Love is in the air!
God has been doing so much in the three months since my last update. It’s only June, and I honestly don’t know how He’ll possibly fit anything else into 2022! But let me fill you in on what He *has* been doing so far!
Join me as I share updates on how my eleven year season of singleness is drawing to a close; the resurrection of a childhood love that I hadn’t even realized that I’d lost; and the changes God is making in the areas of body perception, workload, and much more!
P.S. I know it’s a super minor note in this episode about all the big, amazing things God is doing…but if you want to give Stitch Fix a whirl, feel free to use my referral link to get a $25 credit (remember, returns are FREE!): https://bit.ly/REStitchFix
Show Notes:
Intro
Alright, so I’m not going to spend time doing much of an introduction to this episode because I want to ensure we have time for all the juicy updates.
All I will say before diving in is that these are updates since my last Reflections episode which was released back in March. I do one every three months so that you can be more along for the ride as things are happening. And it means I don’t have to try and cram a ton of things into one episode at the end of the year.
So this is what God has been doing in my life since the end of March. And just to give it some structure, I’ve organized the list into the two categories of personal and business updates…even though the lines may blur a bit for some things. It just helps to communicate things better.
And since I know you’re probably biting at the bit to hear the personal news, I’ll start there.
Personal Updates
1) My Season of Singleness is Ending
I frequently talk about this on the show, but I’ve been in a season of singleness since my marriage ended in 2011. So, for about eleven years.
When my marriage to my manipulative and emotionally abusive ex-husband ended, I didn’t foresee ever being in another relationship. I saw the rest of my life as being just Jesus and myself.
But, Jesus has done a lot of work over the past decade. Healing wounds, removing old mindsets, and basically all the things that I cover on the podcast. A few years ago, I started getting the sense that God had a partner in my distant future.
In the past, I don’t know, 6-12 months I’ve been sensing that the road of this season was coming to a close. And then, a few weeks ago, I had an experience during a church service that God used as a catalyst to really say, “This season is drawing to a close.” And I had that confirmed by a group of Jesus-loving women in my church.
So, while there isn’t a specific man yet…the man Jesus has for me…I’m definitely in the closing of this decade-long season. And it’s a testimony to the work Jesus has done because, as I said a few minutes ago, if you’d asked me back in 2011 if I would ever be in a relationship or get married again, the answer would have definitely been “no.”
It’s funny because, when I was asking for prayer and any prophetic words from the group of women from my church about this, one of them said that, “Jesus is giddy over the fact that you’re open to loving a man.” And I was like, giddy? There’s a word you don’t hear everyday in accordance with Jesus, LOL!
But I am definitely ready to move onto this next season, despite any challenges that it will bring. I feel as if there’s this hole inside me that’s waiting to be filled with that kind of partner and relationship…and that things won’t feel right until that’s addressed.
So, stay tuned for further updates! Maybe by my next Reflections episode in September, I’ll be able to share that Jesus has revealed the man He has for me. Who knows!
In the meantime, God has been preparing me by working on other areas of my life.
2) God Has Changed My Perception of My Own Body and Beauty
Sister, listen to this. This summer, for the first time in, oh my goodness, literally twenty years, I’ve worn shorts. I’m not even joking!
Ever since I stopped growing and got my adult body, I’ve always been self-conscious about my legs. ‘Cause I don’t have sleek, stylish legs. I have sturdy, vein-covered legs along with a genetic condition that means I always have puffy lower legs into my ankles.
So I’ve always hated my legs. And, in the past several years, I’ve gained a lot of weight. This past January, I started doing something called PiYo six days a week. My focus was just on getting this weight off…getting back to feeling, physically, like myself…but also being prettier. And not wanting to meet the man God has for me at this weight.
But as I started working out, I could sense God wanting to speak to my value. In other words, He wanted me to love myself now and in the future - no matter what I weigh.
And I basically fought it at first. But then, as He is known to do, God made it clear in some pretty direct ways that I couldn’t ignore, and so I eventually allowed myself to be open to seeing it His way.
And I’m really glad that I did because it’s changed a lot. I’m still working on losing the weight, because it’s not that God is against that. He just doesn't want my sense of self-worth to be tied to my weight.
He also wants me to love myself. Which means letting go of old mindsets and wearing shorts again! And internally, being able to open up to others more because I’m not holding back due to how I think I look (or don’t look).
Also, since making this change, I started investing in an actual wardrobe for myself that makes me feel good. Because of previous money struggles in years past, and the fact that I hate shopping, and that I find it difficult to shop for a pear-shaped body with a short torso…I’ve never had a wide range of clothes (or what most people would call a normal range of clothes)...or clothes that I felt good in.
So recently, I decided to try Stitch Fix in order to solve this problem that’s gone on for way too long. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a service where you create a profile on their website - price range, sizes, things you like or don’t like, etc. - and then, at a frequency you choose, one of their stylists selects 5 pieces of clothing to send you in what they call a Fix. You try them on at home, keep what you want, and send back anything you don’t like via their prepaid packaging. You can also buy items straight from their Freestyle store.
I signed up for Stitch Fix so that I could get help buying clothes that fit me, and that went well together, and that made me feel good in the body I currently have. It’s one of the best things I’ve ever done for myself - and I don’t think I would've done it before! I don’t mean to sound like I’m pitching the company, but it’s amazing to finally feel like I have a real wardrobe that works for me. They’ve introduced me to brands I didn’t know existed - including their own brands - and they automatically put outfits together for you on their website. So I can see what other items they have that would go with something I’ve bought from them, or just educate myself…it’s great!
And, of course, if God is going to introduce a man into my life soon, it’s much healthier to have a good perception of my body. And it also helps to have a decent wardrobe! So I’m grateful to God, on several fronts, for pushing this lesson home.
3) God Has Called Me to Lighten My Workload to Something Healthier and More Realistic
I’m not going to spend much time on this one as I’ve spoken to this in a couple of recent episodes. But, I will say that this has been a really great change. And I think an important one to put in place before I started on a new project - which I’ll talk about more here in a minute.
God is really driving home to me that He calls us to work from a place of rest. And that we need to rewire ourselves to see things from a long-term perspective versus trying to do everything today.
Business Updates
1) Podcast Growth
So back in early March, before my previous Reflections episode, I released my 50th podcast episode and, along with that, launched the online Jesus Maiden community. Which was a hallmark event.
Since then, the podcast has continued to grow in downloads. As I record this episode, I am seventy-five downloads away from reaching 1,000 downloads - which is the first real benchmark as a podcaster. Podcasting is a long-term game, so having released 65 episodes and being on the cusp of reaching 1,000 downloads is cause for celebration.
And those downloads are helped by my Pinterest pins. For each podcast episode, I create a blog post on my website and direct women there through Pinterest pins. My monthly number has dropped since changing to doing one episode per week versus two, but I’m holding steady at about 5,500 views per month. And people are consistently pinning my Pins, which sets things up for success in the Pinterest game (which, like podcasting, is also long term).
2) I’ve Started Writing My Book
In my previous Reflections episode, I talked about how God has called me to write a book - which was not something that I entirely saw coming.
Back in December, God called me to attend an online dreamers summit. And at the end, we made vision boards to visually declare the dreams we felt God had for us in the coming year. The host provided us with some printable assets, including various words that we could use. And as I went to cut out the ones I wanted to use, I had this nudge to include writing a book.
And my response was to just instantly brush it aside. ‘Cause at the time, I thought, a book? There’s no way. There’s too much going on. That’s something that will happen way later in my business, after I’m more established and bringing in a steady income, etc.
And then, several months later, God’s like…hey. You need to write a book. And this was confirmed in a pretty blatant way.
God also made it clear that my book is to be about my story. How I went from the girl with the abusive childhood, and bad marriage, and religious exposure, and messed-up culture…all of it…and, through the power of God, and Jesus, and Holy Spirit, grew into a Jesus empowered woman.
So that’s what I’m doing. The purpose of the book is to prove to women that it’s possible, with Jesus, to go from where they are to where I am - and beyond. The working title right now is: The Journey of a Jesus Empowered Woman: Break Free from Your Past and Transform into the Strong, Confident, and Impactful Woman God Created You to Be.
I’ve started the actual writing as of a few weeks ago. I gave myself some time to just process that I’m writing a book, and I was also out of commission for most of April due to having COVID. But I’ve created the high-level outline. I’ve started on Part I and right now I’m about 5,700 words in.
My goal is to have most, if not all, of the first draft completed by the end of the year. I’ve done some homework on how many words a memoir or biography type book usually is and done the math and that seems a realistic goal.
After the first draft, I may look for some beta readers to give me feedback before I hand it over to a publisher to professionally edit. So stay tuned for more info later in the year if you’d like to be part of that. As well as other updates regarding the book’s progress.
Now, besides the business aspects of doing the book, the most amazing thing about this whole thing is that God has presented me with a truth with this project.
Before God called me to write a book, He told me that He would be resurrecting childhood dreams. Growing up, I wrote a lot and actually dreamed of being a book author one day. In middle school and high school, I had two fiction novel attempts that I wrote, and then printed out, on my parents’ word processor. (This was before PCs became common.) I then punched holes in the pages, assembled them into a large three-ring binder, and would actually carry them around school so I could make edits and work on them during the day. Still have them, as a matter of fact.
Now, I didn’t finish either book simply because, after I reached a certain point, I didn’t know where to take the story. But I also write popular parodies, in play form, that my English teacher in 11th and 12th grade loved. And I wrote in other avenues as well.
I wrote a lot. I was good at it. And I dreamed of being a writer. When I went to college out of high school, I went in as a creative writing major. But then I left college to get away from the toxic orbit of my mother, and I never really picked up creative writing again. (When I went back to college years later in my early 20s as a married woman, I got a B.S. in web and graphic design.)
And as I got older, and I looked back on my childhood, I saw my writing not through the lens of joy…but escape. Because as I got older, growing from child to teenager, my father’s abuse got worse. My home life got worse…even after my parents’ divorce and my father moved out.
I was trapped at home for numerous reasons, and so the things that used to be pure pleasure - like writing - became my own escape. I was trapped at home so I couldn’t escape externally, even for a while. Which means any result had to be internal.
So as the decades passed, I just looked back and saw writing as this thing that, yeah, I kind of enjoyed…but I mostly did because it was a form of escape.
But God knew better. He knew I had a talent and a joy for it…it had just gotten twisted and then lost.
Which is why, when I started working on this book, I asked God to help me fall back in love with writing. And He’s answering that prayer.
So writing this book is to help change the lives of other women by showing them what’s possible. It will also have a place in the funnel of my business by giving me credibility and helping to build trust and lead into the paid products I’ll eventually have.
But on a personal level, it’s also rekindling something that I didn’t even realize that I had lost. I’m even thinking ahead to the future and wondering about a fiction series that speaks to female Christian empowerment. That would truly be a childhood dream reborn and restored…God’s way.
But…one step at a time, right? First I need to finish and release this book. So, as I said, stay tuned for more updates! If you want to get first dibs at any of the action, sign-up for my email list using the link in the show notes.
Wrap-up
And that, my dear friend, is it! Those are my updates from the past three months! Crazy, no? Who knows what I’ll be sharing in three months!
In the meantime, like I said, feel free to sign-up for my email list so that you can be the first to know about all things book related - or other special announcements.
Also, again at the risk of sounding like I’m pitching Stitch Fix, if you didn’t know about it until today and/or it sounds like something you want to try, I’m going to put my referral link in the show notes. You’ll get a $25 credit if you use that link. They automatically assigned me one, so I figured I might as well share it.
Otherwise, sister, that is everything that I have for you today! Take care, have a great 4th of July weekend, and we’ll talk soon. Cheers!