Kaylin and Christy, along with their guests, empower women to live fully loved and fully free
SHOW NOTES“It’s that ‘stranger in your own body’...I just don’t know myself.” -Kaylin“I took a picture of myself in the mirror one week after having my twins and I still looked 6-7 months pregnant….I didn't know that would be my experience and that's what made it so hard...That was a very shocking experience that I wasn’t prepared for...I wish I had been prepared for that with somebody telling me: That may happen, and that’s ok and that’s normal.” -Christy“I was so proud of myself that I could walk a block...then a total stranger said something (hurtful) and it just totally shattered me.” -Bartley“Your body made this incredible human and now you’re caring for them.” -Bartley“What is it that makes us think that we’re going to go back to our previous selves after having a child?...I think it's more of an internal dialogue...Why is it so hard to not see yourself as ‘normal’ afterwards? Why is postpartum so not talked about, so strange?” -Kaylin“I think it does need to be normalized. Postpartum is a stage that we as women go through...a lot of people want to skip over that part.” -Bartley“I do think there is a place for normalizing things like this by being a little more open and a little more vocal...just talking like it’s a natural thing.” -Christy“I think it’s because a lot of times we objectify ourselves...that that’s all we are is our bodies, instead of understanding that we’re a whole person, and that we’re more than just our bodies..we’re more than just what our body’s doing.” -Kaylin“I want my girls to learn: You are valuable regardless of what you look like, and beauty’s definition can be a lot of things.” -Christy
RESOURCESThe Biology of Belief, by Dr. Bruce LiptonThe Emotion Code, by Dr. Bradley NelsonThe Tapping Solution- Emotional Freedom Technique Video16 Ashley Meyer: How Authenticity Led to Her WholenessInsight Timer AppSHOW NOTES“So what does holistic mean? It is all about our physical, emotional and spiritual beings. It's not that we are just physical; we’re so much more. It also means that we are always looking to the root of the problem, so we see symptoms as your check engine light. And so why is your check engine light on? Mainstream is all about treating the symptoms, and we are more about asking why...Going to the root is really where the answers become really prominent...We want to get to the root of the problem.” -Jen“Emotions are inherited...Each member of the family has similar DNA, but we don’t all turn out the same. So we might all have similar core emotions… but the culture that we are in can produce some different results in each one of us.”“Emotions aren’t just about me, they can be from the next generations passed on.” -Kaylin“Love is the highest vibrational frequency...it’s where we were created.” -Jen“Energy attracts like energy.” -Jen“In this country, 90% of disease and illness is caused by stress.” -Jen“If we’re running in fight or flight 100% of the time, our adrenals are burnt out, our immune system is not working whatsoever.” -Jen“We have to find the beautiful harmonious balance in emotional life just like we do in the rest of life. The good comes with the bad.” -Jen“It is ok to have all these emotions and be human.” -Kaylin“It takes some love and some courage to go within...Some people think the scariest place is to go within, so that’s why we have become so busy so that we can ignore all those things.” -Jen“Take a moment, be present...stop and ask, ‘why? What’s going on?’...You have the choice always to be in control of your emotions.” -Jen“Meditation literally means being still in your mind...breathing techniques, music, there’s many ways to use meditation.” -Jen“Nature has so much to offer us...God created everything.” -Jen
RESOURCESMusic Spotlight: Love Doesn’t Have a Color, by David Paul MartinSHOWNOTES“Our definition of a mom is anyone who nurtures.” -Christy“We want any woman in any place in her life and journey to feel this podcast is for her.” -Christy“Our goal is to be relatable, to empower you as a woman, to think deeply about things we may need to be challenged on with our assumptions.” -Christy“I think a lot of times you think you know yourself and then when something big happens in your life (you have a baby, or start taking care of somebody else, or just growing up), you realize your world’s upside down and you realize you don’t necessarily know who you are. And you realize your systems or how you see yourself isn’t working. And we want to be here to challenge and encourage women to start that process of rethinking who they are, and finding out that they are really beautiful people made in the image of Love.” -Kaylin“We really are here to start a conversation about identity. We’re here to empower women to go deeper in our understanding of ourselves and...to grow in understanding who we are.” -Christy“We want this podcast to be for any woman who is in any walk of life, from any faith background, and at any point in their spiritual journey.” -Christy“How do you need to care for yourself in ways that no one else can or will so that you have enough to give to those who are dependent on you, or those you love and care for?” -Christy“When we understand how we were designed and made, and that we are loved and have that diamond inside of us, there’s no reason to be selfish but only to give to others because we are confident in that.” -Kaylin“You have nothing to give your kids or anyone else you nurture if you have not also received love - and so part of that is self-care. You have to fill up your tank to have anything to give to others….We’re not saying love yourself above others; we’re just saying - include yourself in this.” -Christy“You have to love yourself to be able to love others well...It always comes back to receiving God’s love first. And we won't make any advancements until we get that figured out and we can receive love. Then we’ll be able to give it to ourselves and others.” -Christy“A lot of times the messages that we get in a lot of different places are making us ‘less than’ or making us ‘greater than,’ and we’ll find ourselves on one side or the other if we don’t realize who we truly are.” -Kaylin
RESOURCESMusic spotlight: “Stars” by Sofa CitySHOW NOTES“A lot of times we think forgiveness is just forgetting...and excusing what actually happened. I think there’s just a lot of lies that we believe about what forgiveness actually looks like and who it’s for.” -Kaylin“You cannot forgive something that isn’t a wrong...that’s by definition why you're forgiving.” -Christy“Not forgiving is like...drinking poison. And it’s a festering bitterness that grows inside of you and makes everything turn more and more sour and it doesn’t go away by time.” -Christy“Forgiving is one of the most powerful things we can choose as an ongoing way of life.” -Christy“By giving myself the ability to express the pain and frustration and how that really impacted me, then I felt ready and willing to let go of it on the other side of that. Because my heart had had a voice and been validated, and even though I never brought this up with that person, I was able and willing to let go because I hadn’t denied my heart the voice it felt it needed.” -Christy“I am letting this person off my little hook, and putting them on God’s hook. Because I believe it's not my job anymore to get back from this person what they owe me, I can walk away free...they’re going to have to be accountable to a Higher Power.” -Christy“Holding onto your unforgiveness doesn’t affect them at all, and forgiving them doesn’t affect them...it’s for you.” -Kaylin“Forgiveness can be a process, and is a process, and is a journey, and it can take time. It might not happen in two seconds, it might happen in two seconds but...letting your heart have a voice can take time.” -Kaylin“It's complex...it's a process. And because our hearts are deserving of the journey it takes to live fully free and fully alive, there will be certain offences and wrongs that are deep enough and wounding enough that you can’t just let go in that same moment and be done with it. It can take time to identify- why did that hurt me so badly?” -Christy“It takes time to process and heal.” -Kaylin“Forgiveness and reconciliation are not the same thing. So forgiving someone does not mean you need to continue a friendship with them, if they’re someone who hurt you repeatedly, or for whatever reason you don’t feel is a healthy friendship or relationship to keep in your life. You can forgive and still not reconcile. Reconciliation, I think, can really only truly happen when both sides are humble and willing to acknowledge their side...Forgiveness does not automatically equate to reconciliation.” -Christy“By putting up the boundary there, it’s not letting them hurt you. And that’s being kind to them to not let them keep hurting you. But it's also for you, to not let yourself keep getting hurt because you are worthy of not being treated like that.” -Kaylin
RESOURCESMari Park, Rocking This Baby (rockingthisbaby@gmail.com)"When Minneapolis Segregated" (article on redlining and racial housing covenants)SHOW NOTES“For most people, I or my siblings-our family-were the first blacks that they’ve ever actually befriended or come in contact with, or had a relationship with. So there were a lot of questions. There may be a lot of ignorance because of the perception that society puts out there. The narrative that is out there about blacks can make our peers even feel uncomfortable.” -Jeanette“That was very challenging for us to constantly be on display, or being asked to speak for the entire race...People are individuals. I can say what I think, but I am not in any position to speak for an entire race. There was a lot of weight on our shoulders being the only blacks in our circles.” -Jeanette“How do we help our children understand the value of all races, all colors of skin, and see the unique image of God in people? Because I think it can be easy to think, ‘I’m not racist. I value all people, all cultures.’ But when our context is pretty monotone in color, we just aren’t even aware sometimes of what we don’t know. And we can find ourselves feeling uncomfortable by things that are different than what we are familiar with.” -Christy“As mothers we need to start having crucial conversations with our children, and that can start right at the dinner table when families are together, bringing up these conversations so that as they grow it doesn’t become uncomfortable...Let’s start showing them the beauty of all cultures.” -Jeanette“You’re only gonna grow and build from learning these cultures, so I think we need as mothers to just kind of embrace them so that they (our kids) don’t fear what they don’t understand.” -Jeanette“It creates a world for us to live in where it requires such intentionality on our parts to not live out of a different narrative, but to choose kindness, to choose love, to choose patience, to be willing to hear the whole story; to be slow to speak, quick to love.” -Christy“When they’re (kids) that age, that’s when you’re starting to shape who you want to be...but if you don’t see people who look like you in those professions, then your dreams get shut even more because you don’t believe that you can get there. Part of believing is seeing...If you can see those role models, it’s that much more encouraging to see yourself get there.” -Jeanette“Our children are our future and I think that our children will model what they see. So we as parents have a responsibility to show our relationship, our partnership, our stance against those things that are derogatory and negative.” -Jeanette“It shows the importance of identity, knowing who you are, to be able to love others.” -Kaylin
RESOURCES1 Timothy 4:12W. Timothy Gallwey (quote about being a rose)Stephen Witt, All Around MeDr. Caroline LeafDanny Silk, Keep Your Love OnConnected Families, Framework for parentingThe Mom Podcast, Ep 27 Katie Skurja: Drama RescuingThe Mom Podcast, Ep 30 Cindy Mattson: "Know Yourself to Lead Yourself"The Mom Podcast, Ep 24 Baxter Kruger: “I am Caroline”The Mom Podcast, Ep 06 Becoming an Emotionally Safe ParentSHOW NOTESTEN LIES WE BELIEVEI have to be perfect to be good.I am not good.I will be enough when I get thereI am not enough because of my gender, race, age, or family history.I'll be lazy if I believe I'm enough.I am selfish if I take care of my own needs.I am “less than.”My pain disqualifies me and it’s my fault.Because I have done______one too many times, I’m damaged goods.Expectations we have that hurt us“We’re always asking the question, ‘Am I enough?’ Especially in the mom world we struggle to answer the question, ‘Am I enough?’ And when we define it based off of our competencies or unhealthy expectations of ourselves that we can’t live up to, we can feel like what we’re doing is never enough. Who we are is never good enough and that really gets in the way of loving and living fully loved and fully free...It comes back to our identity and our intrinsic value. Because we are humans created in the image of God, we are good.” -Christy“If something is made in God’s image, it's not trash.” -Christy“Our imago dei, that is the image of God in us; that is who we are at the core, that is our enoughness.” -Kaylin“Yes, we are fallen now. Yes, we’re all wounded, we’re all broken, so none of us can escape that. But the image of God is still in us, and the fact that Jesus came to die for us is not what re-creates goodness in us, it's what shows that there was something already intrinsically in us worth dying for and that is our value. Yes we are broken, yes we are wounded. Yes, we needed Jesus to come to re-connect us with the Father, Son, and Spirit. But our intrinsic value is already at infinity and can’t be changed by our woundedness, brought lower by it, or brought higher by our performance.” -Christy“The rose is a rose from the time it is a seed to the time it dies. Within it, at all times, it contains its whole potential. It seems to be constantly in the process of change; yet at each state, at each moment, it is perfectly all right as it is.” -W. Timothy Gallwey“Our enoughness is not performance based; it’s’ intrinsic.” -Kaylin“And don’t be intimidated by those who are older than you; simply be the example they need to see by being faithful and true in all that you do. Speak the truth[a] and live a life of purity and authentic love as you remain strong in your faith.” (1 timothy 4:12, TPT)“How you love yourself is how you teach others to love you.” -Dr. Caroline Leaf“We model to others how we expect to be treated.” -Christy“Remember that you’re somebody else’s ‘other.’” -Kaylin“Hurt people hurt others, so when we have insecurities we kind of leech that onto other people as well. But when we hold high value of ourselves we'll start walking around and seeing the high value of everyone else around us.” -Kaylin“When we live with that sense of enoughness, that belief that I am enough in terms of my intrinsic value, then we can leave room for growth. We can accept ourselves in the stage, in the process that we’re in and not expect perfection or think we’ll only be enough when we get to some...destination.” -Christy“Shame hides our intrinsic value from us.” -Kaylin“You are valuable; you’re worth fighting for.” -Kaylin“Our expectations can feed us lies.” -Kaylin“We can have expectations on ourself, and then we can feel the expectations of others on us, which can make us feel like we are not enough.” -Kaylin
RESOURCESRivers From Eden- BookChildren Can You Hear Me? & Jesus Showed Us! -Books1 Corinthians 13 New Testament David Bentley HartSHOW NOTES“We have to show our kids and the people around us that we value ourselves that we are showing them that we love ourselves, and this is how we’re caring for ourselves.” –Eden“If all they know is just someone pouring out on their behalf, then that’s all they know to do…but in the future when they have little ones that they’re meant to care for, all they know at that point is ‘Oh, mom does everything, right?’, and then we’re stuck in that same holding pattern of ‘not enough.’ It’s really, really important for us to be demonstrating for our kids how we value ourselves.” –Eden“This isn’t about being selfish, it’s about being self-aware and it’s an entirely different thing. When you are aware of what your needs are, you can move to having them met. You're not at the behest of someone else meeting those needs on a regular basis. You just know- this is what I need and so I know how to proceed to have that need filled.” –Eden“It’s really important to recognize what you need and then to take the steps needed to fulfill that. That doesn’t have to in any way negate your responsibilities to anyone. Everybody gets space, including you. And I think somehow we’ve discounted ourselves, and not given ourselves a place of value where we’ve treated everyone else the way we want to be treated, and we don’t treat ourselves that way. That’s a sad place to come to because if we actually want to thrive- as a woman, as a mom, as a human being- we have to be self-aware enough, and love ourselves enough to be able to meet our own needs.” –Eden“If we can be kind in our love for ourselves, if we can dispel envy and comparison to others, we are loving ourselves…And can we tolerate all things about ourselves. Can we take in our shadow side and all the bits and pieces that we’re not so thrilled about, but can we tolerate them in hope that they will become something better.” –Eden
RESOURCESwww.candymcvicar.comHolding on to Love After you Lost a Baby -BookSHOW NOTES“If we looked at what it means to not grieve well, I would say it’s really trying to ignore it, and it’s a misnomer, you really can’t ignore it. It contends with you; it demands to be dealt with. Ignoring it – it ends up coming out in many sideways avenues. And so we find that people overeat, they over-shop, they’re out doing things that are destructive to themselves or to others. Even working out can turn. People can become a workout fiend. They’re trying to fix it or solve it through a focus and an intention on something not good. It can start off ok, but then it becomes obviously an unhealthy pattern and people end up having outlets. A lot of men look to porn or to extra marital affairs to just try to feel better, and have some sense of excitement or release- an ability to just live in a fantasy land and not face reality . So grieving well is the opposite of all that. Grieving well says I’m gonna look pain in the eyes and I’m going to address my hurt and acknowledge my feelings. I’m gonna validate my right to grieve and validate that my baby mattered. I am going to take back ownership and my right o process this and not do what the world tells me- to just get over it and move on. We don’t get over our babies. We don’t move on from them. We actually carry them in our hearts with us. And we process all of it and you need to allow yourself to feel the emotions. You need to allow yourself to think through and go through the memories...How do we do that in stages and little bits? Because its overwhelming just to say I’m gonna do it all right now. You can’t just do it quickly. This is something we do over time.” –Candy“You are not alone. Many people are feeling many similar feelings to you.” –Candy“We have to get it out of our brain, on paper, in video, somehow and recognize it from an external perspective.” –Candy“We missed out on a lifetime of opportunity, and the heritage of our child has been lost. They were our heritage. They were supposed to live on passed us. And now we live on and they don’t, they’re not here. So while you’re going through all of your celebrations in life, there’s always a tint of sadness in the grieving parents heart, because they’re very aware of the fact that they’re missing out on these life moments. And while they’ll still be able to hopefully celebrate with you as they heal and get stronger in their journey, it doesn’t negate the fact that they’re still sad at some of these situations. So for you to acknowledge is far better than your silence...If you have something comforting and of help and of support and some acknowledgement, it will always bring you closer to that friend.” –Candy“If there’s acknowledgement, it really is a healing salve to the heart of the grieving parent.” –Candy “There is incredible strain on marriages when there is infant loss. That is huge strain, and we need help. I can see how The 5 Love Languages is a valuable tool.” –Christy
RESOURCESRivers from EdenSHOW NOTES“We especially as women feel like and express that we aren’t enough. What we’re actually feeling and saying is – we’re not everything. I would just like to give every person who feels overwhelmed with not being everything permission to not be everything.” –Eden“What we’re trying to do, or what I want us to be doing is to be giving each other permission to actually just do the things that we’re really good at, that we love, that make us tick. It’s really important in this to be aware of your essential self- who you are at the core. And to be aware of what you have to offer, so that you can offer that and you don’t get stuck in all the other stuff that people are expecting...you discover more things about yourself along the way.” –Eden“Take off all the labels that are attached to relationship, so: mom, auntie, grandma, sister, daughter, wife, partner, and even woman. Strip all of that away from your identity because those are just facets; those are just things that are peripheral really. And then take out anything that attaches you to a task or a job, a career, or a role, and just kind of remove that…push it to the outside because what we want to get is to the very core of us. And these kind of things –relationships and tasks and roles- those are kind of trappings in who we really are. And then take yourself down to this- ask yourself, what makes me tick?…There will be things that get in the way of you finding out what actually makes you tick… how do I line up with God best? And that’s how I found what made me tick.”“It’s important to be able to know that, to understand who you are and how you work and what you have to offer, so that when the world wants you to be more than you are actually able to offer, that you can just say ‘no’…and keep giving permission to those around you to do the same.” –Eden“People with ‘servant hearts’ can get lost in their ‘service,’ like that becomes their identity-‘I serve,’ when that’s something you do, but that’s not actually your identity.” –Eden“If it’s(serving) not coming from a place of a genuine self, then it’s probably going to end up being kind of toxic.” –Eden“As your kids listen to you not just saying, ‘yes’…to everything and everyone, they begin to decide and learn, ‘Oh, I don’t’ have to be everything, I just get to be myself and offer what I have’…we want to change ourselves, but we want to give that same permission to our kids too.” –Eden“I think our constant comparing ourselves to other people, and then feeling like, well if she can do that, then I must be able to do that as well, and I can’t just maybe do it like her, I have to somehow do it better, and comparison is this toxic recipe we use that either devalues the other person or ourselves…There’s way more value In dropping the comparison and just observing other people flourishing.” –Eden
RESOURCESDefining Point ConsultingSHOW NOTES“It wasn’t just about, ‘I am given up and rejected’…I was chosen.” –Cindy“I always had a heart for people knowing who they were and building their identity on how they had been created in a beautiful way, no matter what their story had been.” –Cindy“That’s a big part of how we operate, as moms and in all our roles: Understanding who we are and loving that and feeling free in that, and being enough in that.” –Cindy“I can be free. I can love who I’ve been created to be. I am enough, no matter what my past has been.” –Cindy“We need to know our self to lead our self, and in turn leading others.” –Cindy“As parents, as moms, we need to know ourselves first, and know how we parent before we can understand how to then bring up that little one in the best way that we can. Knowing our strengths, and then understanding who our kids are…we can start to really notice their patterns…good moments or brilliance that we’re finding in these little ones…those are all keys to your kids’ strengths.” –Cindy“This whole concept of enoughness: If we know who we are, we don’t have to worry about who we’re not….If we know our strengths, if we know how we operate and how we’ve been created to be, we don’t have to be pressured to be something else .We just need to work on that. So it’s better to work on what you do strongly than try to work on something you’re not. It’s just a more effective way to live.” –Cindy“We always start with strengths- where someone’s at- and then we can move them forward into their goals, because we want them to operate out of who they are.” –Cindy“Who am I as a whole person?...It’s not just about five strengths. It’s about who we were created to be holistically.” –Cindy
SHOW NOTES“At the end of (Kaylin’s) fourth grade, I knew I needed to do some research. Something wasn’t right. I did not understand what it was, but we had to do something…and as a mom I was distraught. So I did a really big prayer, and then did some online research and it took me to this place…and they gave us some answers. And it was like walking through a really dark valley, and all of a sudden this bright light was shone onto the situation.” –Cory“20 percent of the population thinks in pictures.” –Cory“They actually gave me tools to learn how I learn.” –Kaylin“The diagnosis was helpful because they gave me tools so that I could learn in the education system that I have been given. And that was, I think, a big relief because I didn’t necessarily just have to sit there and struggle and deal with a lot of the emotions of not being enough.” –Kaylin“We had a really good administrator at the school…and I was expressing some of my initial frustration as a mom, and he just said…God has already given her everything she needs to be the best ‘her’…that just profoundly stayed with me, and it was with that I really did step into that advocacy role.” –Cory“We had alleviated some of the stress, put in all these accommodations, and then she learned how to use her tools.” –Cory“I think it’s really starting to catch on- the different ways that kids learn and letting all the different options be out there.” –Kaylin “There’s so much pressure in our society and especially as moms to be good at everything and to be everything, and we aren’t called to be everything.” –Christy“What I’m good at in my home is gonna be different than what another mom is good at in her home.” –Kaylin“You need to let things take their time…you need to have a growth mindset. Learning is a growing process.” –Cory
RESOURCESImago Dei MinistriesParadox Lost BookSHOWNOTES"God shares power and control with us. He gives us choices. We have the choice to turn towards Him or to turn away. He allows us to do that." -Katie
RESOURCESImago Dei MinistriesParadox Lost BookLynne Forrest - The Faces of a VictimSHOW NOTES“Right there in the garden when Adam and Eve had eaten of the fruit and then they start blaming each other, their starting in the drama triangle, That’s where it started…That’s exactly what the drama is about, it’s about blaming, rescuing, defending, and it’s not the way that I believe that God intended.” –Katie“We’re intended to operate in the middle of this- the circle of love…the circle of the Trinity…we are right in the middle of that.” –Katie“The rescuer: It’s like a distorted Savior mentality, like a ‘savior’ complex. ‘I have to fix this person, I have to rescue them, I have to lay my life down for them, I have to bleed out in order to help them out.’” –Katie“The persecutor role is a distortion of the judge role of God. But because it’s a distortion when people in drama think about God as the judge, then it’s almost always in this negative view point of God: ‘He’s going to condemn me.’” –Katie“When we don’t live from the diamond, that’s what draws us into drama. And we create our own shame and we perpetuate the shame cycle that covers our diamond, and we lose sight of who we are.” –Katie“The victim…can be a person who ends up taking their identity in their brokenness, and then they need somebody to rescue them…When you have a victim and a rescuer…they’re going to keep each other locked in this drama cycle.” –Katie“The way that God treats us is never drama-type rescue…God never ever acts like the person is a victim.” –Katie“You’re going to care more about people when you care less about what they think of you.” –Katie“If you see the diamond in the other person you’re gonna always honor the autonomy and their choice. God always honors our choice. He allows us to go into the pig pen and He allows us to turn away. So we honor choice…In drama we feel responsible for the person, like their well being is my responsibility-their being ok, their being happy- I am responsible for. In Christ we’re responsible TO the person, to speak the truth in love, to show up in my diamond, to come alongside where I can and to let them walk away if I need to, or let them suffer their consequences...In drama we do for the person what they’re actually capable of or should do themselves.” –Katie“In drama we are agenda driven: We know what that person needs, how they should do it, how they should act…In Christ there’s no agenda. We offer services, we offer help, we offer advice. If the person doesn’t take it, we let them suffer their consequences.” –Katie“When we’re operating in rescuing, the other person feels “less than”… but in Christ it’s side-by-side. They need God and I am not their God, so I am gonna come alongside them.” –Katie“They(kids) just want to be seen as the capable diamond that they are rather than being squashed.” –Christy and Kaylin“Christ sees us as capable. He sees the diamond in us as well.” –Christy“If you think about the way Christ is with us, He raises up those that were below and He brings down those that were high. So He doesn’t play in the dominant hierarchy. He takes children and the lepers and the blind, and the women and the outcasts…and then He brings those that are haughty down.” –Katie
RESOURCESPerichoresisSHOW NOTES“The Father, Son, Holy Spirit are actively involved in how these children are turning out as well…In with and through what we’re doing, the Holy Spirit’s at work.” –Baxter“The value of sacrifice is that the Father, Son, and Spirit are not self-centered, they’re other-centered and they’re always laying down themselves for the benefit of their creation.” –Baxter“It gives me hope…Jesus is the Good Shepherd…He will redeem my mistakes and turn those into lessons that help me follow and come to the transformation that I’m seeking.” –Baxter“That’s part of the process of having children is you’re learning in the process of this. You will make mistakes and you’re not meant to not make mistakes. We’re not meant to be perfect, we’re meant to participate in the perfecting word. (Jesus)” –Baxter“Whatever it is you believe will make you enough- it won’t.” –Baxter“If you see yourself as separate from Jesus, you’re not in union with him, then you’re over here beside yourself and you’re constantly being evaluated, you’re gonna be found wanted, rather than seeing yourself in Him and He’s in you, and we are enough…We are not good in ourselves; we share in His goodness.” –Baxter“We’re not perfect in ourselves; we share in His perfection. And he’s always at work perfecting us and redeeming our mistakes.” –Baxter“Part of the struggle that we have in America is that we have made an agreement with darkness without knowing it that we cannot hear God speak to us…but in meditating on the fact that Jesus Christ is the eternal Word of God, who is never silent, I think we were designed to hear.” –Baxter“The Father, Son, and Spirit love us. We cannot change how they feel. If we don’t feel it, stop and ask Him, ‘What is going on inside of my inner world that I cannot feel Your love and Your presence?’ That’s where the battleground is right there- in the moment by moment.” –BaxterSHOW NOTES & SUMMARY BY DAWN GEURINK
RESOURCESSponsored by Rocking This BabyLily Ewing CounselingSHOW NOTES“Counseling is just such an important thing because it brings light to some of the things we don’t talk about…talking about the mess, the hard things in life… I think it’s important to talk about the things that we all experience, but that we don’t like to talk about.” –Lily“The mind-body-spirit connection is so integral. We are whole people and we can’t really tease those thing apart…We are designed to be with people. We need connection. We need love and belonging for survival.”“We need to be seen and understood and valued by people.” –Lily“The culture of being a mom and especially a new mom is such a pressurized system…it’s so competitive and there are so many high expectations that you have to be a perfect mom.” –Lily“We all have these big questions, you know we have huge questions that we walk around with everyday- our big insecurities, the pain that we’ve carried since childhood- the big questions like: Am I worthy? Am I loveable? What do I have to do to earn love and be able to be connected and belong in the world? Or what do I have to do to get people to love me or be good enough? We all carry around these huge beliefs about ourselves that are incredibly scary, and a lot of times we don’t even know we’re carrying them, because it’s so uncomfortable and so overwhelming and vulnerable to admit it to ourselves. But these things kind of inform us. They guide the auto-pilot kind of rhythms that we go through our day with. They guide how we connect with people or how we parent or how we show up at work.” –Lily“Where connection is essential to surviving and thriving and being healthy as this mind-body-spirit person, mom culture is really pulling people apart when we need to be with people the most.” –Lily“Therapy in reality, it’s this non-judgmental and safe space…It’s this really beautiful trust relationship, and it’s incredibly supportive.” –Lily“Therapy…can help you draw out the important things in yourself. It can help you get in touch with who you are in the internal landscape of your mind and soul…it really is a growth process. It really is a deeply connected thing where you get to be seen, you get to be understood and known, and you get to be fully authentic.” –Lily“Vulnerability is the thing that is absolutely essential for connecting with people. Vulnerability is taking that scary step to say, ‘This is who I am. This is the authentic, real me.” –LilySHOW NOTES & SUMMARY BY DAWN GEURINK
RESOURCESPerichoresis MinistriesSHOW NOTES“In 10,000 years from this moment, when everything that we can see right now is transformed and gone, that little baby in your arms is still gonna be calling you mama…You wanna talk about the Holy Ghost falling and something supernatural? That child has come into being; is a divine human being. And in Jesus Christ, once he (the baby) is here, or once he is conceived or she is conceived, this child will never ever disappear through all eternity...so you are investing your life in something that you cannot conceive of- the value of…The most supernatural thing in the cosmos is a human being. And you got to participate in this child’s creation. You get to participate in this child’s upbringing, and through suffering and sacrificing, just like the Father, Son, and Spirit do, and you’re gonna get to participate in this child’s glorification. It’s for keeps and forever. We just live in a culture that’s lost its mind and doesn’t realize the staggering value of a human being, and human life.” –Baxter“There’s only one Good Shepherd in this universe and He’s the One that cares for all of us, and He doesn’t like to do things alone. So my suggestion is you wake up in the morning in the passion of the Good Shepherd to care for your sheep. And it’s His burden, and it’s His joy...and if you don’t see what you’re doing as caring for these little ones who are eternal beings, then being a mother is going to be something that wears you out.” –Baxter“There is no such thing as a secular world. This world belongs to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The only thing that has happened is that we have been twisted and we have been misused and we don’t know who we are. And so we don’t know the value of life, we don’t know the value of relationships, and we think that many other things outside will give us what we think we don’t have.” –Baxter“We are valuable because He brought us into being and He loves us forever, and we can’t do anything about it. Now we can live in alienation from it, we can get ourselves in a mess, but that doesn’t have the power to alter the Father’s heart. That’s identity.” –Baxter“Somebody, somewhere, whispered to Adam and Eve and told them they weren’t yet good enough...You are valuable. That’s His verdict. You are enough. That’s His verdict…We were designed to participate in Jesus’ goodness, and in His value, and in His relationship with His Father...We were designed to participate, and Jesus is the Good Shepherd.” –Baxter“The recognition of the sacred presence of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in every person, moment, and place is the beginning of wisdom.” –Baxter “We have to have a vision of Jesus Christ that’s large enough to tell us we need to be looking for Him everywhere, because He is.” –Baxter“The Holy Spirit’s a redeeming genius ...You weren’t meant to do it right, you were meant to participate in the Fatherhood, in the Motherhood of the Holy Spirit and the Brotherhood of Jesus.” –Baxter“If you never do anything right in your entire life, you cannot change how the Father, Son, and Spirit feel about you, and they’re not ever gonna give up on you.” –BaxterSHOW NOTES & SUMMARY BY DAWN GEURINK
SHOW NOTES“I didn’t know what grass was. I didn’t know what a whole tree looked like at all. Because you don’t get those kind of stimulus- things to feed your spirit and your eyes- you go inward, and you go inward with what you know already.” –KaWan“I felt like I was almost falling out of my skin. When you’re in a building that holds you in…you don’t even know how to hold yourself in…When I first walked on grass it was surreal. It just felt incredible under my feet because I had never walked on grass before.” –KaWan“We are in a society that is really visually driven…Beauty and creativity allow us to ask questions. It s like a child, it brings us back to the way we were designed to be a child of God.” –KaWan“God wants all of our questions. Not just some of them, even the hard ones that you don’t want to ask.” –KaWan“Beauty restores safety and sometimes we cannot move beyond pain or trauma unless beauty kinda scoops in and it helps us move through it by joy-building. And it’s God’s grace that covers us during that time. Beauty also exposes and identifies. So often times beauty will reveal something that we’re missing. We selectively pay attention to certain things, but beauty sometimes makes us pay attention to the thing that’s actually hidden.” –KaWan“You get to a point where maybe you aren’t able to cry it out anymore, but you still have stuff in your heart that you need to say.” –KaWan“Beauty unifies us…it brings a commonality and then we can actually engage with open hearts.” –KaWan“Beauty invites us to participate. It engages us as observers. It provokes us to risk and to be vulnerable.” –KaWan“We try to edit ourselves and look great, but there is something incredibly beautiful about vulnerability.” –KaWan“We moms- we really need to be seen. We need to be validated…when that happens, we flourish as women.” –KaWan“You model an appreciation for beauty, and that will get handed down to our kids.” –Christy
MUSIC SPOTLIGHTOver Now by DominicInstagramSHOW NOTES“I think we live in the generation that has dealt with the most change, that is in the most fast paced generation that’s ever lived on the face of this planet…Just a few years ago nobody had iPhones, nobody had personal mini-computers in their hands for everything, so we’re just going through so much change. With change comes the need to process loss.” –Christy“How well you can handle change will determine how well you make it through life. Because we all deal with change, we have to understand that with any change…there’s some form of loss in it, and if you don’t know how to grieve well, you won’t make it through change well.” –Christy“It’s possible to hold excitement and grief at the same time, and it’s really important that we realize that so that we can give ourselves permission to grieve while being excited.” –Christy“With every change there’s loss, even in good change.” –Kaylin“One step in change is to acknowledge that things are changing.” –Kaylin“Sometimes you can make the best choice out there, and still face grieving afterward because there’s loss in any decision, even good ones.” –Christy“It’s ok to have these emotions and it’s ok to be grieving. There’s nothing wrong with these…it’s what we do with them that can be hurtful to ourselves or others.” –Kaylin“We have to acknowledge the loss that’s coming even with a good decision.” –Kaylin“I think when we’re dealing with change that brings a loss to us...focusing on what you are gaining can be really helpful...like gratitude journaling and the benefits of out-loud verbalizing the things we’re thankful for on a daily basis. Literally, it can change our brain chemistry to talk about the things we’re thankful for.” -Christy“There is still good and it outweighs the negative and I can hold both at the same time. I can process loss and grief and I can be happy about the positives at the same time.” -Christy“We can hold both emotions at the same time and that’s okay. We can grieve the loss, and yet we can be really excited about a change that we have.” -Kaylin
RESOURCESAlicia GranholmSHOW NOTES“I remember on my 36th birthday crying…because I was like, we still don’t have kids, and I just feel old…I had envisioned being a mom for the majority of my life and I just felt like we were so late…timing and how things happen in your life is not in your control.” –Alicia“It was a huge season of transition because I stepped out of everything familiar: Became a mom, and a wife, and a student again basically in twelve months.” –Alicia“I felt like from so many people we heard ‘Oh just listen to your instinct, parenting will just come so naturally and easily to you.’ And it felt like people made it seem like…’You’ll just know.’” –Alicia“I think it can be difficult going from something you’ve been working on that you’re trained in, that you know a lot about, that you’ve been successful in and kind of defines you, and all of a sudden you’re thrown into this world that you think should be coming naturally...and it’s not, and it’s hard.” –Kaylin“It’s helpful to know that it’s not necessarily an easy season, and as much as people say it comes naturally to you, I think it’s more about when you’re parenting those tendencies come out, but newborn infancy stage is not ‘parenting’ in the way that we imagine parenting: The discipline, helping them thrive in their gifts and that kind of thing. Newborn is like- you’re feeding them, changing them, that kind of thing…that just doesn’t necessarily come naturally.” –Alicia“I think, for sure, having a community around you, even if it’s just like one other mom…so you can have these honest, raw conversations…and being able to really just be authentic with them would be really helpful.” –Alicia“If this is a really hard season for you of ‘momming’ that’s okay, and that’s not a reflection of you being a bad person…there’s no shame in that.” –Christy“I still struggle with not measuring my worth and my value by what I accomplish…To be in a season of life where those achievements are not obvious and they won’t be- really wrestling with God and getting to a deeper understanding of how my value and worth doesn’t come from that.” –Alicia“Things that I think were important before being a parent- I hold that a lot more loosely today.” –Alicia“Something that has helped me tremendously is letting go of my perfectionist tendenciess...there is no perfect way to parent. Every day can be different. The amount of change that happens through those early stages: it’s been really helpful to let go of my desire to control things.” –Alicia“I think it’s beautiful when women can give each other grace and understand that we are each different and our circumstances are unique.” –Christy“I think being able to hold our identities confidently in who we are and who we’re created to be, and simultaneously loosely as to what God wants to do with our lives in and through us as parents…I feel like that is the best place we can get to as parents.” –Alicia
RESOURCESChristine can be contacted for consulting at christineliptak@yahoo.comSHOW NOTES“It’s so easy in our culture to compare ourselves and think that we need to be like someone else, and then get frustrated or discouraged or face shame when we don’t match somebody else’s standard, or a standard we set on ourselves that doesn’t work for us but worked for someone else.” –Christy“Differences are beautiful and the uniqueness in cultures globally, but then also in individual people is just really, really beautiful. I love getting to see that on both a macro scale around the world and on a really micro scale in the differences between individuals.” –Christine Walz“Why we organize is a really important question because I’ve seen in my own life a tendency to organize for…unhealthy reasons, so I’ve seen in myself a need to organize as a form of control and also as a form to control others, and that doesn’t usually work out very well especially when my husband or my children are involved. So I’ve really come to learn that I need to be organizing for myself. I need to be organizing because it brings me joy and it brings me rest, not out of this need to control other people….it doesn’t have to be the way other people expect… it needs to be something I do out of a place of rest, from a place of rest to create more rest.” –Christine Walz“It is okay for your house to not look like what you see in the magazine or on your phone.” –Christine Walz“Organizing is doing what you need for your home and your spaces to be joyful, restful places for you and for the people who live there with you… We’re each unique, and the way we think about our stuff is unique, and the way we use our space is unique.” –Christine Walz“It’s really what works best for you. It is not a one-size-fits-all approach.” –Christine Walz“If it’s a ‘should’ then I strongly encourage you to find a way to live with it in a way that is beautiful to you, and that works for who you are, and to not just stuff it away because you’re trying to be something that you’re not.” –Christine Walz“Find joy in the moment even if it’s not exactly what you want it to look like.” –Christine Walz
SHOW NOTES “Whatever that you’re going through, and however you are going through those things in your life, that’s your journey. No one can tell you, ‘No, you shouldn’t feel that way. You need to keep on trusting God. It will happen one day.’ If you feel like it’s painful, and that’s where you are, it’s completely valid.” –Cora “Everyday just putting myself in a posture of, ‘God, I love you. I love you beyond anything and everything You can choose to give me or not give me.’” –Cora “She (Mary) kept everything in her heart, and I think that’s really a posture of someone who really, really trusted God with everything inside of her.” –Cora “I want to be in a head space where I don’t have anything that’s filling up my spirit, just taking over some space for nothing…just connect right away with the Lord…The more I do it I’m starting to see that it’s actually creating peace in my heart. My spirit is being quieted…more peace is rising inside of me…It doesn’t mean that my situation has changed, it just means that my heart’s posture is starting to change.” –Cora “I believe that God is good, and I believe He wants good things for my life, and He wants the best…Whatever His will is for my future or for my life, I want to be prepared to receive it.” –Cora “We have to allow ourselves to be completely vulnerable before Him so that He can first of all pinpoint those things inside that He wants to change; He wants to mold; He wants to take through the fire, so that we can truly be transformed at the end of each year. Not just accomplish all these things that we want to accomplish, which He also wants us to accomplish those things, but I believe that the real transformation should be from the inside.” –Cora
RESOURCESThe Allender Center: Coming Home To Our BodiesJesus Showed Us by Bradley-JersakMusic spotlight- Father in HeavenC. Baxter Kruger: The Great DanceSHOW NOTES“She (Eve) was told she would have conception. That was the first declaration of the gospel.” –Kaylin“There’s a great…sacredness…that His incarnation…gives to our own humanity as well…It shows us that our humanness is not bad, is not shameful, is not something that God despises. God made humans in His image and so there’s something very important about being a human being, and Jesus shows that by becoming one as well.” –Christy“I think we can come to Jesus as very transactional- that He just came to appease a higher being from Himself to fix us…Or we can look at Jesus as completely coming and showing us and being there in our darkness with us and bring us out of it. I think one is very just quick fix, and I think the other one is very loving, caring, relational- which that’s who Jesus is.” –Kaylin“He understands what it is to be human and I just think that shows that it’s ok to be human. I think that shows our Imago Dei.” –Kaylin“We miss an understanding of who we are when we draw such big dichotomies between our body and our emotion and our spirit, and we address our spiritual health completely separate from our emotional health and completely separately from our physical health…All of those things have to go together to create the integrated being that we are.” –Christy“He shows us how He loves all people through His life…coming as a baby…his lineage…washing disciples’ feet, how He went to the woman at the well, how He talked to Zacchaeus. He cared about ALL.” –Kaylin“He came into our darkness. It wasn’t like, ‘I’m out here fixing you.’ It was this-‘ I understand you. I am here with you…I’m including you in who I am.’” –Kaylin“We feel separated from God because of our shame, our sin, our choices, maybe things done to us, but that the incarnation reminds us that we’re not separated from God…nothing can separate us from the love of God.” –Christy“That’s why we chose in our tagline to say that this is about ‘living fully loved and fully free.’ It’s not about ‘becoming’ or ‘trying to be.’ We believe that we already are. It’s just a matter of seeing it and living in it.” –Kaylin
SHOW NOTES“The key to this whole passage in Ephesians 5 is verse 32, where Paul says, This mystery is great, I’m talking about Christ and the church. Everybody thinks this is a passage giving us details about husbands and wives and heads and non-heads…and he’s saying, no, I’m writing about Christ and the church, and we miss that…because we go to this passage with this patriarchal point of view, and we’re looking for rules and application of these certain principles, and they’re not even there…We’re not talking about hierarchy, or even source, we’re talking about unity.” –Bruce“There are whole verses in the New Testament that are not Paul’s instruction, just like there were verses that weren’t Jesus, but Jesus said, but I’m not teaching that, I’m saying this instead. Paul is doing similarly, and when pastors and teachers and people reading their Bibles try to make sense out of something they don’t realize is in quotations, as something he’s about to refute, then you have to try and make sense out of something really confusing and quite contrary to the very intention of the author.” -Christy“Our English Bibles are translations from the Hebrew and Greek, and these are simple translations mistakes. But they’re made because of a theological bias that people think they’re honestly bringing through the meaning of Genesis 3:16 and putting into practice later on. Once you true up (Genesis) 3:16 then you don’t have to do it, but there’s a lot of unpacking and rewriting and clearing up and getting the garbage out that has to be done.” –BruceKeys to those five famous passages on women and menby the Rev. Bruce C. E. FlemingHere are the five famous passages people get wrong about women in the home and the church. Each can be corrected by recognizing one or more errors made in their translation. Most are due to misunderstanding the true meaning of Genesis 3:16. (See Tru316.com)1 Peter 3:1-7. How to win to Christ your unsaved spouse. “If” in verse 1 means “since.” None of their husbands obeyed the Word. Verse 7 begins with “likewise” in Greek. Only unsaved wives are “weaker.”1 Timothy 2:8 and 11-12. Correcting certain men and women teachers who had gone astray, as had Eve. “Woman” in verse 11 has no article in Greek. It means a subgroup of women or “these women” who you need to retrain – not all women, everywhere. Once corrected, thanks to Christ “the faithful Word,” all can aspire again to ministry (3:1).Ephesians 5:21-32. “As Christ” is the key illustration and is used three times. The main point is about “about Christ and the church” (verse 32). It’s not about marriage. The head/body metaphor Paul uses indicates unity. It means neither “hierarchy” nor “source.”1 Corinthians 11:2-16. Paul corrects teachers of Jewish oral law and restates his own teaching. He taught this clearly in Galatians 3:28. He accepts no extra “laws” for women. All are united in Christ as is made clear each time the head/body metaphor is used. He quotes the deviant teaching in verses 4-7 and corrects it. He appeals to Jews (verses 7-9), to the church (verses 11-12) and to Greeks (verses 13-16. Note the Greek says “Nature itself does not teach you …”). His main point comes in verse 10: a woman has full authority over what to put on, or not put on, her head following Paul’s teaching. Since women too will judge the angels (1 Corinthians 6:2-3) they certainly could judge this issue! In this entire passage Paul encourages them to follow what he taught them from the beginning (11:2).1 Corinthians 14:34-35. Paul quotes the oral “law” and refutes its teachers in 35-38. “Add quotation marks here” like translators do in most other cases when Paul makes a quote. These words come from their “law.” In 14:34-35, as in 11:4-6, these are not Paul’s words.” They certainly aren’t based on God’s words to Eve (see www.Genesis316.com).Want more? Enroll in the twice monthly Think Again Workshop. Included are workbooks and audiobooks. Tru316.com/taworkshop. Or get our book, Familiar “Leadership” Heresies Uncovered by an inside look at the Bible, 2005, available from Wipf and Stock or Amazon. (cc) Bruce C. E. Fleming (October 28, 2019) Tru316.com/taworkshop
RESOURCESlivingorganique.comThe Energetics of AuthenticitySHOW NOTES“One of the most important things I’ve realized over the last few years is the context of our culture and how much we are a product of it and its belief systems — without reflecting on it, realizing it, or questioning it.” –Ashley“You’re placing the highest value on the idea in your mind of who you should be, or what you should be, or who you’re told you should be. I thought I wanted to be what I was told.” –Ashley“The opinions of other people do not matter as much as my opinion of my own life. Why would I think that another person has a better concept of what’s going on energetically inside my soul than my own God- given innate intuition and gut feeling.” –Ashley“Our divine and sacred nature: God is out there; God is also in here, connecting “as above, so below.” We integrate the two. And we start to realize that the alignment is from God.” –Ashley“A lot of people get nervous with the word “energy,” and understandably so. But we are energetic beings, and our entire body is comprised of electromagnetic energy. This is proven in quantum physics.” –Ashley“We cannot cut out forms of energy and expect the physical body to heal and repair. Emotional health and spiritual health are critically important if we expect the physical body to run properly.” –Ashley“Disconnect from the voices. Disconnect from the “shoulds.” Reconnect with God. Start by evaluating the fruits of your thoughts and allow that internal voice to have your time instead of the Internet, Facebook, etc. Listen to what it’s trying to tell you.” –Ashley“It seems that the mom who has the most anxiety and turmoil is the one who is putting high value into what that others think. She becomes so concerned about pleasing, or appeasing, but it is often at the expense of her own children and personal symptoms.” –Ashley“Have the courage to say, 'This is right for me; it does not have to be right with others, and I’m good with that'.” –Ashley
RESOURCESGenesis 3https://tru316.com/SHOW NOTES“Everybody knew…that God cursed the woman and God cursed the serpent and…the ground and...the man. And maybe God cursed several more times, but the more she researched it, and read the Hebrew words, she found out that there were only two curses: One on the ground, and one on the serpent. But everybody felt like He…at least cursed the woman.” –Bruce“Not only was the woman not cursed by God, but she was not alone at the tree at the beginning of Genesis chapter three. So when the serpent spoke to them, in Hebrew…what he says is…you BOTH. Every time he says you it’s ‘you both’…he was speaking to both of them.” –Bruce“She (Eve) was created to be a human being…she was one created in the image of God just like he (Adam) was…both image bearers…They were both given the charge to be fruitful and multiply…The mandate to rule over the world…was given to both of them, the woman and the man.” –Bruce“The…part about having many children is not part of Genesis chapter two…the woman was not a ‘baby-maker.’ She was created just like him.” –Bruce“Was she (Eve) a help in the Hebrew? There’s a word that doesn’t say ‘helper.’ It says ‘help’; it’s ‘Ezer’…Ezer is used 21 times…most of the other times…it’s used of somebody whose stronger who comes with their excess strength to help somebody who needs help. Usually it’s God (example-Psalm 121).” –Bruce“She’s (Eve) created to be an Ezer, or a ‘help.’ What does she help? Well, there was something that was not good. What was not good? He’s (Adam) alone, and she was supposed to be an Ezer. And the second Hebrew word is Kenegdo…and it has to do with ‘face-to-face.’ So she’s a helper ‘face-to-face’ to him…They’re looking at each other face-to-face.” –Bruce“When God asked him (Adam), ‘What did you do?’ he blamed her and he blamed God. He didn’t confess that he had done it.” –Bruce“God never…really cursed either human being that He created…He worked six days to build up to their creation, and He didn’t curse them, even though they had done what He said not to do…very, very loving.” –Bruce“What is marriage supposed to be? He’s (the husband) supposed to desire her. And what is a sinful way to act? To rule over you (her)…Instead, you’re supposed to be face-to-face…loving one another, ruling over everything…in the image of God. That is Genesis 3:16. That is Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden.” –Bruce
RESOURCESDr. Caroline Leaf Podcast - Episode 62: Debunking the IQ and Personality Profile MythScott VanderWerf // Decision Making In the New Covenant 07.28.19Katie Skurja Baxter Krueger Dan Allender SHOW NOTES“I wanted signs in the sky. I went to every kind of authority figure in my life that I thought might be ableto give me input, and I was terrified of getting it wrong…I kind of viewed it as like, God has this ‘Plan A’for my life, and If I don’t make the right decision every time, I will get off, and I’ll suddenly have gottento ‘Plan B’…that His first best for me would be missed.” –Christy“It’s about relationship rather than…this authority structure of- I better get it right and figure it out, orelse somehow God is going to be upset with me, or in His disappoint will never let me have His best.”–Christy“In making a decision, we can go to people that help us and they can give us counsel, but in the endwe’ve been given intrinsic authority, and that is us- our direct relationship to God Himself.” -Kaylin“Ultimately we are the ones who are responsible for the choices we make, and nobody else ends up fullysharing in them the way we will.” –Christy“I missed this whole concept that the dreams God puts in our hearts are from Him, and I lived a lot ofmy life thinking I needed to please God, kinda like a servant relationship rather than a childrelationship…I wanted so badly to please God that I assumed it would have to be at the expense of all ofthe dreams in my heart.” –Christy“We might be facing two choices, neither one is right or wrong, but we can choose and there’s joy inthat.” –Kaylin“We are in the image of our Creator God, and so it can be a joy to make decisions when we begin to seeit from that freedom lens, rather than this fear lens.” –Christy“Even when we make decisions that hurt others, or do hurt ourselves…that doesn’t mean the canvas isruined.” –Kaylin“If God can bring good from anything we do, then I think that can free us from a lot of fear…out of all ofthem God can bring beauty.” –Christy“When you’re making decisions, I think it’s super important to understand what we think is successfulversus what IS successful.” –Kaylin“Your intrinsic authority means that others can’t tell you how to make decisions, but they can give youadvice and feedback when you seek it, and seeking counsel is very important and good. But at the end ofthe day your decision process will be unique to you, and you get to make it in the freedom ofrelationship with a kind and loving Father who is FOR you.” –Christy
MUSIC SPOTLIGHTKAINARESOURCESParadox Lost, Katie SkurjaSHOW NOTES“As moms we want to be loving our kids, but if we have a skewed view of what love is or if we haven’t received love…very well, or we have really well, all of us have to explore this…what does love really look like and what does it mean to be loved and to love my kids?” –Christy“When you’ve always sheltered yourself from being really seen, you can’t feel fully loved ‘cause you’re like, what are they loving? They don’t really know the full me, so do they really love me? If they saw all of me, would they still love me?” –Christy“When we were in the garden and we felt shame, God did not just come up to us and be like, you guys are fine- He came and He gave us clothes. He met us and beautifully clothed us.” –Kaylin“If I believe I’m loved in a way that brings security to me, my girls will learn that too and pick up on that, whereas if I live in any way ashamed, fearful, or hiding, my daughters will pick up on that too…It is a worthwhile goal to live fully seen, fully free, fully loved because we’ll be able to much more fully love.” –Christy“Love does not control. God does not sit and control…love does not grasp…love does not overtake.” –Kaylin“You can’t expect a child to just do the right thing and just love God until they have received love and felt that love.” –Christy“It (love) gives choice, and it doesn’t control.” –Christy“I think we can look around in our world today and see the control of a cult or a victim being controlled by an abuser…we understand that and we say that yes, that isn’t loving or correct. But yet we change and have this idea about God as that controlling…yet we say He’s love…understanding God is love…that is who He is...We almost start seeing God through our coat of shame versus seeing Him for who He is.” –Kaylin“So many times we live our lives, sitting there hiding from experiencing this desire that we have to be fully loved and yet we have that right next to us. We have Him right next to us and we can’t see it because we see Him in the lens of our shame, and we put on different things of who we think God is based on experiences, versus seeing Him as He truly is, and He is love.” -Kaylin
RESOURCESImago Dei MinistriesParadox Lost BookSHOW NOTES“You cannot talk someone out of their shame. It’s just an impervious force. Words will not penetrate it, and as a matter of fact can even make it stronger. And we’re often so afraid to speak those words of our shame because we fear that it’s gonna give it power, or we fear that it’s gonna make it true, or we fear that someone’s gonna not love us if we say that. And yet it’s in actually identifying the things that we believe in our shame that allow us to bring it into the light, where it can be healed.” -Katie“When we allow ourselves to be human is when we can actually go back to living the way we were meant to be…in the garden we were created as human and God called us very good…When we expect ourselves to be perfect we’re not allowing ourselves to be human, and that takes us out of right relationship with God.” -Katie“With our children sometimes we just need to help them to name it. We need to help them to understand what it is they’re feeling.” -Katie“Christ is the image of the unseen God and so we can look to Christ to understand that Imago Dei within us, and Christ contains both lion and lamb…He’s the Lamb of God and the Lion of Judah. They’re both held within and we have both. And it’s a simple metaphor that even children can understand.” - Katie“If I can own my lion as well as my lamb, then I can live out of my diamond, where I’m not gonna judge the lion in this child as bad, and now I can help them to find their lamb. But I can’t really help this child to find their lamb side if I don’t know my diamond.” -Katie“If you are a lion-leading person who doesn’t know your lamb side, your lamb child is going to be afraid of you, no matter how gently you come across, because they’re going to see your fangs and your claws and know that you can tear them apart.” -Katie“It’s like a tree…a tree is used in the Scriptures a lot, a tree planted by waters. It just is. It’s just powerful and it’s strong and it’s standing there, and it’s taking in energy and it’s giving out energy, and it’s a place to find shade and comfort, but it’s strength. It’s strength and grace all at the same time.” -Katie“If I don’t value both of them (lion and lamb) in me, then I can’t help them find what’s missing in them.” -Katie“The cool thing about our children is, because their layers aren’t so solidified yet, like us adults, they’re much more moldable and we can get through the shame in a much easier way than if we wait until they’re in their 30s and 40s.” -Katie“We actually handicap them (children) by trying to protect them from their worst fears. And we make them stronger by going after that, and if we can do it from our diamond then we won’t add shame to their shame.” -Katie
RESOURCESImago Dei MinistriesCompanioning CenterParadox Lost Book“I believe shame is the most powerful force on the planet apart from grace. Grace is the only thing that’s more powerful than shame, and shame is a given in the world. We all are subject to it, it’s like a force that’s in the world…and in the peanut M&M metaphor the shame is the chocolate. It’s the stuff that ends up attaching to our diamond. It coats us and it comes from those ‘shoulds’ and it can start as early as…infancy.” -Katie“If you don’t think everybody has an Imago Dei…the latin for “image of God”… or they don’t have a diamond, then…what God created them?…If you believe in one God, then all people are created in the image of that God….If we understood that inside of everybody, you wouldn’t hurt another individual that you could see the diamond in…every human being is a reflection of God.” -Katie“From a mom perspective, the most important thing that you can give your child is to see their diamond…and you cannot see another person’s diamond if you don’t know your own. If your diamond is covered in shame, then you’re going to see shame in your child …It’s really important that we understand shame in ourselves so that we can bring it into the light.” -Katie“Shame that’s not transformed is transferred.”-Richard Rohr“Depending on your kid’s personality, they’re either going to absorb it (shame), or they’re going to shoot it back at you …and then they have more layers covering their diamond.” -Katie“If you shut down on your child, your child feels shut down…they’re going to experience it as ‘You don’t like me.’ They’re going to take it personally. It may not be personal, but they’re going to take it personally…they’ll tell themselves a variety of things, but all of them are going to be shaming.” -Katie“The problem with binary thinking is it’s the product of the garden - of the fall…I won’t always make diamond choices and that doesn’t diminish the diamond. If we can’t acknowledge that we won’t always make ‘diamond choices’…then we’re not going to make room for the kids to do that either.” -Katie“You can’t talk yourself out of your shame…The Paradox Prayer is…neurologically what’s happening is it’s a statement of fear from the limbic and a statement of faith from the prefrontal cortex. When I force a connection between those two parts of the brain, the shame can go down…you can also teach your kids paradox prayers.” -Katie“It’s in admitting our worst fears in the light that actually brings the healing.” -Katie
RESOURCES:Bold Idea PodcastLuke 10:27 “And he answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.’”1 John 4:19 “We love because he first loved us.”MUSIC SPOTLIGHTRAMIESHOW NOTES“We have to care for ourselves in order to be able to be present to care for our kiddos, and that can really be a complicated thing to find that balance between making sure we are healthy enough to be present and active, and able to care well for our kids, and then giving all the time and energy for our kids that they require…when we’re the primary person responsible for them.” -Christy“A lot of times we have misconceptions on what it means to take care of ourselves , because a lot of times we go for self-help when that’s really not helpful because we’re trying to do it on our own. So what does it look like to take care of ourselves in the responsibility we’ve been given for ourselves, without overstepping and trying to do everything on our own?” -Kaylin“God showed me that I needed to matter to me. That in order to take care of me, I need to see that I matter, and I need to believe that I matter to other people.” -Johanna“The best way to take good care of your daughters is to model for them taking good care of yourself.” -Christy“What are the one or two things you might need every day, or once a week, that you need to carve out time for, or have a hard boundary around, so that your needs are being met so that your tank can be fueled, because it is impossible to give out of an empty tank… we also have to have something to give from.” -Christy“We’re modeling boundaries to our kids in that moment, we’re modeling taking care of yourself and being filled to take care of others. And you’re actually able to take care of them in a healthier way when you’re either starting your day, or whatever it might look like for you…if I don’t have the emotional capacity, I’m going to be short with my kids; I’m not going to be parenting well.” -Kaylin“My job as a mom is not to do everything for my kids, it’s to train them and raise them up to be able to gradually… do it for themselves.” -Christy“You set up boundaries based on your values. And don’t we want to see our kids valuing themselves?” -Kaylin“In my journey of learning to love others, I don’t think I could love somebody else if I didn’t love myself,because I understand that Christ has made me, and I understand that Christ has made them, and there’s that connection that says, I can love them because I love myself. The only reason I can love God is because He loved me … Because I am loved I can love.” -Kaylin“If we love because He first loved us, my girls are not going to be able to just automatically love, they’re going to have to receive love from me…I as a mom cannot love from a place of emptiness. I have to receiveGod’s love first to then be able to love my children well.” -Christy
RESOURCES:Connected FamiliesConnected Families PodcastSHOW NOTES“To become an emotionally safe parent is far more than doing the right thing to get your kids to do the right thing. It’s about knowing who you are because of the cross; it’s about learning to be in the process of spiritual formation and being formed into the likeness of Christ, and then learning how to pour what you’re learning out into that relationship with your kids.” -Jim“No human being can control another human being…What you can control is yourself, and you can get to a place where your goal isn’t to control your child, but it’s for you to stay calm…If I have a goal to parent wisely and graciously, then my child can’t intervene in that goal, and I can have that as my primary goal, and my secondary goal to guide my child towards wiser behavior.” -Lynne“The reason that I correct, or the way that I correct, isn’t about putting the right punishment in place that my child will want to avoid next time, and so they do the wrong thing out of fear of punishment. I want to put something in place that help them value doing the right thing for the right reason… it all grows out of this foundation and this message of ‘You are safe with me.’” -Jim“When I had a stronger sense of authority I was less controlling…I was more authoritative, I was more creative and assertive, and guiding their learning…God is calling me with a sense of strong God-given authority to be my kids’ disciplers about faith, and about life, and that’s a big calling that changes your perspective of parenting.” -Lynne“Research shows that authoritarian parenting, which is the firm, punitive, immediate obedience-oriented parenting…tends to produce one of two results in kids…One is ‘God-anxiety,’ which is ‘I don’t know if God really love me or not,’ and the other, which is ‘God avoidance,’ which is, ‘I don’t really care, ‘cause I don’t really want to know that kind of a God.’” -Lynne“You don’t make good progress going forward on the field unless you take steps back to survey what’s going on, and for me, practically what that was, literally sometimes was a step backward, or a deep breath… it became very intentional because as we do that, our kids see that- that become an example for them about what to do when their upset.” -Jim“Those little blow-ups in life are just incredibly valuable opportunities to model the fact that God’s mercy is alive, well, and here with us right now…to see those as opportunities to make kids aware that God’s love and mercy is present for every person involved in that moment is a huge discipleship opportunity.” -Lynne“When we do the ‘do-overs’ it trains our brains, our spirits, to do the right things the first time, the next time.” -Jim“We’re talking about a measure of safety that builds into young children especially a position of trust between parent and child…Gaining our kids’ trust, through the message ‘you are safe’ sets them up over a lifetime to trust us, to come to us…The long term effect of safety is that it frees our children to move into the courses before them with a sense of grace, a sense of safety… to find their ‘ok-ness’ with themselves and with God on their own, on their own terms.” -Jim
RESOURCES:Connected FamiliesConnected Families PodcastEmpowered to ConnectSHOW NOTES:“Emotional safety is really about kids having the basic understanding that I am for you, not against you, as a parent. And kids can so easily get that feeling that ‘mom is just trying to control my behavior to make her life more easy’...and even if we have…good intentions to help the child calm down, or share a toy, or something like that, but if the message that they get is, ‘What’s important to you isn’t important, and your emotions aren’t important, but just this correct behavior is important’…that’s not emotionally safe. Because the child feels invalidated, they feel managed, they feel like they don’t matter, and they don’t have the opportunity to develop true wisdom versus just have their behavior managed.” Lynne“It starts with emotional safety, and then as we are safe with our kids, we can communicate love and affection for them even in the midst of misbehavior, and that is the launching pad to helping them be accountable for their behavior and learn wiser choices.” Lynne“Love sandwich… we need to hold our kids accountable, but if we make accountability our supreme goal, our kids detach from us, and they attach to us less. And so let’s make a love sandwich when we have to deal with their misbehavior, which is to start the interaction by saying I love you- now accountability- and then remember, I love you- so it’s like a sandwich… To start and finish with this message of love is so critically important.” Jim“It’s about getting your heart to the place where you love your child and you’ve… asked God to guide you to, ‘How can I communicate that?’ And it might be ‘I love you’, it might be a smile, it might be just holding your arms out for a hug… some way that you reconnect and you establish that child’s value before you ask them to change what they’re doing.” Lynne“What’s important here is my heart of love for my child, and there are various circumstances in life that make capturing that heart, being in touch with that heart, harder than others… but if the judgment is in the heart, kids know that judgment for what it is. They don’t hear the words, they receive the judgment. So are we taking our thoughts about our kids captive to Christ’s obedience? Are we allowing our hearts to be formed into the image of Christ and the heart of Christ, even for our children? That’s hard work.” Jim“What am I believing about myself? What am I believing about my child? And when I got in touch with those kinds of things, it was transforming.” Lynne“When we encounter difficulties with our kids, we tend to put most of our energy to solve it into pointing our finger at the kids, and at the problem, and strategies for making the problem go away…but what’s needed first is for me to turn the finger around 180 degrees and point it here, and ask those questions of ourselves: What’s going on in me? What are the thoughts that I continually have?” Jim“These things that we believe- we can often notice them as recurring thoughts in a conflict… to realize that they usually take the form of what we call a toxic half-truth. So there’s a coating of truth that gets us to swallow this appealing looking pill…underneath that truth is a lie…and the lie is usually about our identity and our future… We have been given an identity in Christ and we have been given a future in Christ and it is all full of grace and hope.” Lynne“It is about taking the lies captive to the freeing truth of Christ, and that is a whole different perspective and is one that absolutely changes your parenting.” Lynne
RESOURCES:MUSIC SPOTLIGHT: Song “Like the Rain” by JESS Album: Nothing WastedVerses that describe Gods’ nurture and protection for us: Deuteronomy 32:11-12, Matthew 23:37, Luke 13:34, Isaiah 66:13Verses about being made in God’s image: Genesis 1:27, Genesis 2:18For more information on the meaning of “ezer kenegdo” from Genesis 2:18:Woman, a Power Equal to Man, by R. David FreedmanMan and Woman in Biblical Unity: Theology from Genesis 2–3, by Joy FlemingGod’s Word to Women: Word Study: Ezer KenegdoPastor Josh Krehbiel: "WOMEN: God's Original Design" (05.12.19)SHOW NOTES:“We believe… that everybody reflects who God is because God made us in His image… that’s our Imago Dei, that’s who we are, our worth and value.” Kaylin“As Mothers Day happened recently, I’ve been finding myself asking, how has God ‘mothered’ me, and how do I learn what it looks like for me to be a woman, and in my role of caring for my daughters? As a mom, how am I reflecting the very nature of God?” Christy“That’s part of the fall in our humanity is we put others as ‘lesser than’ to bring ourselves up, to make ourselves more than… it’s this ‘lesser than/ greater than’ struggle… if we look back into the garden… we were created to be equal… in face-to-face relationship with God Himself.” Kaylin“We see in Genesis that He will make a helper and we assume that that’s a ‘lesser than,’ ‘underneath’ relationship, instead of this ‘face to face.’” Kaylin“God was not making a ‘kitchen assistant’ to Adam, but He was making a partner corresponding to the man…the word uses [of Ezer] often refer to God Himself for His people: Being a helper to His people, a strength to His people, a rescuer to His people.” Christy“If you’ve had strong healthy women in your life, thank God for that, and I know that they will be informing your thoughts on who you should be as a woman. And if you haven’t, there’s still hope, because God mothers us.” Christy“It [femininity] will come out differently for everyone, but…I don’t have to say I’m ‘just a mom,’ because I know that I have the power and strength given to me, and my value isn’t necessarily what I’m doing… but because of my value I can move forward in what I’m doing with power and strength, and be there with my husband as a couple.” -Kaylin“Wherever we are in our stage of life…our strength is God-given; it’s intrinsic to our femininity, and that’s going to play out in so many different ways: Full time working woman, full time stay at home mom, and anything in between. Our strength is a huge part of our intrinsic femininity given to us by God.” Christy“What we do and what we bring to the community around us is sacred, because God, in us, is sacred.” Christy
RESOURCES:The Message BibleThe Blessing, Gary SmalleyJosiah’s Fire - bookJosiah’s Fire - websiteJosiah’s Fire - facebookSHOW NOTES:“There is a supernatural, cosmic chain… that will literally invoke and create ripples and repercussions throughout the earth that breaks the chains of depression, anxiety, and every kind of circumstance that really seeks to keep us bound and not living the life that is free- that Jesus said He came to give us.” Tahni“Faith is believing for kites to fly when there’s no wind in sight.” Josiah Cullen“God is reaching my child in places I can’t go- to have that level of trust even when it feels like- well why don’t’ you just fix it, why don’t you just fix him? But to realize God’s taking him through a process too… parenting has changed my heart… changed my ideas about God and about myself.” Tahni“I saw in really going through the psalms, David who was honest… ‘I am in a pit… I am being consumed by enemies…’ and he would just keep reaching out.” Tahni“You’ve just described the two sides of the bowling alley lane- lose your ball in this gutter or that gutter or send it down the middle… I’ve got to hear God perfectly or do everything the right way… you better get it right so that God does what you want or what you’re hoping for happens… I’m this pawn in a cosmic chess game and I don’t have much control.” Christy“We know that from the Bible, we love God because he first loved us. But we often teach our kids and raise kids… to love God like it’s our duty… I’ve decided I really want to raise my kids in a way that before I say “let’s praise God”… I want them to just hear me shower them with the truth… I want them to be receivers of love.” Christy“Family and motherhood and parenthood and all of those things- how can we get this right if we’re not able to receive that same kind of fatherly love ourselves?” Tahni“Kids are under so much pressure, so much oppression, bullying, words against them that are tearing down their destiny…and their self-worth. If we don’t fill them up as parents, who is going to? We need to teach them how to receive that (God’s love) and to be a blessing to others.” Tahni“It literally is exuding a blessing that says, ‘I wish well for you: that there is nothing missing, nothing broken in your life- that there would be wholeness and completeness in your life, and in fact let me release to you a blessing that is that which destroys the authority of chaos over your life. That is Shalom.” Tahni“There’s weight behind our words, our names, what we ascribe energy toward, belief toward, so we can be more intentional to realize… the words we’re speaking… they mean something; they stick. And when they are life giving words, do we realize how important those words are… that they are going to mean something and they’re going to stick.” Tahni“A lot of times we see our child’s coat of their circumstance instead of seeing who they really are. I think that can be a block for us to really, truly understand how to speak a blessing, and to see who they truly are… I think a lot of times we start telling them ‘just obey, just do this’ and start shaming them because that’s what we see, instead of seeing their true selves.” Kaylin
Resources mentioned:Tahni Cullen’s book Josiah’s Fire: Autism Stole His Words, God Gave Him a Voice www.josiahsfire.comQuote by Krista Black Gifford “If you’re not anchored in the goodness of God, you will lower your theology to match your pain.”Quotes:“Where is hope when there is no hope? That is the journey I had to enter when our son was given the diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder: No known cause, no known cure, lifelong. It felt like the gavel came down on all our dreams.” -Tahni“I kept having to look to God for hope and that was a choice most times when I didn’t feel like it. I felt disillusioned and I felt like I was losing everything…” -Tahni“In the professional world, everyone was telling us ‘you need to learn how to cope with what is happening’ and I went to the Bible and asked God to give me some examples and show me how to do this. I couldn’t find one example of coping, just managing around the circumstances you have. Everything was hope. Everything was hope against hope: that even when hope was lost, you still hope!” -Tahni“To choose to hope that God is good, that the future is good, that you can declare and speak life over the situation… to do that is to risk disappointment, but to not hope is to choose disappointment.” -Tahni“To choose to hope, I will make different decisions, I will speak different things, I will declare life instead of just trying to keep from circling the drain. Choosing to hope will change me on the inside, it can change the atmosphere in my home and it can change the context in which my own son will grow up.” -Tahni“How do I live in this dichotomy between the circumstances and storms of life and Jesus who says ‘I came to give you peace’ and calmed storms?”-Tahni“I’m constantly having to go before God and asking ‘Who do you say that I am?’ and also answering the question when God asks me ‘Who do you say that I am?’ Am I able to say “You are the Son of the Living God and You have died to give me the Kingdom”? And if I’m not experiencing joy, peace, righteousness in the realm of the Holy Spirit, which is, as a Christ-follower, something I’ve been promised, then I’m missing something.” -Tahni“If you can find out what your kid’s name means, and if it means something, when you speak their name, you’re speaking the blessing of their name. So I started speaking life over my son by saying ‘Josiah, you are the fire of the Lord, the one who Jehovah heals. Josiah, God is your salvation.’” -Tahni“I would speak life over my son when autism was trying to consume him and our family and it’s still a fight and a battle to keep autism from winning the day. But it doesn’t get to be king.” -Tahni“‘God is a good gift-giver’ became the thesis statement for our lives.” -Tahni
Resources mentioned:Paul David Tripp’s book Parenting: 14 Gospel Principles That Can Radically Change Your FamilySong “All He says I Am” by Cody Carnes featuring Kari Jobe“Worm theology” is a term coined by Nate Banker of Immerse DiscipleshipMusic Spotlight: Artist KAINA, song Better ThanBook Paradox Lost: Uncovering Your True Identity In Christ by Catherine SkurjaQuote by author Tim Gallwey: “A flower is not better when it blooms than when it is nearly a bud; at each stage it is the same thing...a flower in the process of expressing its potential."Quote from The Forgotten Way by Ted Dekker: “Your journey now is to see who you truly are the light of the world. The daughter/ son of your Father, a new creature flowing with more beauty and power then you dared imagine possible“Quotes:“When you get into something that you’ve always wanted and then it’s not exactly what you expected and you think that’s where worth is going to come from, then it can come as a big blow.” -Kaylin“For me, it was when I was trying to sleep train and I’m getting all these things said to me by other moms… and you feel like nothing from all the shame and judgment you feel.” -Kaylin“Many times we don’t realize we’re putting our sense of worth into something until it gets shaken.” -Christy“We can put our identity into a lot of things and when that fails us, we’ll just go to the next thing and realize eventually that that is also failing us and when we put our identity in those things, we will never feel enough. For me, a lot of times I’ll ask myself the question, ‘where am I getting my enoughness from?’ ...and that question can really determine if you’re going to live that day free or live that day a slave to something.” -Kaylin“If we are getting our sense of worth and enoughness from our performance as moms, then we will be forever disappointed and missing the mark. So I think it’s really important that we as moms learn how to be stabilized in our sense of enoughness in something greater than ourselves. “ -Christy“You are enough because God made you… and your performance never made you enough and your lack of performing well never makes you less than…God in His beauty designed us to be in God’s image so who you are is already enough and now from that place of enoughness, let’s look at how we can fulfill our roles in a better way, get the tools we need... seek out whatever support we need from a place of knowing who we are is already enough. We’re not reaching out to those things to build our ‘enoughness.’” -Christy“I was shocked that God would think that good of me” -Kaylin“It’s a sacred thing to view each other as in God’s image. Because of the fall, we are all struggling to remember who we are and to live according to who God says we are: as worthy, as beautiful, as all these positive things. I think ‘worm theology’ can really get in the way of that.” -Christy“So to know ‘Who am I?’ and answering that question is ‘I am made in the image of God’... and there are other things God says I am…we are fully secure in Him, we are His children, we are fully accepted, we are whole because of him” -Kaylin“On the days when I feel like I’m completely failing and this motherhood thing is not looking at all like what I expected, I can come back to that truth of ‘You know what? I might feel like I have nothing to give, and I might not have organized my day very well and I might not have the energy I would like to have for my kiddos at the moment… but, I can still choose love in this moment, I can still choose patience, kindness, gentleness, I still can have self-control… all these things are still true about me whether I feel them or not.’” -Christy“Knowing that none of our actions surprise God, that’s where grace comes in. He knows us inside and out and for us to experience God in who He already is and what He’s already done for us is where we can find life. He’s already given it to us. It can be this mindshift of seeing who we are and who He is and starting that journey of living in that light.” -Kaylin“For me, in becoming a mother and finding my worth in being a mother, and then shifting my mind to ‘no, this is something I get to do and to enjoy, but this does not define me’ really gives me freedom to enjoy my children and to be okay with failure and let failure pick me up.” -Kaylin
“I discovered that becoming a mom has been everything my heart longs for and more. It’s extremely rewarding as well as incredibly challenging.” -Christy“I was not prepared for some of the challenges that would come with momming… and the mom community and the expectations there can be for perfection from others and ourselves” -Christy“I think women need women, especially when you’re going through pregnancy and those mothering things that aren’t talked about … “ -Kaylin“I thought I had an awareness of myself and then I became a mom and all these feelings of shame and all these lies that start creeping like “my body is not good enough; I don’t know what I’m doing; I’m not important enough…” All these things can start weighing you down; becoming a mom is very difficult.” -Kaylin“Becoming a mom is threatening to your identity if you placed any sense of your value or worth as a woman in any of the titles or roles you’ve had. So many of those get stripped away because you’re now just at home alone with this baby wondering what to do now; I was faced a lot with questions of what am I contributing to society now?” -Christy“I now love saying ‘I’m a full-time stay-at-home mom,’ but it’s come with a journey to get there without shame or feeling the need to give qualifiers... to believe and feel like this is enough.” -Christy“I find myself saying “I’m just a mom” like you’re not important or enough. And I think that’s the question that moms and humans ask themselves: “Am I enough?” So I think this conversation is important because I really want to talk about our self care and taking care of our heart because there’s not a lot out there for support when you’re sitting out there alone with your baby or you have just entered into having a new child and you’re alone with your emotions and thinking “I don’t know what to do with these emotions…” -Kaylin“I found myself thinking, ‘What do we as moms need to be able to make these kinds of decisions from a place of freedom and validation in who we are such that we’re not choosing something to get our validation from what we’re doing? How do we live knowing that who we are is enough and believe that who we are as a mom is enough?’” -ChristyKaylin & Christy share a Polar Bear story from Como Zoo about the health of the mama bear being important and critical for her to be able to care for her cubs. “Something struck us when the zookeeper said ‘the mom’s health is important to be able to take care of the cubs…’” -Kaylin“I don’t think we as moms will ever be satisfied as moms if we’re trying to get our sense of value out of our momming or anything we do. We’ll never be fully satisfied when we’re comparing or trying to get our worth from anything of the things we’re doing.” -Christy“Loving God, loving ourselves and loving others is our goal…” -Christy“We’re never going to arrive; it’s a process and that’s part of being human and that’s beautiful.” -KaylinOur definition of being a mom is very broad and might be different than what you might expect. For The Mom Podcast, a listening “mom” could be a woman who has given birth, fosters, has adopted or who mentors and loves people - that is our definition of mom.” -Kaylin“Our goal is to take you on a journey with us of process toward becoming more confident moms who are journeying with others in a similar state of life...knowing we’re enough!” -Christy
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