Latest / I Don't Know You / How One Phone Call With a Coroner Shaped Katie Kelly's Hope in the Darkest Season

Transcript

How One Phone Call With a Coroner Shaped Katie Kelly's Hope in the Darkest Season · I Don't Know You

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, I'm Matt.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a Jesus follower,
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: husband,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: father,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: son,
• 0:09
  and friend who is deeply curious about people's creativity and
• 0:13
  how we unleash our
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: unique talents onto a world that needs them.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Today, I'm joined by my new friend, Katie.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: She's the founder and president of Through It All,
• 0:22
  a nonprofit that walks those dealing with the loss of a loved
• 0:26
  one through some of
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: the most challenging moments of their lives.
• 0:29
  We talk a bit about her journey with grief,
• 0:32
  how to help others grieve well,
• 0:33
  and how we're
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I like the idea of just taking the tram up there, looking around.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I've done that before, and when I was doing that, I was like...
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: You gotta climb this thing It's a mountain,
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: it needs to be climbed So how long That's another,
• 1:06
  you have a lot of good pithy sand I appreciate that When did
• 1:12
  the bug for this one
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: come into your brain?
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: Actually when Will and I were training for Whitney When was Whitney?
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Five years ago
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: where we climbed San Gorgonio.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: And when we were climbing San Gorgonio,
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: there was a guy up top and he's like,
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: oh,
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: have you guys done Cactus to Cloud?
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's right there.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: And we saw it.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: And he's like, that one's way more intense.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, that one's got to do it.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: You put that in.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, yeah, that... Gorgonio was also a 22-miler.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: But it was...
• 1:52
  um but it wasn't as what's the most intense like I'm assuming
• 1:58
  overnight backpacking
• 1:59
  is just more intense in general but you have like an actual
• 2:02
  pack yeah yeah this one
• 2:03
  you just have like a day pack or whatever and yeah yeah um but
• 2:08
  probably the most I
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: guess the most intense day hike was probably this one
• 2:13
  really yeah um but the Strava person did you like no I'm not
• 2:18
  I'm not Strava you
• 2:20
  just do it for the love of the game yeah I don't even have
• 2:22
  Instagram I can't even
• 2:22
  post it I'm just doing it for for kicks um but the backpacking
• 2:31
  probably Whitney was
• 2:32
  like the okay the is that like a four-day thing is that a no
• 2:36
  just so well you can
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: do it in a day hike but we did it in a two days
• 2:41
  and so backpacking it though is like a whole nother it's fun
• 2:45
  because you get to
• 2:45
  enjoy it more but it's also you're carrying like a 35 pound
• 2:49
  pack on your back well
• 2:51
  it's funny because Andrew and Will are like and this other guy
• 2:55
  Josh have you met
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Josh?
• 2:57
  Heard of him a lot you'll probably meet him at some point if
• 3:00
  you guys do another
• 3:02
  one of these things but like they're Josh is like ultra light
• 3:06
  yeah but they're like
• 3:07
  optimizing every little like they'll go get the water from the
• 3:11
  gas station and then
• 3:12
  they have that bottle and then they'll just like chug that
• 3:15
  before they go so they
• 3:16
  can like yes Will keeps on talking about this like how Josh
• 3:19
  does it is he just
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: drinks enough water I'm like
• 3:22
  that doesn't seem like it would be still effective like you'd
• 3:25
  probably just pee it
• 3:26
  out before you actually start moving yeah like I can't hold my
• 3:29
  water yeah I just I
• 3:31
  have to go to the bathroom I know yeah we'll just go through
• 3:33
  your system but hey if
• 3:35
  it works for them Josh Josh he said the I mean normally normal
• 3:40
  packs are like
• 3:41
  30-35 pounds Josh's at the end of this of this go around was 17
• 3:48
  pounds he's like
• 3:49
  ultra yeah yeah yeah ultra light that's like half the I mean I
• 3:54
  don't know I feel
• 3:54
  like my my work backpack is it's also made out of like the
• 3:59
  heaviest materials ever
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: so I'm sure it's not
• 4:03
  but I feel like my backpack is like 40 pounds all the time yeah
• 4:07
  exactly which is
• 4:09
  not good but it's like a camera but at least there's a in your
• 4:12
  in your backpack or
• 4:14
  in like an actual backpacking backpack you know that you've got
• 4:17
  straps yeah yeah
• 4:18
  mine has like a like a prosumer version of that where you can
• 4:23
  like put little
• 4:24
  straps on for the waist okay but I don't think it like actually
• 4:28
  works yeah it
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: doesn't actually you know have you been backpacking before
• 4:32
  a long time ago with scouts okay I did like one backpacking
• 4:36
  trip that was like a
• 4:37
  couple days and I sort of enjoyed it I didn't really have a
• 4:40
  great time with scouts
• 4:41
  in general yeah that was like the only time in life that I got
• 4:44
  bullied oh that's
• 4:46
  sad by like one of the leaders what in the world it was awful
• 4:51
  but then that kind of
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: like
• 4:53
  that's terrible my entire experience yeah oh of course so like
• 4:57
  Andrew and Ian are
• 4:57
  both Eagle Scouts oh but you were like never yeah I think just
• 5:01
  because I didn't
• 5:02
  have a good time with it understandably um yeah that's that's
• 5:06
  never been a regret
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: of but yeah at the same time it's like oh
• 5:12
  couldn't build a fire fast yeah exactly I got like my little uh
• 5:17
  knife card like if
• 5:18
  you were unsafe with your knife they would like take little
• 5:21
  pieces of the sides of
• 5:23
  the card and I think I only had like one card one side of my
• 5:26
  card left I was very
• 5:28
  not good at scouting oh my gosh that's hilarious I can kind of
• 5:32
  do the outdoor stuff
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: too but uh like uh you've met Matt right um uh Matt Lebs
• 5:39
  yeah yeah yeah like his version of camping I like oh his is a
• 5:44
  little more luxury
• 5:45
  like he's got a heater almost glamping yeah like he sleeps in
• 5:48
  the back of his truck
• 5:49
  he has like the cool gear like the heater for his car uh-huh
• 5:52
  he's got like the
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: skillet and he's doing amazing gourmet meals like
• 5:57
  but you're still out in the middle of nowhere because you like
• 5:59
  four wheeled drove
• 6:00
  out there yeah which I enjoy yeah but he likes desert camping
• 6:03
  which is I don't like
• 6:05
  that part yeah but in the desert you can shoot guns and I think
• 6:08
  he likes shooting
• 6:09
  guns so yeah he's gone out there with have you met you've met
• 6:14
  the Freemans I don't
• 6:15
  know if I have like John and Kat I don't know I'm sure they've
• 6:22
  come up at some
• 6:22
  point but he likes doing that with with them John yeah yeah
• 6:25
  yeah so they'll
• 6:27
  I don't know the desert is so boring to me it's just like yeah
• 6:30
  like give me trees
• 6:31
  yeah it's like the ocean but there's nothing underneath you
• 6:34
  know I mean I guess
• 6:35
  there is technically but you have to dig for it yeah yeah you
• 6:38
  can't just like swim
• 6:38
  around in it yeah that's a terrible analogy no but it is it's
• 6:42
  like there's nothing
• 6:43
  there so yeah it's not the best but um that's a very
• 6:47
  long-winded way to start our
• 6:49
  conversation yeah um yeah thanks for letting me are we are we
• 6:52
  on right now yeah
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: yeah we're on oh we're on yeah
• 6:56
  I like to kind of start a little bit more relaxed like I don't
• 7:01
  know I'm still
• 7:02
  figuring we're very much in the exploratory phase so are you
• 7:05
  gonna keep this part
• 7:06
  in right now probably okay yeah I don't know it's like a way to
• 7:10
  kind of get to know
• 7:11
  you a little bit yeah your interests and stuff because like our
• 7:15
  conversation I
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: think will be more targeted towards like
• 7:18
  what we've kind of already talked about around like a lot of
• 7:23
  the stuff that you're
• 7:25
  doing for work which is like a very different feel and vibe
• 7:29
  than like you having
• 7:30
  fun on the weekend and like going camping and stuff and so I'm
• 7:36
  still trying to
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: figure out I'm very much in the exploratory phase of like
• 7:40
  what is the right way to kind of start her off and like I don't
• 7:45
  know there's so
• 7:45
  many different formats for doing podcasts where it's like I
• 7:49
  don't really want to
• 7:50
  introduce you to like the podcast while I'm sitting here with
• 7:55
  you like I'd rather
• 7:56
  just get into the questions and then like record a little bit
• 7:59
  afterwards to be like
• 8:00
  hey this is who Katie is and what she does and like the
• 8:03
  organization that she runs
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: like I don't want to have to do that like in the moment
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: while I'm sitting with you.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And didn't you look at the camera?
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: I usually don't.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: I kind of just pretend that it's not there.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's the one thing I love about this setup.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's so tiny and small and it's not invasive at all.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's the most that I've spent time setting stuff up.
• 8:29
  Most of the time I'm just talking with people and setting it up
• 8:31
  and then it's going already.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: So I need to decide
• 8:36
  even in the conversations I'll be like make mental notes about
• 8:40
  like okay we'll
• 8:41
  think about how many have you done this will be my 13th okay
• 8:45
  yeah so they say once
• 8:47
  you've done 23 you've done more than 2% of like podcasters whoa
• 8:52
  that's that's an
• 8:53
  accomplishment you 10 more yeah so that's rad before we start
• 9:00
  can we pray yes I'd
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: love that you don't have to keep it in but that'd be awesome yeah
• 9:05
  Dear Jesus thank you so much for today thank you God for just
• 9:10
  this ability to grow
• 9:14
  Matt's skill and share my story and God I pray that you just be
• 9:18
  glorified in our
• 9:19
  conversation direct it and guide it and guide my words and my
• 9:24
  responses and Lord
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: that we readjust our perspective and align our eyes to you
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: and God is all for you.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: He will for you.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: That's cool.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: I like that.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: I feel that.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean.
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  I feel like so many of the episodes that I'm doing are with
• 9:51
  like Christians and
• 9:52
  that's like a thing that I want to do a better job of in
• 9:55
  general is like one of my
• 9:58
  good friends his name's David he does this so intentionally and
• 10:01
  I love it is like
• 10:03
  when we're talking about something and he's like he doesn't say
• 10:06
  like oh let me like
• 10:07
  I'll pray for you yeah like later it's like let's pray let's
• 10:10
  pray yeah and that is
• 10:12
  like such a it's such a subtle difference but it makes all the
• 10:16
  difference I feel
• 10:17
  like it's just well and it creates prayer so much more
• 10:19
  conversational yeah which is
• 10:21
  so cool I mean I'm terrible at it and I want to get better at
• 10:24
  it but it's like
• 10:25
  right there but like like it's a habit you develop and like a
• 10:28
  muscle you kind of
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: flex and like it's easier but it is like it just readjusts
• 10:33
  the perspective you know that we have and the posture of like
• 10:37
  any conversation that
• 10:38
  you're in where it's not like oh you're not alone in this thing
• 10:41
  and I'm praying for
• 10:41
  you separately like we're in this together we're corporately
• 10:46
  kind of doing that and
• 10:47
  I don't know that's something that I've learned from David and
• 10:50
  I'm trying to get
• 10:50
  better at where it's like oh that thing is really hard like
• 10:53
  let's pray about it
• 10:54
  right now and like kind of getting over the shyness of like oh
• 10:58
  we're in a public
• 10:59
  space or like even meeting with this guy that I had never met
• 11:03
  with yesterday where
• 11:04
  it's like oh he's going through a lot in his life and it was
• 11:08
  like oh let's like
• 11:10
  I don't know it's kind of stepping out for me to practice that
• 11:14
  yeah and it's like
• 11:15
  at Bear Coast where they're like putting tables away and it's
• 11:18
  like some random
• 11:19
  employee is like waiting for us to finish up or whatever but
• 11:23
  also just I don't know
• 11:24
  it's a skill that I want to throw in so I'm encouraged by you
• 11:28
  know I feel like and
• 11:29
  it's like what does the Bible say like we're two or more
• 11:32
  gathered you know like to
• 11:33
  be able to like gain realign our perspectives and then gain
• 11:37
  encouragement from
• 11:39
  each other um in that and and and it doesn't also have to be so
• 11:44
  intense where you
• 11:44
  like close your eyes yeah fold your hands you know where it's
• 11:47
  like it can just be
• 11:48
  conversational yeah and I think that's the beauty of it yeah I
• 11:52
  got the opportunity
• 11:53
  to go did I tell you this um to go to like a practicing the way
• 11:58
  retreat yeah so
• 12:00
  cool it was it was amazing but it was such a like breath of
• 12:04
  fresh air to be like oh
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: like
• 12:06
  there's so many different ways to like pray and worship and
• 12:10
  like I grew up in this
• 12:12
  very kind of more legalistic kind of yeah put your hands down
• 12:18
  by your side yeah
• 12:19
  there's a right and wrong way to do things and and it was so
• 12:23
  refreshing to be like
• 12:24
  oh this is not how like this is such a new thing for the church
• 12:29
  like the the old
• 12:31
  and the ancient church like practice these things in very
• 12:34
  different ways than we do
• 12:35
  and even just going to different parts of the world and seeing
• 12:37
  yeah like how they
• 12:39
  practice worship totally and it's just like eye-opening and to
• 12:44
  your point just the
• 12:45
  perspective shift of just like hey like this is happening now
• 12:49
  the holy spirit's in
• 12:50
  this thing in a very different way than like if we're not
• 12:53
  acknowledging him yeah um
• 12:56
  that's a good segue into I think like mostly what I want to
• 13:01
  talk about is like your
• 13:03
  organization and kind of how you got into that and like talking
• 13:09
  about uncomfortable
• 13:10
  things like grief and pain are definitely very uncomfortable
• 13:14
  and people don't enjoy
• 13:16
  going through them or talking about them they probably enjoy
• 13:19
  talking about them
• 13:19
  less than they enjoy going through them or sitting with other
• 13:22
  people in there too
• 13:25
  it's hard it's totally hard I kind of want to preface and this
• 13:29
  is something I'm
• 13:29
  trying on for size with some of the last episodes that we've
• 13:32
  done and I'm curious
• 13:34
  to get your thoughts on it either right after I do it or after
• 13:37
  or whatever is like
• 13:40
  kind of theming the conversation with like a quote and so I was
• 13:46
  doing some research
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: for this and I found this quote from John Mark Comer
• 13:51
  my favorite love him and I didn't realize he like wrote a
• 13:54
  little kind of almost novella length
• 13:58
  work on like pain and suffering like during COVID okay no I
• 14:03
  don't know if I read it
• 14:05
  I hadn't either until I was researching this but he said like
• 14:11
  our greatest wounds
• 14:12
  come from relationships but so does our greatest healing the
• 14:18
  risk is worth it and
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: that's what he says in his opinion
• 14:23
  I'm curious like as we kind of jump into this conversation if
• 14:27
  that's like a theme
• 14:28
  and we think about that through the lens of the rest of the
• 14:31
  conversation but I'm
• 14:34
  kind of curious how you sort of grew up and specifically around
• 14:39
  like dealing with
• 14:41
  pain for lack of a better way of saying that and like learning
• 14:47
  empathy was there
• 14:48
  like someone in your life that you like learned empathy from
• 14:51
  yeah well one I love
• 14:53
  that quote I think that's so accurate I think we heal through
• 14:56
  community we I've
• 14:59
  come kind of come to this like realization of like we there's
• 15:04
  like a vertical
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: gospel and a horizontal gospel and God
• 15:09
  meets us through tangibly loving us through people and there's
• 15:13
  so much healing that
• 15:14
  comes from community and staying in community and and being
• 15:19
  loved by others and
• 15:20
  seeing God's love through others so love that quote that's a
• 15:23
  good one I agree as
• 15:26
  for my childhood upbringing I grew up in a really strong
• 15:31
  Christian home and
• 15:32
  which I'm so fortunate for and yeah I really grateful for my
• 15:38
  family and my parents
• 15:40
  and siblings and but I would say it wasn't necessarily modeled
• 15:47
  for me of like grief
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: and pain and we were very good at having fun and
• 15:52
  and being joyful and praising God through everything which is
• 15:58
  which is so important
• 15:59
  but not necessarily seeing the the importance also of lament
• 16:04
  and like and the
• 16:07
  hardships of life and I was honestly shielded a lot from the
• 16:11
  hardships of life
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: which is amazing for
• 16:17
  most of my life and the obviously the biggest one was all of a
• 16:23
  sudden when I was 27
• 16:25
  years old and came out of nowhere and Ben my husband passed
• 16:30
  away instantly like
• 16:33
  suddenly very tragically and it kind of like set me on this
• 16:39
  path of like hey what
• 16:40
  does grief look like what does my life look like now and it
• 16:43
  felt instantly like my
• 16:46
  life had shattered into a million pieces and and so I've kind
• 16:50
  of fumbled my way
• 16:51
  through like what is the what does this look like now and and
• 16:56
  who is God and is God
• 16:58
  good and there's been so many things that I've had to wrestle
• 17:00
  through and through
• 17:02
  people I've really seen God's goodness and God's love the most
• 17:09
  and yeah and you
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: also asked like
• 17:13
  how did I see empathy modeled and honestly I would say that was
• 17:16
  from Ben my husband
• 17:19
  Ben was much more emotional than I I remember like every time
• 17:25
  he like he would just
• 17:28
  cry at different things he was just moved like emotionally with
• 17:32
  so much and it was
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: so beautiful in that in
• 17:36
  in like the state of being present with him I was always trying
• 17:41
  to like get him out
• 17:42
  of like when he'd have hard days I'm like come on Ben let's
• 17:45
  like you're ruining my
• 17:47
  mood like let's fix it like and and he did so well like with
• 17:54
  just like why would
• 17:56
  you want to God has something to teach me in this like why
• 17:59
  would I want to like
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: jump out of this too quick God has something to teach me in it and
• 18:04
  um and I remember like anytime I would cry he would like smile
• 18:08
  at me I'm like
• 18:09
  you're so mean like why are you like feel it I know he's just
• 18:13
  like just means
• 18:14
  you're human but like honestly like he taught me so much so um
• 18:22
  how to love others
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: and literally like after he passed away
• 18:27
  I just look back and he had created a playlist all about like
• 18:32
  lament songs of like
• 18:34
  that he had titled on his Spotify like God take this somber
• 18:36
  heart and it was just
• 18:38
  these like songs of questioning and like lament but like also
• 18:44
  praising worship
• 18:45
  songs to God I just like played that over and over and like as
• 18:49
  I learned to grieve
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: which I'd never grieved in my life before
• 18:54
  I really felt close to Ben as well and there were so many
• 18:58
  stories of after Ben
• 19:00
  passed of like how much he was there for other people and
• 19:04
  everyone came out of the
• 19:05
  woodwork so I was like gosh if Ben were only here to see like
• 19:08
  that little moment
• 19:09
  meant the world to that person of just sitting in it with other
• 19:14
  people seeing them
• 19:15
  like being present and being like I don't know either man that
• 19:19
  sucks like you know
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: and I typically
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: I used to be like how do I fix this?
• 19:27
  How do I get you out of your bad mood because I don't want to
• 19:29
  be brought down?
• 19:30
  I used to be able to hold it out in arm's length because I
• 19:34
  didn't want it to affect
• 19:35
  me and then all of a sudden I saw how much people's empathy and
• 19:40
  people coming into
• 19:41
  the space of pain with me changed everything for me and so Ben
• 19:48
  really modeled that
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: I even I got a call from somebody I didn't even know
• 19:55
  a year after Ben died and they said hey you don't know me but
• 20:02
  Ben was my youth
• 20:03
  group leader when he was in college and he saved my life and
• 20:09
  like he was there for
• 20:10
  me in like the hardest time and I always said if I ever get
• 20:14
  married you're going to
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: be standing up front with me
• 20:17
  and Ben's literally never mentioned this person before like I
• 20:21
  did not know his name
• 20:22
  even and Ben was so humble about those things and also like was
• 20:25
  so like close to
• 20:27
  his chest about like sharing other people's stuff as well but
• 20:32
  so he asked me if
• 20:33
  like I would come to the wedding and like asked if I could if
• 20:36
  somebody could walk
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Ben's photo up there
• 20:39
  for like to stand as his groom and his like party groomsmen
• 20:42
  party and it was just
• 20:43
  like so powerful like Ben you have no idea how much of a impact
• 20:49
  you have and I
• 20:50
  don't think anybody knows how much of an impact they have until
• 20:54
  someone until they
• 20:54
  pass away like people begin to reflect or like share those
• 20:58
  stories and you're like
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: wow it's the little day-to-day moment by moment like
• 21:05
  encouragement and conversations that mean the most to people
• 21:09
  and change people's
• 21:10
  lives yeah yeah well it's interesting because I feel like I
• 21:13
  don't know so much of
• 21:14
  my framework for thinking about things is like uh running this
• 21:21
  is going to be a
• 21:21
  terrible comparison but like if you're if you want to run a
• 21:25
  marathon you do that in
• 21:26
  little bite-sized chunks of training and doing the little
• 21:30
  things consistently over
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: time um and it feels like
• 21:34
  that that is a parallel to what you're talking about where it's
• 21:37
  just like how do
• 21:38
  you see people not in like the grand gesture of like oh I went
• 21:41
  out and bought you a
• 21:42
  car or like did this really big thing for you it's just like no
• 21:45
  how did I see you
• 21:46
  like look you in the eye and like give you a compliment or
• 21:49
  listen to you or like
• 21:51
  not try to fix your problem and just see you and listen well
• 21:55
  and so often I feel
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: like we miss that when we're
• 21:59
  in the busyness of life and all that kind of stuff Mother
• 22:03
  Teresa has some quote I'm
• 22:04
  going to really butcher it but it's like love the world best by
• 22:11
  you love the world
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: and you change the world by
• 22:17
  loving in small in small ways and it means the most to people
• 22:22
  you know and it's
• 22:23
  like I really butchered that I wish she was far more eloquent I
• 22:26
  get what you're
• 22:27
  saying it's the she had time to write it down yes yeah yeah she
• 22:30
  thought about it
• 22:31
  lots of silence and solitude yeah like do it in small ways and
• 22:36
  with big love yeah
• 22:37
  or something and that changes yeah oh yeah no I think that's
• 22:41
  like the challenge I
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: always come away with is like
• 22:44
  I often feel like indifference at the world's like big problems
• 22:48
  where it's like
• 22:49
  well I can't do anything about like this big war that's going
• 22:52
  on in whatever
• 22:52
  country or whatever challenges is going through but it's like
• 22:56
  well but what are the
• 22:56
  little things that you can do that actually impact yeah like
• 23:00
  people which are the
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: things that are living in the world that matter the most totally um
• 23:07
  and it's like such a great reminder where it's just like how do
• 23:09
  you live small and
• 23:11
  that's all you take in this world too you know like when we die
• 23:14
  like that is all
• 23:15
  you take is the relationships yeah and talk about a crazy
• 23:18
  testimony where like some
• 23:20
  high school guy like his life was changed because of the way
• 23:24
  that Ben saw him
• 23:25
  15 years later and he's still wanting them in his like bridal
• 23:29
  party like it's just
• 23:30
  yeah really powerful stuff crazy that sounds like a bizarre
• 23:33
  weekend to like be a
• 23:35
  part of but so cool at the same time yeah it was such an honor
• 23:38
  super like a huge
• 23:39
  privilege wow that's amazing yeah well you kind of already that
• 23:44
  was my next
• 23:44
  question was like kind of what's your story with grief but you
• 23:48
  kind of already
• 23:48
  shared it a bit yeah I could go more in depth but I'm happy to
• 23:52
  skip over yeah up to
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: you um
• 23:55
  but we can yeah we can we can jump to the next one yeah I'm
• 23:59
  curious kind of because
• 24:01
  we talked about this when we were when we were kind of meeting
• 24:04
  last week and I was
• 24:05
  curious to kind of dive into this a bit more like when you were
• 24:10
  processing grief
• 24:14
  was there a moment or a time that you kind of like working
• 24:17
  through that it wasn't
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: like a
• 24:22
  like something to survive but something to like live in and
• 24:25
  through where you came
• 24:27
  to that realization where it wasn't like I just need to get
• 24:29
  past this thing because
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm assuming that's like
• 24:34
  a lot of what grief is where a lot of people are just like I
• 24:37
  just need to like get
• 24:38
  through this somehow rather than like tough your way through
• 24:40
  it's like now a part
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: of me and how do I live with that yeah you know it's been a progression I
• 24:47
  definitely came at the beginning you know I thought that that
• 24:51
  was the way to do it
• 24:52
  is like you know tough your way through it and I will say I'll
• 24:55
  stop and just if
• 24:57
  anybody's listening with this and doesn't know anything about
• 25:01
  my story I'll just
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: share like
• 25:05
  Ben was a surfer and he as you know and surfboard shaper we
• 25:10
  were living up in Santa
• 25:11
  Cruz County and we were living this like dream life we had we I
• 25:17
  remember like a
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: couple weeks before um
• 25:21
  we kept looking at each other being like why has God blessed us
• 25:24
  so much like like
• 25:26
  how did we get so lucky because this life like we had built an
• 25:31
  online marketing
• 25:32
  company and it was doing really well Ben had his surfboard
• 25:37
  shaping company we had
• 25:38
  just done like Ben's bucket list trip to the North Shore for
• 25:41
  two weeks and it was
• 25:44
  it was this like dream life we were living that we were like
• 25:48
  creating up there and
• 25:50
  I mean we definitely had our hardships but we had just come
• 25:54
  down actually to Orange
• 25:56
  County for Easter and saw most of his family and then randomly
• 26:02
  everything was shut
• 26:02
  down with COVID and so we were like well we don't have any
• 26:05
  business meetings so
• 26:06
  we'll go up to Oregon and we went up to Oregon and visited my
• 26:09
  whole family and that
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: was a week before Ben passed and so it was just like
• 26:14
  such a gift from the Lord all of these like last goodbyes when
• 26:19
  we didn't even know
• 26:20
  and we Ben went out surfing with two of his buddies and on
• 26:29
  Saturday May 9th 2020
• 26:31
  and he got bit by a shark and pretty instantly the shark bit
• 26:39
  the worst possible
• 26:40
  artery in his leg and passed away within minutes of getting to
• 26:45
  the beach but it was
• 26:48
  like everything was done in the best like like as as well as
• 26:53
  possible where I don't
• 26:54
  have to ever have to wonder like well what if he had gotten
• 26:57
  help like I'm so
• 26:59
  grateful there was first off-duty first responder that was on
• 27:02
  the beach that was
• 27:02
  like ready for him and like they called in a helicopter and all
• 27:05
  of that so um he
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: was 26 years old a week away from his 27th birthday
• 27:11
  and I was 27 at the time and so yeah it just like launched me
• 27:15
  into that then grief
• 27:18
  it was I mean everything went numb from there everything went
• 27:21
  like chaos but I
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: remember a Ben and I's
• 27:29
  premarital counselor also like our good friend she was she kind
• 27:35
  of gave me a key to
• 27:35
  her house and she was like come over anytime and like you got
• 27:39
  you can live here if
• 27:41
  you want and she was down here in Orange County and and like
• 27:45
  I'm here to process
• 27:46
  with you and so I would go over every Saturday for like hours
• 27:50
  and hours and hours
• 27:52
  until I ran out of words and I would just process with her but
• 27:55
  that first time I
• 27:58
  I walked in to her house I was like sat down and I was like how
• 28:03
  long is this gonna
• 28:04
  take and she just laughed and was like oh Katie you have a lot
• 28:09
  to learn and that's
• 28:11
  kind of that was my extent of grief knowledge of like let's get
• 28:15
  through this you
• 28:16
  know and yeah I have since then really figured found like grief
• 28:24
  is such a journey
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: and it comes in
• 28:27
  Waves of grieving different things and I actually don't think
• 28:32
  that I'll ever be
• 28:33
  done grieving like there's there's a level of healing of you
• 28:37
  learn to carry it a
• 28:38
  little lighter and maybe like swim a little better in the deep
• 28:41
  end kind of sort of
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: thing but um it is
• 28:46
  the love will never stop like I will always love Ben and so why
• 28:50
  do I expect the
• 28:52
  grief to end where it's it comes in different ways you know in
• 28:58
  different seasons of
• 29:00
  of like more like different milestones and different things so
• 29:05
  yeah it's definitely
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: been I've learned my grief a little bit better but
• 29:12
  it's not an easy process was that friend the premarital
• 29:17
  counselor was she the one
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: that had she gone through something similar and
• 29:22
  she had lost yeah Michelle she has lost her mom um but she's
• 29:25
  but she's a therapist
• 29:26
  yeah she's like a very very talk about gifted therapist at the
• 29:31
  right yes yeah right
• 29:33
  time at the right place yeah such a gift yeah that's amazing
• 29:37
  well and just even
• 29:38
  just like I don't know the posture that she had it doesn't
• 29:40
  sound like she was like
• 29:41
  hey let's fix you no it was like we're available do whatever
• 29:46
  you're gonna do
• 29:47
  Yeah and like talk it through and yeah yeah your grief needs to
• 29:53
  be witnessed in a
• 29:56
  way of like somebody else being in it with you and I used to
• 30:01
  think that like when
• 30:03
  you would when you would validate people's emotions like let's
• 30:08
  say you're really
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: angry and I'm like
• 30:10
  that yeah that's right like that sounds unjust and I'd be angry
• 30:15
  too I used to think
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: if I validate your emotion
• 30:19
  then it would become a bigger emotion of like let's say you're
• 30:22
  sad and I'm like
• 30:23
  validating like oh yeah let's dampen it so I try to dampen it
• 30:28
  because it's like
• 30:28
  maybe it'll make it smaller but it actually does the opposite
• 30:31
  this was like pre-Ben
• 30:33
  Ben passing away like this is how I used to operate and then
• 30:37
  realizing actually
• 30:38
  when someone's in it with you and just sitting in the pain of
• 30:42
  it with you those
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: feelings actually get so much smaller and
• 30:46
  because you're not smaller but they become more bearable
• 30:50
  because you're like I'm
• 30:51
  not alone in it and I don't have to prove to someone this hurts
• 30:55
  it's actually so
• 30:57
  powerful to have someone else in it with you to be like oh man
• 31:01
  it's not just me
• 31:02
  feeling this I'm so curious have you always been a journaler
• 31:08
  are you a journaler
• 31:09
  now is that a helpful exercise in processing through stuff
• 31:14
  because what I'm hearing
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: you say is like
• 31:16
  it's way more helpful to process it with people and I'm sure
• 31:21
  it's different for
• 31:21
  different people depending on personality and stuff like that
• 31:25
  but like has it been
• 31:28
  helpful to do that were you like a journaler before I've always
• 31:31
  been a journaler I
• 31:32
  was a journaler way before always had kind of like a prayer
• 31:38
  journal not like
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: journaling my like today I did this
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm one of those psychotic people.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: Do you?
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've never done that.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's more so like a prayer journal.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: After, it was really where I processed.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: That was through my processing, was journaling.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: and even writing letters to Ben.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: I had a friend who sent me a journal that had Ben's initials on it.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: So anytime I wished I could talk to Ben,
• 32:15
  and wanted to share something with him or like I didn't want to
• 32:18
  forget something
• 32:18
  about our relationship or our inside jokes or things I would I
• 32:21
  would just journal
• 32:22
  him and it actually helped so much to get the all the chaos in
• 32:28
  my brain out so I
• 32:30
  could focus on different things and it was super it was like a
• 32:34
  really healthy
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: helpful outlet there's so much science too on like how powerful
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: yeah journaling is um there's a book called like writing it down by James
• 32:44
  Pennebaker and it is all about the science of journaling and
• 32:48
  how helpful even if
• 32:49
  you aren't a journaler the how helpful it is to get your words
• 32:54
  out on paper and
• 32:55
  like slow your brain down yeah yeah every time I am just
• 32:59
  overwhelmed with stuff and
• 33:00
  I write it down then I don't feel like I lose it yeah totally
• 33:04
  somewhere but then I
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: I then I can move on
• 33:07
  otherwise I just kind of ruminate and spiral yeah thinking
• 33:11
  about like whatever
• 33:12
  thing totally for a long time so I was just curious yeah kind
• 33:15
  of like I don't know
• 33:16
  how do you go away and then come back to like people because
• 33:21
  it's almost it almost
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: feels like
• 33:23
  the journal is an extension of your mind but then like actually
• 33:28
  figuring out how to
• 33:29
  process through whatever you're going through and then having
• 33:32
  that time to also do
• 33:33
  that with people too it's like both and it's not like either or
• 33:37
  it almost feels
• 33:38
  like for me journaling is the way that I actually understand
• 33:42
  what's going on in my
• 33:42
  head and putting words to the chaos of my brain where I don't I
• 33:49
  actually can't
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: necessarily process with people as much as
• 33:53
  I do on my journal and then I have words for it and then I can
• 33:56
  process with someone
• 33:57
  else or share it with someone else so it's like more so first I
• 34:02
  figure it out and
• 34:02
  then I am able to like bring other people into it yeah yeah
• 34:06
  that's really good I'm
• 34:07
  curious kind of and you touched on this a little bit but I'm I
• 34:11
  would love to have
• 34:12
  you expound on it a little bit like the kind of your faith
• 34:16
  journey through like
• 34:17
  going through this extremely tragic thing like you seem like
• 34:21
  you're a very strong
• 34:23
  like stronger now than you probably were before I would imagine
• 34:28
  Christian like yeah
• 34:29
  how do you go through something like that and actually yeah I
• 34:33
  would imagine and I'm
• 34:35
  sure it's like day in day out uh like working through it but
• 34:39
  like what are some of
• 34:39
  the tools and like how how have you kind of grown I don't know
• 34:44
  that's a big
• 34:44
  question yeah I mean it's definitely like hard fought hard
• 34:49
  fought gritty faith that
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: you develop um
• 34:52
  I had a really strong relationship with Jesus before Ben passed
• 34:59
  away but I would
• 35:00
  also say it was very naive to pain as well and I actually
• 35:05
  always I have a specific
• 35:07
  memory of telling asking Ben like man I wonder like I wonder
• 35:12
  when it's my time like
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: where something will hit
• 35:15
  and like dangerous question to ask Ben said the same thing he's
• 35:18
  like why are you
• 35:19
  saying that like don't say that but I was just like if anything
• 35:24
  happens like of
• 35:25
  course I can say God is good because God has I've seen God's
• 35:29
  quote unquote goodness
• 35:32
  worldly goodness of like a good life so far that like of course
• 35:39
  I can say wow God
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: you're so good your provision but can I still say God is good when
• 35:45
  um life doesn't go my way you know and I always wondered if my
• 35:49
  faith would like
• 35:50
  kind of like sustain and I could hold on um and for you know
• 35:57
  the first month I was
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: very much like
• 36:01
  God's got this God's like God's gonna get me through this
• 36:04
  leaning back on that
• 36:05
  historical yeah of like I know that he's gonna pull me through
• 36:08
  and really leaning
• 36:11
  on the faith of like my childhood and who I knew God to be the
• 36:16
  Bible verses that I
• 36:17
  knew that I had memorized as a kid but then it's like this
• 36:25
  journey is long
• 36:26
  and God to be honest like I had this way envisioned of how God
• 36:32
  would show up for me
• 36:33
  in my pain and he wasn't showing up in the way that I thought
• 36:38
  he would and it was
• 36:39
  super disorienting it was really it was really confusing for me
• 36:46
  because I was like
• 36:50
  it would be a great time for you to comfort me right now when
• 36:52
  I'm in agony on my
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: bed just like weeping you know and
• 36:56
  and there were times where like I would get this like text from
• 36:59
  a friend and or
• 37:01
  exactly at the time I needed and there's definitely those times
• 37:03
  which was such a
• 37:04
  gift other times it was like it was just painful and learning
• 37:10
  it was yeah it was
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: this like very disorienting process C.S.
• 37:18
  Lewis has a book that was really helpful for me called A Grief
• 37:21
  Observed and it's
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: actually his journal entries
• 37:25
  processing after his wife passed away that was that was it was
• 37:30
  either going to be a
• 37:31
  grief observed quote or a John Mark Coen quote to open this up
• 37:34
  so I'm glad that you
• 37:36
  mentioned that what's crazy is that Ben that was the last book
• 37:40
  Ben ever read and he
• 37:43
  was like always like he would like underline things in in his
• 37:47
  books and stuff
• 37:48
  and he he read that book gave it to me a week before he died
• 37:53
  and said you have to
• 37:54
  promise me this is the next book you'll read because then
• 37:57
  you'll know me because he
• 37:59
  had so much emotion in his heart which wasn't necessarily uh
• 38:03
  comparative to CS
• 38:05
  Lewis's emotion but um it's just it's such a crazy thing yeah
• 38:12
  that I don't know god
• 38:14
  God was working in the details before like he he knew what was
• 38:20
  to come it's not
• 38:21
  that he caused it it's he knew what was to come and he was
• 38:24
  working in the details
• 38:25
  previous and and so I yeah that was the first book I read and
• 38:31
  actually didn't even
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_01: know what it was about until I started reading it and C.S.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: Lewis being able to see like this
• 38:43
  like patriarch of faith like known as like such a revered man
• 38:50
  of like our Christian
• 38:51
  culture and to see him struggle through his faith and be able
• 38:57
  to question God was
• 38:58
  such a gave me so much freedom to be willing to do that myself
• 39:04
  so wild that he like
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: became a Christian later in life too where it was like
• 39:09
  this formative thought I always wonder about like I don't know
• 39:13
  I don't remember
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: when Mozart died but I think he was like
• 39:17
  really young and it's crazy to think about the the catalog of
• 39:21
  music he would have
• 39:21
  made if he was like a lot older obviously like his life worked
• 39:26
  out the way that it
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: did for a reason but the same thing with C.S.
• 39:28
  Lewis where it's like oh I wonder if you had gotten saved
• 39:30
  earlier like what your
• 39:32
  experience would have been and like what you would have written
• 39:34
  that you didn't
• 39:35
  write because you got married later well and that and that book
• 39:38
  like he actually
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: put it under a surname because he thought that he it would be like
• 39:45
  looked at he would be looked down upon and so he didn't he gave
• 39:49
  it to his publisher
• 39:50
  and his publisher really wanted to publish it and he said I you
• 39:55
  won't you're not
• 39:55
  allowed to publish it unless you put it under a different name
• 39:58
  fascinating and so
• 40:00
  they put it under a different name and as far as I know this is
• 40:03
  the story I've been
• 40:04
  told and and then once he died his publisher came out and said
• 40:08
  this was actually
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_01: C.S.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: Lewis
• 40:10
  that dirty dog I know so crazy though and it just goes to show
• 40:15
  Christian culture
• 40:16
  yeah of we need a a level of authenticity in lament in our
• 40:23
  Christian culture of
• 40:24
  like being real because I it's it's so easy to hide those
• 40:31
  feelings of doubt and
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_01: pain and anger and frustration with the Lord and then it
• 40:38
  it bubbles up and it like it actually takes root in our heart
• 40:41
  versus if we're able
• 40:43
  to like somebody's able to sit with me in it you know so yeah
• 40:48
  I've with that I
• 40:50
  think it was a very I've had to really strip down my faith it
• 40:56
  was like year two or
• 40:57
  three that I really had to I really started questioning
• 41:00
  everything and started
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: looking at like can God be trusted I've seen God work
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: in very clear ways in my life that I couldn't say God doesn't exist.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: But can he be trusted?
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's such an interesting question.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:18
  like a very distinct question from like does he exist because I
• 41:22
  feel like that's
• 41:23
  probably that's the question I always hear from people that are
• 41:27
  deconstructing
• 41:28
  faith but like that's almost more important the trusted
• 41:33
  question to me yeah yeah
• 41:35
  it's very much like I can't say that you're not real because
• 41:39
  you have very much
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_01: shown up in my life in specific ways but but do I want to serve you yeah
• 41:49
  and like are you good and yeah so it was a very kind of like
• 41:54
  building it back
• 41:55
  stripping it down and then building it back up little by little
• 41:58
  to see and train my
• 42:00
  eyes to see God's goodness again and see his love for me again
• 42:04
  and yeah well you
• 42:06
  know what they say it's like trust is gained in droplets and
• 42:10
  lost in buckets so
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_00: true was that kind of like the path back to like trusting and
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_00: God in that?
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: Was it like, here's a little step?
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: Or was there a moment of revelation?
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_00: Or is that just all... Yeah, it's all little by little.
• 42:29
  I mean,
• 42:30
  you have to learn...
• 42:34
  Yeah,
• 42:34
  there's so many ways I could go with this.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: But...
• 42:38
  I saw I definitely saw God show up for me in so many different
• 42:44
  ways I could tell
• 42:45
  you like miraculous story after story where I also did gain
• 42:50
  this like intimacy with
• 42:51
  God in a relationship with him that is far beyond I could have
• 42:57
  ever gained if Ben
• 42:59
  were here because every time something wrong bad would happen I
• 43:05
  would naturally go
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_01: to human comfort like
• 43:08
  and go to Ben and instead it literally felt like everything was
• 43:13
  gone and nobody
• 43:15
  knew me and the one person that I could go to was my journal
• 43:18
  and prayer with God
• 43:20
  and that was the one place I did feel known and so it's kind of
• 43:23
  this paradox where
• 43:23
  it's like I don't trust you but I feel like you're the only
• 43:26
  thing I have that I
• 43:27
  have to like rely on you and so for the first couple years it
• 43:30
  was I can't even
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: question because that's too much for me right now and then when I started
• 43:36
  to gain a little more capacity to think and feel and the
• 43:45
  bravery to question.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was this like, okay, what do I really believe?
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I think every...
• 43:51
  Christian should go through that because yes your faith does
• 43:55
  come out stronger when
• 43:57
  you really seek to find that well when you go through
• 44:00
  incredibly excruciating
• 44:02
  things like you went through where it's like I don't know if
• 44:06
  you're it's almost
• 44:08
  like relationships in general when they're battle tested and
• 44:11
  challenged and stuff
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_00: like
• 44:14
  it either goes one of two ways it's either it breaks or it
• 44:18
  becomes stronger and
• 44:19
  it's forged in a new way and so it sounds like and you yeah and
• 44:22
  you have to it's a
• 44:24
  very intentional choice you have to choose to look for the Lord
• 44:30
  and see his
• 44:31
  goodness in like the sunset or like in the little things you
• 44:35
  know and be like man
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_01: like
• 44:36
  thank you God for this and like it's just these little by
• 44:40
  little moments that
• 44:42
  instead of saying oh I'll explain that away or what not it's
• 44:46
  like oh no that was
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_01: actually like a gift from God that like that person just texted me or I
• 44:54
  saw a beautiful sunset or um yeah there's just so many so many
• 44:58
  different ways you
• 44:59
  know and it reminded you of whatever deal like whatever memory
• 45:04
  you had or yeah I
• 45:05
  don't know just I think that's something that I'm in the
• 45:08
  process of working through
• 45:09
  is like the Lord works in so many in the little details and so
• 45:14
  like how are we
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_00: aware of
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_00: of him in those details.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:18
  And attributing them after and being like,
• 45:21
  oh man,
• 45:21
  I had no idea you were getting...
• 45:23
  Yeah.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: There's like a story of...
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: So Seaglass has randomly become meaningful.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was hoping that you were... Randomly become meaningful to me.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_01: But I was...
• 45:44
  though so okay so let's see where do I start this the week
• 45:48
  before the week after
• 45:49
  Ben died I had to call I was forced to call the coroner's
• 45:52
  office and tell them
• 45:53
  where to put Ben's body and they wouldn't accept anyone else's
• 46:00
  like name they
• 46:01
  wouldn't accept anyone else's voice over the phone except mine
• 46:04
  and all I remember
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_01: is like my brother dialing the phone he's like you have to do this and
• 46:12
  um and he like thrust it in in my face and I when it was
• 46:18
  ringing I was like this
• 46:19
  I've never I haven't said this aloud to a stranger that Ben's
• 46:22
  dead and like Ben Ben
• 46:24
  is gone and and so I was like how am I going to do this one and
• 46:28
  also it's the
• 46:28
  coroner's office like I don't want him to just they deal with
• 46:32
  people who have
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_01: passed away all the time like
• 46:35
  he's not just another number yeah they've grown calloused yeah
• 46:39
  it's terrifying to
• 46:40
  me like Ben is not just a number or like just a body and um and
• 46:45
  so all of a sudden
• 46:46
  like somebody answered on the other line and I stumbled through
• 46:50
  like all I could
• 46:51
  get out was like I think you have my husband there and she was
• 46:55
  like what's your
• 46:56
  husband's name and I told her Ben Kelly and she began to cry
• 47:01
  and she's like oh
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_01: sweetie like I have been praying for you all week and I have
• 47:05
  I've read all about him in the news articles and he just seemed
• 47:09
  like he had such a
• 47:09
  strong faith in the Lord and then she prayed with me over the
• 47:14
  phone this was the
• 47:15
  corner and I hung up the phone and I was like I told my family
• 47:21
  I think I just met
• 47:22
  an angel she was the exact person I needed to talk to in that
• 47:26
  moment to make that
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_00: situation like
• 47:29
  bearable yes yeah and that was it that was that was um like
• 47:36
  couple months go by I
• 47:38
  was sifting through all the emails of work emails that Ben and
• 47:42
  I had received and
• 47:43
  and found came across this one that came came through our
• 47:46
  contact us page on our
• 47:48
  website and and it was it was from the coroner and and the
• 47:54
  coroner's office and she
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_01: said I just spoke to Katie and
• 47:56
  and if she ever gets this I just want to give her something I
• 47:59
  would love to meet up
• 48:00
  with her and so we ended up linking up a few months after Ben
• 48:05
  passed and we we met
• 48:09
  and she was like I don't know why but I just feel this need to
• 48:13
  give you this bag of
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_01: sea glass and the way that I processed my my
• 48:19
  parents both my parents passed away within a couple weeks of
• 48:22
  each other and the way
• 48:23
  that I processed was just running the beach and I started
• 48:26
  running the beach and
• 48:27
  started noticing sea glass and and that sea glass was picked up
• 48:32
  at the same beach
• 48:33
  that Ben passed away on and so I just wanted to give this to
• 48:36
  you oh thank you like
• 48:39
  so kind and I have no use for this but I will like one day my
• 48:43
  thought was like one
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_01: day I'll put this on my mantle and
• 48:47
  in my house is like this is a symbolism of like the kindness of
• 48:51
  others like how
• 48:52
  kind people were through this journey like you see the worst of
• 48:56
  life in the midst
• 48:57
  of loss but also like the best of humanity of like the people
• 49:00
  that come alongside
• 49:01
  and a lot of times I was very fortunate to have that experience
• 49:04
  I guess and and two
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: years go by
• 49:10
  but fully forgot about that sea glass and I was asked to run a
• 49:14
  workshop I was asked
• 49:15
  to run kind of like a grief talk actually down in El Salvador
• 49:21
  with some girls in El
• 49:22
  Salvador Super nonchalant in a different country I work with an
• 49:27
  organization down
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_01: there and
• 49:29
  they wanted they hadn't seen me since Ben passed and so they
• 49:31
  were asking me to kind
• 49:33
  of share my experience in the past couple years and really the
• 49:38
  best symbolism I
• 49:40
  came up with at that time was waves I was like grief feels like
• 49:44
  waves like you at
• 49:46
  the beginning the waves are 100 feet tall and you feel like
• 49:48
  you're going to
• 49:49
  completely drown and they just come one after another after
• 49:52
  another and after time
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_01: goes on
• 49:54
  those waves maybe become 80 feet tall and or like 50 feet tall
• 49:58
  and they come maybe
• 49:59
  further apart or like the swell you show up at the beach and
• 50:02
  you think the swell is
• 50:03
  going to be super big or you expect the swell to be super big
• 50:06
  and sometimes it is
• 50:07
  and sometimes it's like oh it wasn't too bad you know but those
• 50:11
  those waves will
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_01: always keep coming
• 50:14
  and and you just learn to like swim a little better you know or
• 50:18
  you and then you
• 50:19
  hold your breath and wait till you pop out the other side and I
• 50:22
  was wanting to
• 50:23
  share this this analogy of waves and but I also was like I need
• 50:29
  to make this
• 50:29
  engaging how do I make this like engaging where they'll
• 50:32
  remember instead of me just
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_01: chatting
• 50:35
  and um as I was going to sleep a couple days before I left uh I
• 50:40
  was praying about
• 50:41
  it and I just felt this little voice in my head so like like
• 50:44
  and it was very much
• 50:45
  so like from the Lord I was just like tell him about sea glass
• 50:48
  like sea glass
• 50:49
  that's super random and I don't know why I would tell him about
• 50:52
  that but um I just
• 50:54
  started like I googling like sea glass tell me like what does
• 50:58
  Google have to say
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_01: about sea glass and and sea glass is is um
• 51:05
  starts out as like a bottle and is crushed in some way it gets
• 51:10
  tossed in the ocean
• 51:11
  and is washed in the waves and in the sand in the storms for
• 51:17
  anywhere they say
• 51:17
  anywhere between 20 to 50 years and until it the like sand salt
• 51:24
  water and sand and
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_01: elements of the ocean um smooth it out so it's like at first like a like
• 51:31
  like really sharp piece of glass and then it eventually lands
• 51:35
  on shore as like this
• 51:37
  smooth like piece of sea glass that's like beautiful but it
• 51:43
  doesn't get that way
• 51:43
  without the without the grit yeah without the waves and it's
• 51:50
  like a painful process
• 51:51
  SPEAKER_01: for that sea glass
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_01: um and then I just realized man that's us that's us who have experienced
• 51:58
  significant loss where you feel like your identity has just
• 52:02
  been completely
• 52:03
  stripped you feel like your life is over you don't have a
• 52:06
  purpose um for me I all
• 52:09
  of a sudden lost my best friend my identity as a wife I lost my
• 52:13
  family because it
• 52:14
  was Ben and I lost my job because I ended up shutting down the
• 52:17
  company because it
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_01: was really
• 52:19
  Ben's passion and dream for that I lost everything I felt like
• 52:22
  I'd lost everything
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: and yet like God was taking me through this like
• 52:30
  the storms these uncomfortable yeah and long story long I guess
• 52:37
  um I I ended up and
• 52:40
  like gosh where do I find sea glass to do this and then I
• 52:42
  remembered that bag of
• 52:44
  sea glass that was sitting on my nightstand and I taught myself
• 52:49
  the next day really
• 52:50
  quick how to make sea glass necklaces off of YouTube bought a
• 52:54
  bunch of stuff off
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_01: Amazon and um
• 52:57
  and brought all the supplies down there and made sea glass
• 53:00
  necklaces with the girls
• 53:01
  and it was really transformative and like helpful for them in
• 53:05
  their journey of
• 53:06
  things that they were going through but even more so it was
• 53:10
  this like eye opening
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_01: thing for me that the very place that my life was shattered
• 53:18
  into a million pieces was the very place that that specific sea
• 53:22
  glass was picked up
• 53:23
  on that beach and God was beginning to remake my story and he
• 53:27
  was allowing me to
• 53:29
  share that sea glass with others and and create hope and be a
• 53:36
  reminder of hope to
• 53:37
  other people who are experiencing loss and it was just like God
• 53:41
  remaking this like
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: purpose in me and
• 53:45
  through that sea glass and it was just this like very powerful
• 53:49
  symbolism for me but
• 53:51
  it's just like going back to what we were just talking about
• 53:55
  was like man God is in
• 53:57
  the details two years before he gave me that sea glass and I
• 54:00
  had zero idea and now
• 54:02
  it's become like a very influential part of my non-profit where
• 54:06
  I run workshops for
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_01: widows and we create sea glass necklaces and
• 54:11
  Now I'm thinking I need a sea glass bracelet I used to have a
• 54:16
  bracelet that I
• 54:17
  really liked and now I need a sea glass bracelet Oh there you
• 54:21
  go I can make you one
• 54:22
  Let me know how I got one of those For sure Well you are
• 54:26
  perfectly segueing into my
• 54:28
  next question which is around through it all and the work that
• 54:34
  you're doing with
• 54:35
  that organization and you kind of hinted at it a little bit I'm
• 54:38
  curious kind of
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_00: like
• 54:40
  and something that really struck me when we were talking last
• 54:42
  week is kind of this,
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_00: I don't wanna put words in your mouth and correct me.
• 54:50
  This sort of like weaponization or guilt of like taking this
• 54:56
  really terrible tragic
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_00: thing and then like twisting it for like good.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_00: I just thought that was really interesting.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like the way that you talked about, like, I don't wanna do this thing.
• 55:07
  um because of like I don't want to like make something good out
• 55:11
  of this like really
• 55:13
  crappy situation yeah um so I'm just curious to kind of hear
• 55:17
  that in your own words
• 55:19
  and then kind of like how how that's the the inception of
• 55:24
  uh-huh the non-profit
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_00: idea and of course it's evolved and changed but yeah yeah I think the
• 55:32
  SPEAKER_01: as I went through this process I was seeing there we live in a very grief
• 55:37
  illiterate world nobody knows how to process through grief and
• 55:42
  yet loss has been
• 55:44
  around for since the beginning of time pretty much and and
• 55:50
  especially in the church
• 55:52
  setting there really is there's very few resources if churches
• 55:56
  want to or anything
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_01: faith based there's very few resources and
• 56:02
  you process a lot differently when you have a hope I'm not
• 56:08
  going to I don't want to
• 56:09
  go to necessarily a medium which is very common in the realm of
• 56:15
  death and loss that
• 56:17
  is that a lot of people go to because they want connection with
• 56:22
  their loved one and
• 56:23
  so it's just a different process grief is experienced similarly
• 56:28
  but we also have a
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_01: hope
• 56:30
  in that we get to see our loved ones again and have like a real
• 56:35
  deep joy to see
• 56:37
  them again one day and that's not the same for everybody and
• 56:43
  depending on their
• 56:43
  SPEAKER_01: belief system and so as I was walking through that
• 56:51
  I also kind of I felt this vision of like what it could be of a
• 56:55
  non-profit and
• 56:57
  wasn't actually planning for it to be a non-profit at all but I
• 57:00
  was thinking gosh
• 57:01
  something like this either it needs it either exists and I'm
• 57:04
  just missing it or it
• 57:06
  needs to exist more resources need to exist for people who are
• 57:09
  in deep catastrophic
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_01: loss and grief and navigating grief and in a faith context and so
• 57:19
  um had this idea but at the same time was like god I don't want
• 57:23
  to do this like I
• 57:24
  don't want any good to come out of Ben's loss and that was like
• 57:27
  something I really
• 57:28
  had to battle through and um at the same time I also felt like
• 57:33
  but if this is
• 57:35
  something that's needed and if this is something that you're uh
• 57:39
  calling me to do
• 57:40
  SPEAKER_01: then like I can't say I'm not gonna say no to that
• 57:44
  and so I had to just let it go but it was also this like real
• 57:50
  fear of like I don't
• 57:51
  want anybody to say man good thing Ben passed away because look
• 57:53
  at all these people
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_01: you can help and
• 57:58
  and by God's grace nobody said that to me but I think that was
• 58:02
  in my mind like how
• 58:03
  like oh like look at all the ministry opportunities that can be
• 58:07
  done through you
• 58:08
  working through your greatest suffering almost as like a
• 58:11
  martyrdom yeah and I don't
• 58:16
  SPEAKER_01: believe that I think that God in his mercy creates
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_01: is able to redeem really,
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_01: really,
• 58:25
  really terrible situations and bring good out of the worst
• 58:28
  situations possible.
• 58:30
  But I do not believe that he causes them so that somebody will
• 58:35
  then make it,
• 58:36
  you know?
• 58:37
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah.
• 58:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 58:38
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 58:39
  I just thought that was like such an interesting take on like
• 58:42
  starting something
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_00: for other people and like purely like selflessly doing something
• 58:52
  because I feel like there's probably more challenge that's
• 58:55
  happened because you've
• 58:56
  decided to jump into this thing and been obedient to the
• 59:03
  promptings of his spirit
• 59:05
  SPEAKER_00: in your life when you had every right not to jump into that.
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I think he would have honored either
• 59:15
  I think like and that's the confusing challenging thing of it
• 59:19
  to me but like it's a
• 59:20
  it's a both and yeah because it's like yeah it is it is hard to
• 59:27
  like wait kind of
• 59:29
  figure out navigate this path of like building a non-profit as
• 59:32
  I'm also in the
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_01: midst of deep grief um
• 59:37
  and so it's kind of been this little by little building but
• 59:41
  process but it's also
• 59:43
  like honestly there is no greater gift than to be sitting next
• 59:49
  to somebody that
• 59:50
  gets it and that understands and I know that and I feel that
• 59:55
  and so when I'm
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_01: surrounded by other people who have experienced the same pain
• 59:59
  You feel this level of camaraderie and understanding and this
• 1:00:05
  instant bond.
• 1:00:07
  SPEAKER_01: That part is easy for me.
• 1:00:10
  The building of it and constantly trying to figure out how to
• 1:00:14
  navigate it.
• 1:00:18
  is definitely challenging and there's pieces parts of me on my
• 1:00:21
  worst days where I'm
• 1:00:22
  like I just wish I worked at a like random job that didn't have
• 1:00:27
  to talk about my
• 1:00:28
  pain or grief at all and just like was kind of some somebody
• 1:00:32
  who who I like this
• 1:00:36
  was just a blip in my in my life you know but the reality is
• 1:00:41
  like there's no
• 1:00:43
  SPEAKER_01: greater privilege than to do the work I'm doing.
• 1:00:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 1:00:46
  SPEAKER_01: and I,
• 1:00:46
  SPEAKER_01: I genuinely feel so,
• 1:00:49
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 1:00:49
  SPEAKER_01: so grateful that God allowed me to like,
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_01: trust in me with this like kind of vision to bring it forward.
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so curious to like,
• 1:00:58
  as someone who's like walking alongside people that are going
• 1:01:02
  through this crazy
• 1:01:03
  SPEAKER_00: loss,
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_00: uh,
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_00: and there's probably so much complexity,
• 1:01:06
  SPEAKER_00: even within a statement like that,
• 1:01:07
  SPEAKER_00: where it's like different for everybody.
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_00: How do you kind of be
• 1:01:13
  like in it with them but then also like sort of somehow like
• 1:01:20
  and maybe detaches not
• 1:01:21
  the right word but like how do you kind of step outside that so
• 1:01:24
  that like you're
• 1:01:25
  not dragged back into that or is that a part of the process
• 1:01:30
  like because you're
• 1:01:31
  probably dealing with it on a different level than like most
• 1:01:33
  people are because
• 1:01:34
  you're living in a lot of other people's loss on some level
• 1:01:39
  every day when you're
• 1:01:40
  SPEAKER_00: like
• 1:01:41
  building the programming and you're stepping into the companion
• 1:01:45
  yeah yeah you're
• 1:01:45
  just surrounded in this work you're just you are surrounded by
• 1:01:49
  a lot of people in
• 1:01:50
  the midst of like really really hard painful situations um I
• 1:01:56
  think there's a level
• 1:01:57
  of like I said uh I used to be able to hold it at arm's length
• 1:02:01
  and then and and
• 1:02:02
  SPEAKER_01: it's been a process of figuring out how to yeah
• 1:02:06
  take it on and like it hits me like I deeply empathize you know
• 1:02:14
  and I like there's
• 1:02:15
  a level that there's it's good to it hits me because I know the
• 1:02:20
  pain and yet
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_01: knowing how to it's like been a learning process of
• 1:02:27
  how to I step out of my own story and into yours and keep the
• 1:02:32
  focus on you the
• 1:02:34
  SPEAKER_01: person that's sitting across from me and I can empathize and I can know
• 1:02:40
  a little bit it's gonna be different than how you exactly feel
• 1:02:43
  but I know it in my
• 1:02:45
  story of that but it's not bringing my story in it's not saying
• 1:02:51
  oh I remember when
• 1:02:52
  this happened to me and I can relate you know because that's
• 1:02:56
  immediately the focus
• 1:02:57
  SPEAKER_01: is off you and onto me or it's off it's then having that person feel
• 1:03:07
  secluded of oh they want to talk about themselves you know so
• 1:03:10
  it's keeping the
• 1:03:11
  focus on you and your story and that's not it's not my time to
• 1:03:16
  receive comfort
• 1:03:17
  right now it's it's your time yeah and so it's really being
• 1:03:21
  able to like tap into
• 1:03:22
  SPEAKER_01: like the empathy yeah and also like we both it's kind of this like
• 1:03:28
  analogy of like we both bring our buckets to a conversation and
• 1:03:31
  I have my bucket
• 1:03:32
  and you have your bucket and it's not my job at the end of that
• 1:03:36
  time together with
• 1:03:37
  you to pick up my bucket and your bucket and leave like you
• 1:03:42
  still have your bucket
• 1:03:43
  and it doesn't actually help you if I take your bucket too
• 1:03:48
  because that means that
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_01: one you might feel that you need to care start caring for me you know um
• 1:03:55
  and because I'm so weighed down by your pain that you have to
• 1:04:00
  make it better for me
• 1:04:02
  or like you need a healthy person to walk alongside you not
• 1:04:06
  somebody who's just as
• 1:04:08
  much in the weight of it yeah that's such an interesting
• 1:04:11
  distinction too of like
• 1:04:13
  because I might see me empathizing with you as like me telling
• 1:04:18
  you about like some
• 1:04:19
  SPEAKER_00: challenge that I went through
• 1:04:21
  but it's actually like doing the opposite to you where it's
• 1:04:25
  like oh like I thought
• 1:04:26
  we were kind of like doing my thing now I'm like thinking about
• 1:04:30
  are you okay and if
• 1:04:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like a good person or whatever like how am I doing that to you and
• 1:04:37
  reciprocating yeah at the same time it's also being like the
• 1:04:41
  majority of people who
• 1:04:42
  SPEAKER_01: are able to say like oh I get it you know it's like the classic
• 1:04:46
  I'm relating my grandma passing to your spouse passing you know
• 1:04:52
  so it's it's like
• 1:04:53
  and then it immediately puts you into a place of like they
• 1:04:56
  don't get it they do not
• 1:04:57
  understand this actually yeah you didn't like it's a very
• 1:05:01
  different relationship
• 1:05:02
  granted grandparents are it's are big losses too it's just
• 1:05:07
  mainly the like a full
• 1:05:09
  SPEAKER_01: life
• 1:05:10
  different relationships a cat probably would have been a good
• 1:05:13
  one for that one yeah
• 1:05:14
  SPEAKER_00: yeah yeah well grandparent I mean that's the thing about that's what I'm
• 1:05:19
  understanding more and more is like loss is so acute to the
• 1:05:23
  person totally has lost
• 1:05:24
  exactly and so it's it's like uh it sort of does because I was
• 1:05:31
  even thinking about
• 1:05:32
  SPEAKER_00: like how do I how do I phrase the questions that I want to ask
• 1:05:35
  Yeah well and like you cannot compare losses like there is like
• 1:05:41
  the worst loss is
• 1:05:41
  your loss and like because you're the one experiencing it and
• 1:05:47
  it took me a while to
• 1:05:49
  like kind of get to that place but I have seen like man you
• 1:05:52
  can't based on the
• 1:05:53
  SPEAKER_01: relational
• 1:05:54
  piece of loss when you're caring for someone I can't I don't
• 1:05:57
  know your unique
• 1:05:59
  background your faith system your relationship with that person
• 1:06:03
  where you're I've
• 1:06:04
  actually sat across from people who said the passing of their
• 1:06:08
  mom was far harder on
• 1:06:11
  SPEAKER_01: them than the passing of their husband and it was because of their unique
• 1:06:15
  relationship they had and yet the passing of her mom it didn't
• 1:06:19
  get the same weight
• 1:06:20
  SPEAKER_01: or care
• 1:06:22
  that she needed yeah like oh it was just your mom you know
• 1:06:25
  versus like her husband
• 1:06:27
  people give it way more gravity where it's like you have zero
• 1:06:31
  idea and I think the
• 1:06:32
  biggest thing when you're caring for somebody is like it is our
• 1:06:35
  job as we care for
• 1:06:36
  people to just be curious yeah like ask questions don't assume
• 1:06:40
  and like you're
• 1:06:41
  SPEAKER_01: answering my next question oh good
• 1:06:43
  but be curious because you don't know what they're walking
• 1:06:47
  through you don't know
• 1:06:48
  that unique relationship and the different complications and
• 1:06:52
  dynamics that is going
• 1:06:53
  along with her grief so what I'm hearing is like ask a lot of
• 1:06:56
  questions listen and
• 1:06:58
  don't try to like empathize or sympathize in the way of like oh
• 1:07:05
  let me tell you
• 1:07:05
  about my hard story like I know what you're going like it's
• 1:07:09
  just sitting and being
• 1:07:11
  SPEAKER_01: like that is hard
• 1:07:12
  yeah that's really hard and that's like that sounds really
• 1:07:16
  painful that's probably
• 1:07:17
  more than most people can handle in general but like those are
• 1:07:21
  the the top things
• 1:07:23
  to like but what a gift what a gift you are giving someone when
• 1:07:26
  you are present
• 1:07:27
  with someone in their pain even just for yeah minutes well
• 1:07:32
  that's like such a
• 1:07:33
  non-western christian mindset in general where it's just like
• 1:07:38
  well how can we gloss
• 1:07:39
  SPEAKER_00: over this how can we problem solve how can we get through this thing
• 1:07:43
  and sweep it under the rug or whatever the coping mechanism is
• 1:07:47
  to kind of be all right.
• 1:07:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 1:07:50
  and we've lost a lot of those traditional practices in our
• 1:07:55
  culture where you were
• 1:07:56
  SPEAKER_01: saying of in the Jewish tradition,
• 1:07:59
  sitting shiva is a really common one where it was actually the
• 1:08:03
  practice that Job's
• 1:08:04
  friends were doing in the book of Job of sitting with him and
• 1:08:07
  you sit with that
• 1:08:08
  SPEAKER_01: person for
• 1:08:09
  seven days and nobody's allowed to talk until that person talks
• 1:08:13
  and it's like why
• 1:08:14
  how have we not how we lost that practice because literally
• 1:08:19
  just don't say anything
• 1:08:20
  just don't just just like in the midst of like when it's like
• 1:08:23
  the initial shock the
• 1:08:25
  last like there are no words that can explain it there are no
• 1:08:29
  words or or Verses or
• 1:08:31
  anything like that and when you when you look at the book of
• 1:08:35
  Job Job's friends were
• 1:08:36
  SPEAKER_01: the best of friends until they open their mouths and
• 1:08:40
  and that is like why how have we lost this practice of just
• 1:08:44
  being with another and
• 1:08:47
  sitting with another not trying to make ourselves more
• 1:08:49
  comfortable by talking to
• 1:08:51
  them at them yeah because that's what it is it's like how do I
• 1:08:55
  feel comfortable in
• 1:08:56
  this uncomfortable situation which is like the selfish thing to
• 1:09:00
  do that's so
• 1:09:01
  fascinating yeah and asking and going back to like asking
• 1:09:04
  questions is so important
• 1:09:07
  Except there's a difference,
• 1:09:08
  I'd say,
• 1:09:09
  between curious and helpful questions.
• 1:09:16
  SPEAKER_01: If somebody passed away from COVID and you ask, were they vaccinated?
• 1:09:21
  SPEAKER_01: That is a curious question.
• 1:09:25
  SPEAKER_01: where yeah you are curious about that maybe but and it's from your own
• 1:09:30
  comfortability of do I have control over this like how did I
• 1:09:34
  like it's almost
• 1:09:35
  accusatory yeah and it actually isn't helpful for them is
• 1:09:39
  before you ask any
• 1:09:40
  question when you're caring for someone it's does this make me
• 1:09:43
  a better caregiver
• 1:09:44
  for that person is this helpful for them or is this a curious
• 1:09:48
  question for me um
• 1:09:50
  like yeah if somebody got in a car crash and they and their
• 1:09:54
  loved one passed away
• 1:09:55
  like yeah were they wearing a seatbelt you know like things
• 1:09:58
  that like so many
• 1:09:59
  people ask but like aren't helpful I'm sure you've heard so
• 1:10:02
  many stories of that
• 1:10:04
  yeah like just yeah people not responding like wanting to care
• 1:10:09
  wanting to care but
• 1:10:10
  out of their uncomfortability and their own want to desire to
• 1:10:15
  even subconscious
• 1:10:16
  SPEAKER_01: desire to be to make themselves comfortable yeah yeah out of it um
• 1:10:21
  okay so we've kind of danced around through it all and like
• 1:10:25
  what you guys do but
• 1:10:26
  explicitly like what do you guys do how do you come alongside
• 1:10:31
  those people that are
• 1:10:31
  going through loss and then like resources all that kind of
• 1:10:36
  stuff yeah I think it's
• 1:10:37
  SPEAKER_01: like
• 1:10:38
  building and growing and forming still but through it all the
• 1:10:43
  essential mission
• 1:10:44
  that I created was to equip churches specifically with the
• 1:10:50
  resources and the
• 1:10:51
  training and the programs to effectively come alongside their
• 1:10:56
  communities or people
• 1:10:58
  SPEAKER_01: in general after the loss of a loved one
• 1:11:01
  and so I think churches have the resources and the desire to do
• 1:11:10
  so but how do you
• 1:11:11
  do it in an effective way especially in our church culture
• 1:11:16
  today where we are it's
• 1:11:20
  just bigger churches so it's so easy to get lost in a church it
• 1:11:25
  was different back
• 1:11:25
  SPEAKER_01: in the day when we had
• 1:11:28
  it was more of a tradition of house churches where you were
• 1:11:32
  actually walking
• 1:11:32
  alongside doing life with one another where now it's so easy to
• 1:11:41
  pull away and the
• 1:11:43
  worst thing you can do in the midst of grief is to isolate
• 1:11:46
  yourself and so often
• 1:11:48
  SPEAKER_01: that happens and I pulled actually
• 1:11:54
  a ton of my friends and family after Ben passed because I was
• 1:11:58
  just saying I was
• 1:11:58
  just watching actually quite a few of them leave their church
• 1:12:03
  and I asked them all
• 1:12:05
  like okay whether it was the loss of Ben or the loss of another
• 1:12:09
  significant loved
• 1:12:10
  one in their life did you feel like your church was helpful or
• 1:12:16
  like came alongside
• 1:12:17
  SPEAKER_01: you and in an effective way and and
• 1:12:22
  only 33% of them could say yes and that to me is a huge
• 1:12:30
  disconnect of where our
• 1:12:31
  church should be if we say that we love because he loved us and
• 1:12:37
  we have the love of
• 1:12:38
  SPEAKER_01: God in us we have to learn to do better to
• 1:12:42
  to come alongside people in the midst of their pain because it
• 1:12:46
  like the Bible has
• 1:12:47
  verses and verses you know of like mourn with those who mourn
• 1:12:49
  and like when one
• 1:12:50
  body part hurt like we are the body of Christ when one body
• 1:12:53
  part hurts then we all
• 1:12:55
  suffer with that person and to do that how do we do that in a
• 1:13:01
  way that one people
• 1:13:03
  don't leave because my church didn't show up for me in the way
• 1:13:06
  that I thought they
• 1:13:07
  SPEAKER_01: would and I mean there's there can be nuances in that um
• 1:13:11
  in fault on both parties you know but also this piece of
• 1:13:18
  figuring out like how to
• 1:13:22
  do it well and people either can often leave their church but
• 1:13:30
  worse like leave
• 1:13:30
  their faith because God then didn't show up in the way that
• 1:13:35
  they thought yeah
• 1:13:37
  because the church becomes a reflection of God yes yeah that's
• 1:13:42
  the the challenge of
• 1:13:44
  how yeah how do we live in I don't know that's such an
• 1:13:47
  interesting challenge to
• 1:13:48
  work through because it's like oh we want the churches to be
• 1:13:51
  bigger because we want
• 1:13:52
  more people to be saved but then we also like I don't know is
• 1:13:56
  the model of like
• 1:13:58
  basically mega church is that like a healthy model for the
• 1:14:01
  Christian because like
• 1:14:03
  SPEAKER_00: the original churches is house churches it's like
• 1:14:06
  I know what Susie is doing and she knows what I'm doing and
• 1:14:10
  like we can keep each
• 1:14:11
  other accountable on that and be to your point like a companion
• 1:14:15
  to each other in
• 1:14:16
  like how we wrestle with things in life yeah we're doing real
• 1:14:20
  life together rather
• 1:14:21
  than like and you're all pulling in your resources to make sure
• 1:14:24
  everybody's doing
• 1:14:25
  SPEAKER_01: okay you know and
• 1:14:27
  taking my skills that I can offer you and you eventually will
• 1:14:31
  offer me like the
• 1:14:33
  skills that you have you know so it's like we're all in it
• 1:14:35
  together we're all in
• 1:14:36
  this life together instead of just coming and going from a big
• 1:14:40
  church service and
• 1:14:42
  then you get lost in the crowd yeah I'm curious as we kind of
• 1:14:46
  wrap things up like
• 1:14:48
  if we look at this episode in five years like what's the
• 1:14:52
  biggest challenge right
• 1:14:53
  now that you're like working through that you like in five
• 1:14:57
  years from now of course
• 1:14:58
  you'll be through for you're saying life or you're saying
• 1:15:01
  non-profit world for the
• 1:15:02
  non-profit okay what's the biggest challenge I'm working
• 1:15:05
  through if I'm being
• 1:15:08
  SPEAKER_01: completely honest the biggest challenge I'm working through is I am not a
• 1:15:17
  entrepreneur leader of I never thought I would be like founding
• 1:15:22
  a non-profit and I
• 1:15:25
  had this passion and so that's what stemmed like this it
• 1:15:30
  stemmed from that and so
• 1:15:33
  it's now figuring out how to lead well and how to expand it
• 1:15:39
  sustainably and do it
• 1:15:42
  SPEAKER_01: in a way that will
• 1:15:44
  SPEAKER_01: be able to continue forward instead of burning out.
• 1:15:48
  SPEAKER_01: So that's definitely my thing I'm navigating right now.
• 1:15:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm really excited to see how that unfolds in the next couple of years.
• 1:15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Lord willing, it'll still be there.
• 1:16:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'll create a reminder and send it to you in five years.
• 1:16:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's like that writing a letter to your high school cell or whatever.
• 1:16:07
  That's like one of the reasons I'm so excited about these
• 1:16:09
  conversations is like I'm
• 1:16:11
  SPEAKER_00: changing so much as a person
• 1:16:13
  that like in five years ten years I'm so curious to be like oh
• 1:16:17
  like I can't believe
• 1:16:18
  that Matt of the past was like saying that that's ridiculous or
• 1:16:22
  whatever it is um
• 1:16:23
  exactly with the with the end of all of these conversations I
• 1:16:27
  stole this from
• 1:16:27
  another podcast but um basically the previous guest asks a
• 1:16:33
  question of the next
• 1:16:34
  guest and so um this is from our last guest this guy named
• 1:16:39
  Steven he's an epic dude
• 1:16:41
  SPEAKER_00: um
• 1:16:42
  but his question is what is a project that you've been wanting
• 1:16:45
  to work on and
• 1:16:47
  complete that you haven't started yet and why oh that is a good
• 1:16:52
  question you didn't
• 1:16:54
  warn me on that well you didn't warn me on any of the questions
• 1:16:57
  but um what's a
• 1:16:58
  SPEAKER_01: project I've been wanting to start um
• 1:17:03
  so filming videos for these trainings that so that's a project
• 1:17:09
  that I've kind of
• 1:17:10
  started but not really and it's because it's just vulnerable
• 1:17:13
  like of like putting
• 1:17:14
  myself on a video and practice I know yeah exactly I just get
• 1:17:20
  so it's just not my
• 1:17:22
  forte and so I would much rather be one-on-one in person with
• 1:17:25
  someone then then
• 1:17:27
  SPEAKER_01: doing like big video format and so I
• 1:17:31
  that is non-profit wise that's kind of probably where I need to
• 1:17:36
  do yeah more of
• 1:17:38
  that well I hope it's encouraging but I've not felt any sort of
• 1:17:43
  like nervousness or
• 1:17:45
  anything like you because we're one-on-one well but that's the
• 1:17:48
  thing just like yeah
• 1:17:50
  hopefully you forgot that the camera was even here you've been
• 1:17:53
  doing a good job
• 1:17:54
  thank you yeah you're helping me practice is there a personal
• 1:17:57
  project that you that
• 1:17:58
  SPEAKER_00: you want to start
• 1:18:01
  oh personal project well we did just talk about that the one
• 1:18:05
  that I just did was I
• 1:18:06
  really wanted to go climb cactus yeah but I and you got it done
• 1:18:09
  I got it done so
• 1:18:10
  that's awesome okay well there's another bigger mountain
• 1:18:13
  somewhere that you yes you
• 1:18:14
  gotta climb what's the next mountain I'm gonna climb I want to
• 1:18:16
  go backpacking but
• 1:18:17
  proverbially or proverbially yeah there we go or uh in real
• 1:18:22
  life yeah I'd love I
• 1:18:23
  SPEAKER_01: love traveling so I think uh I want to go over to um
• 1:18:28
  do you see more places oh okay I really want to go to the
• 1:18:31
  Dolomites oh cool that's
• 1:18:33
  in Italy Italy okay yeah cool it's like the Italian Alps I want
• 1:18:38
  yeah okay there's
• 1:18:40
  this YouTuber that like they're the most satisfying peaceful
• 1:18:45
  calm videos ever but
• 1:18:46
  he basically just like has an iPhone puts it on a drive or it
• 1:18:50
  looks better than an
• 1:18:50
  SPEAKER_00: iPhone yeah it's probably not that but
• 1:18:52
  They're like really long videos and sometimes I'll put them on
• 1:18:55
  in the background
• 1:18:55
  and it's just him hiking through like these beautiful places
• 1:18:58
  with like very
• 1:18:59
  SPEAKER_01: peaceful music Have you heard of Mont de Blanc?
• 1:19:01
  I may be butchering the name of that but it's a route I really
• 1:19:06
  want to do like it's
• 1:19:07
  SPEAKER_01: a backpacking route
• 1:19:09
  SPEAKER_01: that goes through Italy, Switzerland, and France.
• 1:19:12
  SPEAKER_00: Whoa.
• 1:19:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so, and it's like circumnavigating like a giant mountain.
• 1:19:19
  SPEAKER_01: Amazing.
• 1:19:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let me know when you're doing that.
• 1:19:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's my next goal.
• 1:19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Epic.
• 1:19:25
  SPEAKER_00: We'll get the crew together.
• 1:19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:19:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think I'll need to train on that one.
• 1:19:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think it's quite a few miles.
• 1:19:32
  SPEAKER_00: What's a question you have for our next guest?
• 1:19:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:19:36
  SPEAKER_00: You can take as much time as you need.
• 1:19:38
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:19:40
  do I have any like understanding of what that guest do you have
• 1:19:44
  the guest I do is
• 1:19:46
  it a non-profit I'm debating not telling you it is whatever
• 1:19:53
  question you want to
• 1:19:54
  ask so whoever you have in mind whatever that is whether it's a
• 1:19:59
  non-profit or not
• 1:20:01
  just ask away because it's a person at the end of the day what
• 1:20:04
  brings you most joy
• 1:20:06
  SPEAKER_00: okay I think yeah
• 1:20:10
  I'm curious to know your answer to that Being with people I'm
• 1:20:16
  right there It's the
• 1:20:18
  best A good meal with the best people There's nothing better In
• 1:20:23
  nature Climbing a
• 1:20:27
  mountain with people That's me right there You really get to
• 1:20:30
  know people that way
• 1:20:32
  SPEAKER_00: The grit of their spirit Exactly As you hike and walk
• 1:20:39
  It's the best place to process when people end up sharing their
• 1:20:42
  whole lives.
• 1:20:43
  SPEAKER_00: People are okay being quiet.
• 1:20:45
  SPEAKER_00: People are okay talking a ton.
• 1:20:49
  maybe you're convincing me that maybe eating a meal is not the
• 1:20:52
  way to get to know
• 1:20:53
  people I always feel like jacuzzis are a really good way to get
• 1:20:57
  to know people
• 1:20:58
  because you're like forced into a tub of water yes and like
• 1:21:02
  looking at each other
• 1:21:03
  which is probably harder for guys girls we have no issue just
• 1:21:06
  sitting across at
• 1:21:08
  SPEAKER_01: coffee from each other
• 1:21:09
  you guys need a hot tub to look at each other yeah exactly well
• 1:21:15
  thank you so much
• 1:21:15
  for thank you for yeah thanks for having me on your show this
• 1:21:19
  really is extremely
• 1:21:22
  this is what I get a lot of joy doing yeah and it's so cool and
• 1:21:27
  inspirational and
• 1:21:27
  SPEAKER_00: encouraging to hear your story
• 1:21:31
  and I'm sure like so many people have asked it and you've told
• 1:21:34
  it so many times but
• 1:21:36
  it really just means a lot to me that that you're sharing that
• 1:21:39
  with me because we
• 1:21:39
  haven't known each other very long and so well I love your
• 1:21:42
  questions too I think
• 1:21:44
  I've done a couple different I mean I talk about my story with
• 1:21:48
  other people but you
• 1:21:50
  had some great questions that I've actually not been asked
• 1:21:52
  before so it's good