5: I think why did too?
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Speaker 4: And I think it's such a gift if you have
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Speaker 4: friendships that you really can you can be who you
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Speaker 4: are and who God created you to be and not
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Speaker 4: finished and broken down and all the things. And when
8:07
Speaker 4: I speak on friendship, I used I used to always
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Speaker 4: talk about like the how to, and people sometimes want to,
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Speaker 4: but I'm convinced now that we need a why to
8:14
Speaker 4: more than a how to on friendship, like why does
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Speaker 4: it matter?
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Speaker 5: And to your point, I always go back to the
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Speaker 5: paralytic on the mat.
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Speaker 4: You know, the four friends carried him and couldn't get
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Speaker 4: him in front of Jesus, and so they went up
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Speaker 4: on the roof and lowered him down. And when I
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Speaker 4: talk and I think about it this way, like, listen,
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Speaker 4: we need community, we need vulnerability and authenticity because we're
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Speaker 4: the people on the mat. You may or may not
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Speaker 4: be paralyzed physically, but you are spiritually paralyzed. Every single
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Speaker 4: one of us is spiritually paralyzed, and it shows up
8:45
Speaker 4: when we want comfort overcalling and when our kindness is
8:49
Speaker 4: on low regard and all the things that we do
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Speaker 4: every single day that are short of what God calls
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Speaker 4: us to do, Like we need people that are going
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Speaker 4: to carry us on the mat and say, listen, you
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Speaker 4: have a spirit proalysis that doesn't get healed unless we
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Speaker 4: get you in front of Jesus. And I will not
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Speaker 4: set you down until we do that. And so that's
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Speaker 4: what we want in our lives is the mac carriers.
9:09
Speaker 4: And likewise we need to be carrying some mats and
9:12
Speaker 4: so I think that for me is as I get
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Speaker 4: older and I think out friendship, it's really not even
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Speaker 4: so much a how to but a why to and
9:20
Speaker 4: remembering that I have a proalysis and nothing heals me
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Speaker 4: but Jesus, and I gotta have people around me that
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Speaker 4: can carry me to Him. But they can't do that
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Speaker 4: if they don't know what's wrong.
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Speaker 3: So right, right, oh, why too? Is that is lovely?
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Speaker 3: I love that talk to me about is someone who
9:36
Speaker 3: was going for being Alan McBeal. Cute outfits, available, handsome men,
9:42
Speaker 3: cool office, the applause, the world's applause. And let's face it,
9:46
Speaker 3: you and I being in publishing and in content, there's
9:48
Speaker 3: still a certain amount of applause that is required if
9:51
Speaker 3: we're going to continue working in some of these avenues.
9:55
Speaker 3: How do we do what we can to try to
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Speaker 3: separate that from really building toward what is most important
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Speaker 3: and what is eternal. I mean, one of the things
10:08
Speaker 3: that I do appreciate in our world today is its capriciousness.
10:12
Speaker 3: In this way, you were saying that if I'm going
10:14
Speaker 3: to laugh about it in five years, what's gone and
10:16
Speaker 3: laugh about it now? It is amazing the rapidity with
10:19
Speaker 3: which trends, you know, somebody getting you know, canceled all,
10:25
Speaker 3: Like how fast it all comes and goes. And while
10:28
Speaker 3: there is something to that that is a little bit
10:30
Speaker 3: alarming because you're always a bit back on your heels
10:33
Speaker 3: trying to figure out what's going on, there's also a
10:35
Speaker 3: redemptive place of it going people kind of forget. I mean,
10:38
Speaker 3: to some degree things move so quickly now because we
10:42
Speaker 3: are in an Internet age and the Internet never forgets.
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Speaker 3: There is certainly truly in that way. But I do
10:50
Speaker 3: think that there's something about trying to go for the applause,
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Speaker 3: the likes, the followers, the numbers that is also spiritually
11:00
Speaker 3: paralyzing because it can be awfully hard to be, let's
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Speaker 3: face it, truthful when you're trying to maintain a brand,
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Speaker 3: an image, a whatever. How do we release that, particularly
11:15
Speaker 3: for those of us who are performers, like we like
11:17
Speaker 3: getting stuff done, and we like building stuff and on
11:19
Speaker 3: and on. How do we release that except there isn't
11:23
Speaker 3: a reality to it that is part of it, and
11:27
Speaker 3: yet shift our perspective to make sure that we are
11:30
Speaker 3: building about the most important things, which is building toward eternity.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, I like that you're using this building analogy, and
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Speaker 4: obviously that's something that we're all struggling with, right in
11:40
Speaker 4: terms of like what matters, what's significant?
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Speaker 5: That's that's this whole book, how Did I Miss?
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Speaker 4: It? Like an entire life of seeing the things that
11:48
Speaker 4: seem most important really weren't and in the moment missing it.
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Speaker 4: And so that's what the gist of How'd I Miss
11:55
Speaker 4: The book is about. But I like that you're talking
11:57
Speaker 4: about building. It reminds me of the story I heard,
11:59
Speaker 4: and there's a point to the shell. But basically, a
12:01
Speaker 4: man this was a sermon illustration. I don't know it
12:03
Speaker 4: to be true, but a man was building was a
12:06
Speaker 4: contract like a builder, the best in the business. He
12:08
Speaker 4: did it and for thirty years. He knew he wanted
12:11
Speaker 4: to retire it forty years, and so he told the
12:13
Speaker 4: boss five years out, I'm going to retire. And then
12:15
Speaker 4: one year out he's like, this is it my last year?
12:17
Speaker 4: And he went in his last day and the boss said,
12:19
Speaker 4: can you build one more house? I wouldn't ask, but
12:21
Speaker 4: it's for someone so significant, it's only you can do
12:24
Speaker 4: this caliber work.
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Speaker 5: And he was so mad.
12:25
Speaker 4: He's like, are you kidding? And so he ends up
12:28
Speaker 4: doing it. But listen.
12:29
Speaker 5: He was in a hurry.
12:30
Speaker 4: He didn't really care that much, and so he didn't
12:32
Speaker 4: use the same quality of supplies, not the same labors
12:35
Speaker 4: who typically would, And so at the end he handed
12:37
Speaker 4: the keys the boss, and from the outside the house
12:40
Speaker 4: looked like all the others, but on the inside he
12:42
Speaker 4: knew he'd cut corners. And the boss is like, I
12:44
Speaker 4: can't thank you enough, and he's like, I, actually, you know,
12:47
Speaker 4: the person we built this for was you. We wanted
12:49
Speaker 4: to give you this house because you are the one
12:51
Speaker 4: who has meant so much this company. And I think
12:54
Speaker 4: about that story and listen every day we are building
12:58
Speaker 4: the house we live in, right, I just want us
13:01
Speaker 4: to not cut corners. I don't want us to chase
13:03
Speaker 4: after the applause of men. I don't want us to
13:05
Speaker 4: do the things that allow us to have a house
13:07
Speaker 4: that looks pretty good on the outside, but on the
13:09
Speaker 4: inside it's just not our best work.
13:11
Speaker 5: And I know this because I've done it.
13:13
Speaker 4: And I feel like the first thirty years of my life,
13:15
Speaker 4: I built a house that looked really good on the outside,
13:18
Speaker 4: and if you looked at it compared to my house now,
13:21
Speaker 4: they look kind of the same, but on the inside
13:22
Speaker 4: I was chasing after the applause of men, and I
13:24
Speaker 4: wanted to perform, and I wanted to do things that
13:28
Speaker 4: would get you an Instagram post or that the world
13:31
Speaker 4: would say, is like, man, she got that done all
13:33
Speaker 4: the things, but you know what, it looked good on
13:35
Speaker 4: the outside of the inside. Man, you can't cover up
13:38
Speaker 4: foundational problems with a pretty rug, right, Like, that's not
13:42
Speaker 4: how it works. And so there were foundational problems that
13:45
Speaker 4: I was trying to put a little spackling on that
13:47
Speaker 4: I was trying and it just wasn't working. And so
13:49
Speaker 4: at some point the Lord slowed me down and said, like,
13:52
Speaker 4: is this the house you want to live in?
13:54
Speaker 5: And more than that, is this.
13:55
Speaker 4: The house I created for you? And so there was
13:58
Speaker 4: kind of a rebuilding of my house metaphorically speaking, where
14:02
Speaker 4: I decided, like, let the chips fall, that I'm going
14:05
Speaker 4: to do the things the Lord calls me to and
14:07
Speaker 4: some of those things, or most of those things, are
14:10
Speaker 4: going to be the things that matter and the quiet
14:12
Speaker 4: and the Lord called our family into foster care, called
14:15
Speaker 4: us into some really hard places, some not glamorous places,
14:19
Speaker 4: called us to turn down some really big opportunities.
14:22
Speaker 5: And only in that did I realize, like listen, he
14:25
Speaker 5: was checking the structural integrity. He was building a house
14:28
Speaker 5: that would stand and with stand the storms of life.
14:31
Speaker 5: And I would just say for all of.
14:32
Speaker 4: Us, like on a really practical note, every time we
14:37
Speaker 4: make a decision every day on how we're going to
14:38
Speaker 4: spend our day, how we're going to spend our finances,
14:40
Speaker 4: how we're going to treat the person that can do
14:42
Speaker 4: nothing for us, Like all these little tiny decisions every day,
14:46
Speaker 4: they're building the house you live in. And if you
14:50
Speaker 4: want a house that's going to with stand storms and
14:52
Speaker 4: a house that has a foundation in the Lord, then
14:56
Speaker 4: you got to make the individual daily choices to fa
15:00
Speaker 4: all of God's word and not follow what the culture
15:02
Speaker 4: says is successful.
15:05
Speaker 6: You think that you are in the final round of
15:09
Speaker 6: getting all this parenting done. You've got kids who are
15:12
Speaker 6: in high school, you're starting to think about college, and
15:15
Speaker 6: you're thinking.
15:16
Speaker 5: This is it.
15:16
Speaker 3: I'm Julie Lyles Carr.
15:18
Speaker 6: I am a podcaster and I'm a mom of eight,
15:20
Speaker 6: And here's what i want you to know about George
15:23
Speaker 6: Fox University.
15:24
Speaker 3: It's a different way of doing college. Why Because yes,
15:28
Speaker 3: it's all about.
15:29
Speaker 6: Getting a fantastic degree to set your kid up for
15:31
Speaker 6: their future. They have sixty undergrad programs available at George
15:35
Speaker 6: Fox University. But that's not where the story ends. It's
15:39
Speaker 6: also about equipping them spiritually. If you get out of
15:43
Speaker 6: college with a degree but you don't have a closer
15:45
Speaker 6: relationship with God, that obviously is going to deeply impact
15:50
Speaker 6: what your young adult life looks like.
15:52
Speaker 5: So for your kids, I want you to.
15:54
Speaker 3: Consider what would it mean.
15:56
Speaker 6: For your child to be able to go to George
15:58
Speaker 6: Fox University where ninety three percent of George Fox students
16:02
Speaker 6: say they now have a closer.
16:04
Speaker 5: Relationship with Jesus.
16:07
Speaker 6: George Fox University is located in the Pacific northwestern Oregon.
16:10
Speaker 6: They have twenty three Division three athletic programs, and one
16:15
Speaker 6: hundred percent of students at George Fox University receive financial aid.
16:21
Speaker 6: George Fox University is dedicated to their promise. They want
16:24
Speaker 6: every student to be known for who God created them
16:27
Speaker 6: to be. So listen, parents, Yeah, you are getting into
16:31
Speaker 6: some of those final laps, but you definitely want to
16:35
Speaker 6: make these last laps count.
16:36
Speaker 5: In a big way when it comes to the legacy.
16:39
Speaker 3: Of your parenting.
16:40
Speaker 6: So be sure and check out for your student. George
16:43
Speaker 6: Fox dot Edu that's George Fox dot Edu.
16:49
Speaker 3: I think it's so profound that you point out that
16:52
Speaker 3: it's these micro decisions really that lead to a big life.
16:58
Speaker 3: For some reason, both in the world's culture and within
17:02
Speaker 3: spiritual culture, we all seem to be looking for this huge,
17:06
Speaker 3: big profound moment, this huge, big profound opportunity, this big,
17:11
Speaker 3: huge profound door that's going to open, or the voice
17:14
Speaker 3: of God says, go do this and that and the other.
17:17
Speaker 3: And yet I have to think back to, for example,
17:21
Speaker 3: my grandparents rural Mississippi. You know, their lives depended on
17:27
Speaker 3: the small things that they did every day, like this
17:31
Speaker 3: is when we plow the field back up, and this
17:33
Speaker 3: is when we make sure that the pump's working, and
17:36
Speaker 3: any of those pieces that were so small to some degree,
17:40
Speaker 3: but we're all absolutely critical to their furthering, being able
17:45
Speaker 3: to take care of their kids, and what they were
17:47
Speaker 3: building for themselves, which from the outside might have looked
17:51
Speaker 3: like a very small and consequential life. But having been
17:54
Speaker 3: someone who has had the benefit of that legacy and
17:58
Speaker 3: what they poured into it, even though it was small
18:01
Speaker 3: and just a little sharecropping farm in Mississippi, I'm still
18:05
Speaker 3: so struck with the consistency and the faithfulness they had
18:11
Speaker 3: in those small things. How often do you feel like,
18:16
Speaker 3: can you look back at this stage in your life
18:19
Speaker 3: and see that a lot of where you are today
18:22
Speaker 3: hinged maybe for the good and the or for the bad,
18:25
Speaker 3: you know, on some small decisions when we typically get
18:30
Speaker 3: so the clemped about the big stuff, And yet is
18:35
Speaker 3: that really the stuff that is the most directional?
18:37
Speaker 5: Right?
18:38
Speaker 4: Not even necessarily my own small decisions. I think of
18:41
Speaker 4: the small decisions of people to your point, long before me,
18:44
Speaker 4: that made small faithful decisions every single day that impacted
18:49
Speaker 4: generations to come. And my parents made a decision every
18:53
Speaker 4: Sunday morning to take us to church, and that impacted
18:56
Speaker 4: me generationally. They made sacrifices for me to go on
18:59
Speaker 4: mission trips when they did have the money for that.
19:01
Speaker 4: That changed how I look at the needs of people
19:03
Speaker 4: all throughout our country and our world. And these small
19:06
Speaker 4: faithful decisions that seemed hard and probably not significant, they
19:10
Speaker 4: change trajectories. Which is why Jesus says, like, that's the
19:13
Speaker 4: Kingdom of Heaven. It's a mustard seed, right, it's and
19:16
Speaker 4: it doesn't really, it doesn't work for us, the mustard seed.
19:18
Speaker 4: We're like what are we talking about here? Not following,
19:21
Speaker 4: but for the people. Then they're looking around and seeing
19:24
Speaker 4: these tiny little seeds all through their pathways. And then
19:26
Speaker 4: they can look up on the hill where Jesus is
19:28
Speaker 4: pointing to, and it's covered in the biggest of plants
19:32
Speaker 4: and trees that come from this tiny mustard seed, and
19:34
Speaker 4: he's saying, this is the Kingdom of Heaven. The little
19:37
Speaker 4: stuff is the big stuff. That's how this plays out.
19:40
Speaker 4: And I think what happens with us is that we
19:43
Speaker 4: fall into this trap. And I call it in the
19:45
Speaker 4: book the mustard seed mistake of thinking that just because
19:49
Speaker 4: we can't see it and what it's doing and the
19:52
Speaker 4: potential of it doesn't it means it's not significant, it
19:55
Speaker 4: doesn't matter. And that's the mustard seed mistake. And you
19:58
Speaker 4: know you've probably heard this, but they talk about bam boo.
20:00
Speaker 4: When you plant a bamboo seed for five years, there's
20:03
Speaker 4: nothing you water at, the sun shines, nothing, nothing, nothing.
20:07
Speaker 4: I mean, I would have given up about three days in,
20:08
Speaker 4: because that's the kind of you know, harvester I am.
20:11
Speaker 4: But they say that within five years though, all of
20:14
Speaker 4: a sudden many years later, there's all this sudden growth
20:18
Speaker 4: and sometimes up to several feet in a day, and
20:21
Speaker 4: during that whole time, there was a deep root system
20:23
Speaker 4: that is being formed. And I think that's how Jesus
20:27
Speaker 4: is working. Like listen, don't be no pun intended but
20:29
Speaker 4: or pun intend don't be bamboozled into thinking that just
20:32
Speaker 4: because you can't see the end result, that something isn't happening.
20:36
Speaker 4: Because you can plant little faithful seeds every day in
20:40
Speaker 4: your parenting, little faithful seeds at the post office with
20:43
Speaker 4: the person with a clerk that the jerk coworker, whatever,
20:46
Speaker 4: little faithful seeds, and God he does the deep root system.
20:51
Speaker 4: And I think that one day, maybe the side of heaven,
20:54
Speaker 4: but oftentimes not, we will see the full results of
20:58
Speaker 4: what God does through these mind microscopic moments that seem insignificant,
21:03
Speaker 4: because that's his kingdom. It's a mustard seed. And so
21:06
Speaker 4: I want us to be that way. I want to
21:07
Speaker 4: be that person. I want to every day be like, Okay,
21:10
Speaker 4: I'm watering that bamboo seed and I don't see anything
21:13
Speaker 4: in three years and four years and five years, but
21:15
Speaker 4: know that there's a deep root system and one day
21:17
Speaker 4: there will be growth and it will be God that
21:20
Speaker 4: did it all and it will be worth it, and
21:22
Speaker 4: it doesn't show up in our time frames, But that
21:24
Speaker 4: doesn't mean it's not significant, right.
21:28
Speaker 3: I think one of the things I've seen that has
21:30
Speaker 3: only proliferated. We have so romanticized big events in parenting,
21:38
Speaker 3: in marriage, whether that's the baby's first birthday party that's
21:42
Speaker 3: completely catered and seventy five people come.
21:45
Speaker 5: And guilty, guilty. I did one of those first child,
21:49
Speaker 5: not catered, but pretty close.
21:50
Speaker 1: Yeah.
21:51
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I've done every bit of this, you know,
21:54
Speaker 3: like the marriage will be back on fire once we
21:57
Speaker 3: go to that all inclusive whatever place, or the holidays
22:01
Speaker 3: if I can just pull the holidays off at this level.
22:05
Speaker 3: And yet, what is remarkable to me is when my
22:08
Speaker 3: kids the things that I thought they would remember in childhood,
22:12
Speaker 3: and it's something small. And that goes both ways, Cynthia,
22:15
Speaker 3: because sometimes it's something small, they're like, remember that one time,
22:18
Speaker 3: and Mom, you gave me this minute thing and you're like, oh,
22:20
Speaker 3: that's so sweet. I have no idea that would be.
22:22
Speaker 3: Where sometimes it's small in that it wasn't even a
22:25
Speaker 3: blip on my radar, and it was messaging that for
22:28
Speaker 3: them they went well, I knew from that point forward
22:30
Speaker 3: or that meant that because I thought you were upset,
22:33
Speaker 3: or somebody said this small thing to me and then
22:36
Speaker 3: I decided I couldn't do X y Z. And it's
22:38
Speaker 3: remarkable how those kinds of moments show back up in
22:43
Speaker 3: ways that we didn't expect, particularly when we're willing to
22:46
Speaker 3: put a lot of effort into the bigger things, the
22:49
Speaker 3: things that we think will be really pivotal in terms
22:51
Speaker 3: of our kids' memories, in terms of what kind of
22:53
Speaker 3: investment we're making in our marriages. That to me is
22:56
Speaker 3: something that is so timely to remember that even though
22:59
Speaker 3: the world often celebrates big, big moments, things that are
23:02
Speaker 3: you know, postworthy, it's not always those things that make
23:08
Speaker 3: the biggest difference. I want to hear from you. You've
23:10
Speaker 3: got a phrase in this book where you talk about
23:13
Speaker 3: having our own personal Mount Rushmore's, and in a book
23:17
Speaker 3: where we're talking about these small moments, these mustard seed moments,
23:20
Speaker 3: and then I'm correlating that to Mount Rushmore on fact
23:24
Speaker 3: that for me, what does that mean to you?
23:26
Speaker 5: Yeah?
23:26
Speaker 4: Yeah, Okay, I'm going to go back for one second
23:28
Speaker 4: and say what you said in parenting is really profound,
23:31
Speaker 4: and I think I always say as a mom again,
23:34
Speaker 4: I have a twenty two year old, we're all the
23:36
Speaker 4: way down to a nine year old. And I always say, now,
23:40
Speaker 4: knowing what I know, the whatever seems most important in
23:43
Speaker 4: the moment, and parenting almost never is. And so I
23:46
Speaker 4: love that you're saying that, almost never is it what
23:50
Speaker 4: we think is most important. So I love that you're
23:52
Speaker 4: saying that. But Mount Rushmore, yes, I am. I love
23:55
Speaker 4: Mark Patterson. I don't know if y'all know Mark Patterson,
23:57
Speaker 4: but author, preacher amazing and he behind him when I've
24:01
Speaker 4: interviewed to me as these pictures, and I always ask
24:03
Speaker 4: him of certain people, I'm like, who are these people?
24:05
Speaker 4: And he's like, it's my Mount Rushmore. And so I
24:07
Speaker 4: started thinking about that. And I haven't been to Mount Rushmore,
24:09
Speaker 4: although it's on my bucket list. But I started researching
24:13
Speaker 4: a little bit and so Mount Rushmore ninety percent of it,
24:16
Speaker 4: you know, it's the President's right on the mountain, right,
24:18
Speaker 4: and ninety percent of it was dynamite, and then after
24:21
Speaker 4: that the ten percent was honeycombing. And that means just
24:24
Speaker 4: making little individual divots that would somehow break off little chips.
24:28
Speaker 5: And I think.
24:29
Speaker 4: About this Mount Rushmore idea and how the people that
24:33
Speaker 4: have impacted us the most are probably the people that
24:36
Speaker 4: made these little divots and sometimes in their lives. In
24:38
Speaker 4: our lives, there's these big dynamite moments, and it requires dynamite,
24:41
Speaker 4: like you know, a marriage or a change job, or
24:44
Speaker 4: sometimes not easy things divorce. But most of the time,
24:47
Speaker 4: the really really significant things are these little tiny chips away.
24:51
Speaker 4: And I think about how we're all chipping away at
24:54
Speaker 4: the masterpiece that's Jesus, like the portrait of Jesus. We're
24:57
Speaker 4: not doing a mountain right of presence, but we're pointing
25:00
Speaker 4: people to Jesus, and these little individual strokes matter. And
25:04
Speaker 4: so we get caught up in thinking it's the dynamite
25:06
Speaker 4: and I'm not the dynamite. I'm not the one that
25:07
Speaker 4: has the huge following it. I'm not on the platform,
25:10
Speaker 4: and I'll well, no, like really, at the end of
25:12
Speaker 4: the day, yes that did matter, But it's these little
25:15
Speaker 4: individual tweaks that actually show who Jesus is and who
25:19
Speaker 4: these presidents were. And and so I think about our
25:21
Speaker 4: mount Rushmore, who can encourage us to really care about
25:25
Speaker 4: the small little things every day. And so he had
25:29
Speaker 4: three people the way they lived life have really impacted
25:32
Speaker 4: him on his Mount Rushmore, and I started thinking about mine.
25:34
Speaker 4: And I'll just tell you one that kind of sticks
25:36
Speaker 4: with me. But her name is Peggy Powell. It's an
25:38
Speaker 4: older woman who's passed away. But I had some of Mike,
25:41
Speaker 4: and I had my husband and I are best friends.
25:44
Speaker 4: The husband got caught in white collar crime. Caught up
25:47
Speaker 4: in white collar crime, strong believers never could have thought
25:50
Speaker 4: this would happen. Sentenced to ten years in federal prison.
25:54
Speaker 4: We were devastated, two small children, devastated for his family,
25:59
Speaker 4: and so I put in a prairie quest in our church,
26:01
Speaker 4: and a woman named Peggy Powell, I don't know well,
26:04
Speaker 4: she started praying for him. And I heard from him
26:07
Speaker 4: and his wife as he's in prison that every single
26:10
Speaker 4: day she wrote him a letter every single day, just
26:12
Speaker 4: when she doesn't know that lives in a different city,
26:15
Speaker 4: that was in sentenced in a different state. Every single day,
26:18
Speaker 4: and she wrote him scripture and she'd send a newspaper clipping,
26:21
Speaker 4: and eventually they started or writing back and forth and
26:24
Speaker 4: they would memorize scripture together. And he got out of
26:27
Speaker 4: prison and his family is still intact, and his kids
26:29
Speaker 4: are now in college and are doing well and his
26:31
Speaker 4: marriage is intact. And I tell this because Peggy Powell,
26:35
Speaker 4: she understood, back to the Mustard Sea, that little, tiny
26:38
Speaker 4: places make a big difference, and something as small as
26:41
Speaker 4: a stamp writ in writing a letter every single day,
26:45
Speaker 4: she changed his life, and not just his, but the
26:47
Speaker 4: trajectory of his family. And I believe there will be generations,
26:50
Speaker 4: his grandkid's, great can kids, generations of people that were
26:53
Speaker 4: changed because of the faithfulness of a woman who carved
26:56
Speaker 4: out her tiny little part and she did what mattered
27:00
Speaker 4: in that moment for someone she didn't know, that could
27:02
Speaker 4: do nothing in return. I asked her, I said, one
27:05
Speaker 4: day I get to talk to her before she passed away.
27:06
Speaker 4: What what motivates this? For almost ten years, you wrote
27:09
Speaker 4: a letter every day to someone you didn't know. And
27:11
Speaker 4: she said, I wanted him to know that his best
27:13
Speaker 4: days are ahead and there's no condemnation in Christ. Peggy
27:17
Speaker 4: Powell's in heaven. Now, I've got to believe that now
27:20
Speaker 4: she fully sees the picture of what these small things mean,
27:24
Speaker 4: the significance that on earth. Nobody gave her an Instagram post,
27:28
Speaker 4: nobody gave her an award, nobody carried her around on
27:30
Speaker 4: their shoulders. Nobody knows about it except that I just
27:33
Speaker 4: wrote about it in a book. But yes, so like
27:36
Speaker 4: I want Peggy Powell on my Mount Rushmore. That reminds
27:39
Speaker 4: me that all those little things, they don't matter maybe
27:42
Speaker 4: in the moment to most people, but they matter in
27:44
Speaker 4: the kingdom. And so I just encourage us to look
27:47
Speaker 4: at the people, like the people who have impacted your
27:49
Speaker 4: life are probably not the tick talkers, that probably not
27:51
Speaker 4: even the big authors or the Bible study leaders. Like
27:54
Speaker 4: the people that have had the most impact are probably
27:57
Speaker 4: the ones that can be on your Mount Rushmore, that
27:59
Speaker 4: are just digging away a little bit at a time,
28:02
Speaker 4: doing the thing that God's called them to do. And
28:03
Speaker 4: it's the difference that makes all the difference in our lives.
28:07
Speaker 3: On this concept of Mount Reshmore, I love it, by
28:11
Speaker 3: the way. On this concept, one of the things that
28:13
Speaker 3: you write about is that we do become like the
28:16
Speaker 3: people we are friends with, the people who we you know,
28:19
Speaker 3: are intentionally or not, are creating this Mount Reshmore behind us.
28:24
Speaker 3: And I think there's attention Cynthia to me because we've
28:28
Speaker 3: had this messaging in faith communities, which I think is
28:30
Speaker 3: important that we are all brothers and sisters we are
28:34
Speaker 3: to be loving to each other, include each other, all
28:36
Speaker 3: of these things. And yet I think we also have
28:40
Speaker 3: to be honest about the fact that even within our
28:42
Speaker 3: faith communities, even within that women's Bible study, there may
28:45
Speaker 3: be people that yes, God may give you a specific
28:49
Speaker 3: assignment to someone, but you better be clear on where
28:51
Speaker 3: you're at in that structure, because there are people that
28:54
Speaker 3: we can include as part of our friend group. And
28:57
Speaker 3: we are getting really influid with every little conversation, every
29:02
Speaker 3: little bit of complaint or negativity or gossip or whatever
29:06
Speaker 3: the thing is, and slowly, slowly we're being chipped away
29:10
Speaker 3: into a frontispiece that we may have never intended. How
29:15
Speaker 3: do we live in that tension, in those little ways
29:18
Speaker 3: of yes, wanting to be open and kind to all
29:23
Speaker 3: and at the same time being very intentional about how
29:27
Speaker 3: we're being shaped and formed by those who are around
29:31
Speaker 3: us without canceling people, going no contact, putting up what
29:37
Speaker 3: we call boundaries, but have a whole lot more to
29:39
Speaker 3: do with control. How to just fix that for me
29:42
Speaker 3: real quick?
29:43
Speaker 4: If you could sin, Yeah, I got this, I got
29:45
Speaker 4: this covered everyone, So don't panic.
29:47
Speaker 3: Nobody worry.
29:48
Speaker 4: Yeah, nobody worried. Got this And my puffer jacket. No,
29:51
Speaker 4: I will say this. My friend very her She said,
29:54
Speaker 4: their mom always taught her this, and it sticks with me.
29:56
Speaker 4: And if there's different types of friendships, and there's the
29:58
Speaker 4: mailbox friendship, and it's the people that you know. This
30:00
Speaker 4: is metaphorical everyone, but you know you talked to the mailbox.
30:03
Speaker 4: That's great. And then there's front door friendships and you
30:05
Speaker 4: know them better and they can stand at your front door.
30:07
Speaker 5: But there's very few people that.
30:09
Speaker 4: Are couch friendships that come in your house and sit
30:12
Speaker 4: on your couch and kick off their shoes and put
30:14
Speaker 4: the feet on the coffee table. And I say that,
30:17
Speaker 4: of course metaphorically, but I think there's something to that
30:21
Speaker 4: I have learned over the years that I'm very extroverted,
30:24
Speaker 4: and I like a lot of people around me all
30:26
Speaker 4: the time, and I like a lot of different personalities.
30:30
Speaker 4: I like a lot of personalities that other people don't.
30:32
Speaker 4: But there's very few people that I like that I
30:34
Speaker 4: allow to speak into the depths of what God's calling
30:37
Speaker 4: me to do and how I'm raising my family and
30:39
Speaker 4: how my marriage operates. Very few, and they are well
30:42
Speaker 4: vetted out. And so there are people that are defending
30:45
Speaker 4: me in rooms I'm not in. There are people that
30:47
Speaker 4: are praying for my kids when my kids are making
30:49
Speaker 4: ridiculous decisions. There are people that are championing me when
30:52
Speaker 4: maybe I got the thing they've always wanted. And listen,
30:56
Speaker 4: I want to be that for them too. And so
30:58
Speaker 4: there's this inner sanctum, this inner circle of two and
31:01
Speaker 4: three four people, and I think those are the ones
31:04
Speaker 4: you need. You need this inner circle. And it's easy
31:06
Speaker 4: to look at and see, like, oh man, all these
31:08
Speaker 4: girls want went to the Bahamas on a girl's trip.
31:11
Speaker 5: I didn't get invited. I get that.
31:13
Speaker 4: But if you have the two or three really good
31:16
Speaker 4: couch friends, like that's significant. Now you should have a
31:20
Speaker 4: lot of front porch friends and maybe arguably a ton
31:23
Speaker 4: of mailbox friends. Because we are called to be the
31:26
Speaker 4: salt and light. We are called to love our neighbor,
31:29
Speaker 4: and so everybody is our neighbor. Lots of those people,
31:31
Speaker 4: we're gonna love them despite the flaws they have, because
31:34
Speaker 4: you have them to I have them too. But I
31:37
Speaker 4: think we've got to be really careful and set some
31:40
Speaker 4: boundaries for ourselves, because that's not only the right thing
31:44
Speaker 4: for us, but it's the right things for others. One
31:46
Speaker 4: of my best friends does not know the Lord. She's incredible,
31:50
Speaker 4: But I obviously don't call her and say, hey, do
31:52
Speaker 4: you think God's calling me to write another book?
31:54
Speaker 5: Like I don't.
31:54
Speaker 4: I mean, we don't operate on that level. Lover praying
31:58
Speaker 4: every day she comes to Christ. But I do you
32:00
Speaker 4: have a friend that's wise and discerning, that lives a
32:02
Speaker 4: few houses down that I'll call and say, hey, am
32:04
Speaker 4: I on the right track? And just like, actually, I
32:06
Speaker 4: don't think you are. We need to pray through this
32:07
Speaker 4: and so know the position and the posture of the
32:10
Speaker 4: people around you and put them in the rightful place
32:13
Speaker 4: for your own protection and for theirs.
32:15
Speaker 3: And you know that's you mentioned a little thing but
32:18
Speaker 3: something of great importance. Do you have people in your
32:21
Speaker 3: world who can speak truth to you? I have a
32:25
Speaker 3: deep concern that in our desire in this era to
32:30
Speaker 3: do away with potentially some of the toxic patterns we've seen,
32:33
Speaker 3: or people who are denigrating to us or who are
32:37
Speaker 3: making us doubt ourselves, But unfortunately, I think we are
32:41
Speaker 3: often also putting away, pushing away, those who really can
32:47
Speaker 3: help hone us again to this rushmore metaphor help hone
32:52
Speaker 3: us more closely to the image that God wants us
32:56
Speaker 3: to be in, and yet we resist those today who
33:00
Speaker 3: could have that kind of impact. And it's a small thing,
33:03
Speaker 3: but a significant thing when we don't allow that into
33:07
Speaker 3: our lives. Well, Cynthia, I could talk to you all
33:10
Speaker 3: afternoon in whether that you and I are so happy
33:13
Speaker 3: to be boasting today in our little warm clothes. But
33:17
Speaker 3: I know that you got lots going on in your life.
33:19
Speaker 3: You've got a book launch going on, friend, and so
33:21
Speaker 3: I want you to tell the listener where they can
33:23
Speaker 3: go to find the new book, and where they can
33:25
Speaker 3: find you on social media and your podcast, all of
33:28
Speaker 3: the great stuff that you do.
33:30
Speaker 5: Thank you.
33:31
Speaker 4: Okay, how'd I miss? That's the book and I would
33:33
Speaker 4: love for you to grab a copy. It comes out
33:35
Speaker 4: in February. I don't know exactly when this is releasing,
33:38
Speaker 4: So if it's not out yet, I have pre orders.
33:40
Speaker 4: Are everything in this business, as y'all know, not in
33:44
Speaker 4: any way because it's going to make me some great
33:46
Speaker 4: amount of money. That's not how the book business works.
33:49
Speaker 4: But what that does is it tells publishers, it tells
33:52
Speaker 4: it tells Amazon other places that you care about Christian content.
33:55
Speaker 4: So if you would pre order. That would mean so
33:57
Speaker 4: much to me. If it's already out, grab a copy.
33:59
Speaker 4: How do I miss that? And then yes, I'm on
34:02
Speaker 4: social under Cynthia again off. My last name is weird,
34:05
Speaker 4: so it's not hard to find me as one F
34:07
Speaker 4: and my podcast is called Mesmeriz with two s's Mesmeriz.
34:11
Speaker 4: I'm also on a podcast it's called Sidetracked and it's
34:15
Speaker 4: a comedy one and it's lots of fun, and so yeah,
34:18
Speaker 4: check it out. You can find everything on cynthiagainoff dot com.
34:21
Speaker 4: That's a lot of information. But yeah, when you have
34:23
Speaker 4: a weird last name, it's easy to find me. So Julie,
34:26
Speaker 4: thanks for doing this. I could talk to you all
34:28
Speaker 4: day and super fun and I'm glad we were able
34:30
Speaker 4: to solve the world's problems and huffer jackets and sweaters
34:33
Speaker 4: all as well.
34:34
Speaker 5: People.
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Speaker 3: There you go, we got it covered right here. Cynthia
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Speaker 3: as always such a delight. Thank you so much for
34:40
Speaker 3: being with me today. Thank you all right, listener, you
34:43
Speaker 3: know what to do those show knows that Rebecca puts together,
34:46
Speaker 3: that's going to take you to all the links for
34:48
Speaker 3: all the great stuff that you heard Cynthia talking about.
34:51
Speaker 3: Fantastic resources, lots of laughs and a ton of heart.
34:55
Speaker 3: As you can tell, I would love it too. If
34:56
Speaker 3: you would go over to Allmondes dot com and Allmandes
34:59
Speaker 3: on the social you're going to find great community there.
35:02
Speaker 3: I hang out the most, usually over on Instagram, so
35:06
Speaker 3: I would love to see you there, Julie Lyles car
35:08
Speaker 3: all the places. And when you show up into my
35:11
Speaker 3: dms and say, hey, have you love about having so
35:13
Speaker 3: and so on or I have a question for you,
35:15
Speaker 3: we absolutely take that to heart. We're in season nine
35:18
Speaker 3: and we want to make sure that we are addressing
35:22
Speaker 3: the things that you're concerned about, the places where you
35:24
Speaker 3: need encouragement, the questions you have, and the people who
35:27
Speaker 3: maybe they're on your mount rushmore. They're helping hone you
35:29
Speaker 3: into who you're supposed to be. So be sure and
35:32
Speaker 3: come see me over there, and I will see you
35:34
Speaker 3: the next time on the album on does podcast