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Hey, sis. Hey, we back at it like we never left. What's up, podcast? So, you know, we are all about having a word of the week at Woman Evolve. And this week is kind of interesting because it's priorities. Yeah, that one. We're talking about priorities in the summertime. Listen, just know it's revolutionary reset time. God is really up to something. And we're going to talk about that.
And that just might be somebody's word. Just because it's summer doesn't mean prioritization ends, but it can be reset. If you are a part of our 2020 virtual experience, then my co-host is a bit familiar to you. If not, you're in for a treat as I catch up with my girl, Stevie Carter. She's a new mom and newlywed, which means sis is something like a resetting priorities guru at this point. Hi.
How are you? I'm good. I see Dara so often, but I don't see you nearly enough. I know. He in the corner. And then on Mother's Day, I think you guys weren't feeling well, but I brought you a Mother's Day gift. So now it's just in the back of my car.
It's not right. Thank you. Yeah, we got the COVID. Girl, the COVID. Girl, how are you doing? How to do? Tell me about it. It rocked us. Yeah. Okay. We all got it. Me, Darius, and the baby. Mm.
But we're all feeling great now. That's good. Yeah, she only had it for two days, and then she was like, "Ready?" I'm like, "Girl, I'm not ready." Right, I'm not ready, but it's me. I was falling apart, but-
I'm low key glad because I'm like, "Okay, we got some antibodies now so we can move a little bit." Because we didn't have it for the first two years. We didn't either, but I feel the way that you do, even with us going on tour, of course I don't want to be reckless, but I'm like, "I got something to work with while we're on the road."
I was a little nervous. I was like, "Okay Dee, be careful with it." But like you said, not reckless, but just move a little bit more on the crowd and feel a little bit more covered. So I'm excited. How has it been for you adjusting to motherhood and marriage? Not at the same time, but certainly- Real close.
It's been good. It's been a wild ride. I will say, you know, we're coming up on five years since we started dating. Wow. So in five years, a lot has happened. But it's been great. You know, doing this with a partner, I'm just so grateful because, you
Baby girl, she is a personality. She's a force. And I'm just always grateful that he's, you know, he's there. She looks like she's a force. I met a friend once for lunch and she was pregnant.
And she was telling me that when she has her baby, she's like, I am not changing my life. The baby is going to have to become a part of my life. Like, I don't want to change the way that I've been showing up. And I feel like this is how people lose themselves is they make their life about the baby instead of really making the baby fit into their life. And then she had the baby and she basically sent me flowers apologizing because she was like, I don't know who I am. I don't know who the baby is. I don't know why I am like she said.
had to really change all of her priorities and her systems. And so I want to know for you, like, how have your priorities changed? Not from like a day-to-day way, but like just the way you show up in the world, like your personal core priorities, how have they shifted since you've become a mother? You know, I think I turned 30. I was like, I don't care what nobody think about me. Like, I know who I am. I can move.
now baby girl is, you know, she's everything. And that's the thing about it too. I can understand where your friend came from, where she's like, I want to have my life. And I want, give yourself a good six months to just be all about the baby, just to enjoy the baby. You could be crusty for a little while. It's okay. You know, I had to, you know, throw my edges to the wind. It happens, but I think, um,
Really right now, I'm just so in awe. My priority right now is really to be in a place of gratitude. Wow. Because I think when you're dealing with so much from a hormonal standpoint, even with motherhood, the postpartum process, it can get really dark. It can be baby blues. It can be frustrating. So when you can prioritize gratitude, you can just find so much more joy in the little moments. I wasn't concerned about the snapback. I'm like,
I can't handle that. I don't have the capacity for that. I don't have the capacity for none of that.
All I can really focus on right now is just honing in with my family and taking in what I could from a joy standpoint. I love that you said that you are prioritizing gratitude because I think that we prioritize hustle, our purpose, our dreams, saving, business, all types of things become our priorities. But gratitude is one of those things that really falls to the bottom of the list because
As you talk about like prioritizing gratitude, what is it that makes you most grateful for this season of your life? Like what is filling you with awe? I would say family time. You know, with COVID in particular, we really hunkered down and we
You know, we had some real milestones. We got married during the pandemic, you know, and we really kept it to that little 30 person, you know, regulation situation. So I felt like we were really isolated. So now that we can kind of peek our head out a little bit and see folks a little bit more. I love that.
And I love even those intimate moments. It doesn't have to be a huge concert or anything like that, but just like seeing family barbecuing outside. I'm like, I took these things for granted that we could just chill and hang out and, and vibe. So that kind of stuff is what makes me slow down too. Cause to your point, when it comes to the grind and the, the toil glamor, you know, constantly going in,
I'm like, that ain't my season right now. Yeah. Oh, that's that part about it not being your season. How do you? OK, because, man, I feel like there's so many different things that we could talk about, especially as it relates to like prioritizing different seasons of your life. So you became a wife. And let's talk about that for a minute.
Marriage. Let's talk about marriage. Let's talk about what happens when you get married to your identity as a woman, especially since in our culture, marriage is like that carrot that dangles in front of a woman. Like if you get married, you'll be complete. If you find the one, where's the one? You found the one. What did you find out about finding the one that you didn't know until after you and the one had decided to become one?
Well, you know, the last time we talked about this really was like Women Evolve Conference, the virtual one. I was engaged. So I was listening to y'all and I was like, OK, let's see what y'all talking about. I'm trying to get my notes and write them down. And it's funny you mentioned that dangling carrot, because for me, it was like once we
Had the wedding so many people see it as like, okay, I made it to the finish line That was we were kicking out the starting blocks. Yeah, that's when we got started. That's when you start your forever so with that prioritizing
Some friends didn't take too kindly to me really honing in and reprioritizing Darius and family and like our foundation in marriage. So that was a little bit challenging because some people couldn't really handle that. I really wanted to hunker down with him and make sure that foundation was really strong because a lot of things creep in to that first year of marriage expectations you didn't know you had and,
all kinds of stuff. So that one was a little tricky, but beautiful, at least beautiful for me and my husband. It was just the friendships, finding out where all of that fits in was difficult. Did you ever feel like you were betraying yourself or your friends and reprioritizing your life?
You do. I did at least with my friendships, you know, from like a spiritual standpoint, I'm like, okay, well, God says we are now one. So this is how it goes. But with my friends, you know,
I lost a friendship right after the wedding and I was challenging. I had another friend say, you know, I'm a little hurt. Yeah. You know, we spent so much time together. We'd be on the phone for hours at a time, you know, and I don't got that kind of time no more. I don't know what to tell you, you know, so I,
That for me was challenging because you can have a friendship for like 10 years, 20 years. And then all of a sudden here comes this new man, y'all get married. And then everybody's like, well, I've been in the trenches with you. You know, I was, I was with you shooting in the gym. What about me? And you kind of have to work through that tricky dialogue. But I just found that my friends who really loved me and care were willing to talk to me vulnerably. Yeah.
Instead of being mad at me or unfollowing me or some petty stuff, they were more on like, hey, I'm hurt. Or how can I get more of your time? Just be honest, you know, and that was more helpful.
That's so good because, I mean, you have to have communication in any relationship, but specifically as it relates to the changes of friendship. And it's so funny. We were just talking about this last month. When it comes to friendship, like there are so many twists and turns in friendship and sometimes you're not twisting and turning at the same time. And it's difficult to hang on to that friendship without feeling like you're forcing it. Right. Right.
or that maybe it doesn't have that connection or semblance anymore. What would you say maybe to someone who's about to get married? They're in the position that you were in at the end of 2020, and they're thinking to themselves like, whew, I want to hang on to everything and everyone. How do you give them permission to grieve the life that they once had while still enjoying? Is it even possible to grieve a life and enjoy a life at the same time?
That's such a good question. You know, like, thank God my husband is my best friend so we could have these conversations candidly. You know, when I was going through the process, a lot of times I was bouncing these ideas or feelings off of him. And I think in my own hurt,
I was like, well, forget them. You know what I'm saying? Like, they can't be there. And he's slowing me down. Like, ah, ah. Like, this is a really good friend of yours. Y'all love each other. Y'all work it out. I think that that was a huge part, making sure that your partner is somebody that you can, like, level set with and talk through that stuff with. And then I would also say that if it's a season of transition, asking your friends for grace. Mm-hmm.
That's what I ended up learning through the marriage part. Cause when I got pregnant, I was like, okay, I really want to figure out how to navigate this better. So I was just honest. I'm like, y'all,
I don't have a capacity for much. I need grace during the season. You know, if you need something from me, feel free to let me know. But this is what I can do right now. Yeah. You know, I can have a little phone conversation, but I can't drive 45 minutes to the house to chill all night. Like I don't. And my friends were kind of bouncing back and forth with me. And that was really helpful because with the marriage, you know, it was hit or miss.
What? What was hit or miss? It was hit or miss. Like, you know, what actually was interesting too was with the wedding, we had 30 people that could attend. Yeah. I had 15 and my husband had 15. So feelings were bound to be hurt even in the middle of a pandemic. Yeah. You know, everybody wants to be able to share in your special day. And yeah,
I had to make some tough decisions. So I got a phone call afterwards. Somebody was really upset with me that, you know, they didn't get the invitation to the wedding. And, you know, honestly, we didn't reconcile after that. And that's one of those situations too, where you kind of, you're mourning relationships, you're mourning things that aren't working out or you're even mourning what could have been with the friendship. But at the same time, I don't,
I don't think it has to end indefinitely. It just wasn't, it's just not, like I said, not our season. You know, we got to move forward. Darius is like, calm down. Calm down. Calm down. I'm like, okay, okay, right. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.com.
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I love it, though, because at the end of the day, what I hear you saying is that like I am so sure about the destiny that I am headed on, that I am willing to relinquish even things that may hurt me in the process of letting go, even things that have value to me or have had value to me in my past and the process of doing that. And I feel like that level of support.
supernatural maturity to say like, God, if this is where you're leading me, I'm going to prioritize this over history. I'm going to prioritize this over comfort is what makes you the woman that you are. And I just wonder how have priorities been modeled for you in your life or were you just innately the kind of person that says, you know what, whatever it takes in order to step into my next, that's what I'm willing to do.
You know, I think that, um, unfortunately, uh, like loss, I think loss and like disappointment and things like that have really helped me to shift priorities and to be almost radical in the way that I, um, prioritize my family, prioritize my loved ones. Um, so that's been a huge one. Like with my mother passing, um,
that's something that really rocked me. And you think that people are going to be around forever and that you have all the time in the world to spend and cherish people. And then you get this really sudden realization that that just isn't the case. And through that journey, I realized like the enemy, the enemy is slick because the enemy really starts to try to get you to feel like
You resent the things that God wants you to prioritize. Because when that first happened, I really resented close ties and relationships. I was so nervous that the floor would be ripped out from underneath me that I was kind of keeping an arm's distance from everybody. You know, I wasn't connecting with people. I was isolating myself because I was so scared that if I loved people, if I was close to them, something bad would happen. And that was that whole trauma response thing.
But then, you know, eventually with time, I came to realize like, no, like this is something that God calls us to do. God calls us to have relationship. God calls us to be close with people, to be vulnerable, which is for me sometimes, but to be vulnerable with people. And I feel like the more loss that I endured,
the more I leaned into God to help me to understand how I can be closer to folks, how I can be more vulnerable and connected. Okay, Stevie, you've lost about half the podcast with this because...
When you say that loss helped you to become closer and to prioritize people more, there are some of us who have been so hurt, so wounded, so afraid of experiencing it again that we can't even... Like the calculator stopped working at loss helps me become closer. The more that I lost, the closer I got to people. We have to dive into this. Like...
What what is what is loss telling you that is not telling the rest of us? You know, I I've had a lot of experience. It's a muscle, I would say. It's a muscle that you have to build over time to really work through that type of grief.
But you know, my mother passed, my grandmother passed, then in college my best friend passed from sickle cell anemia, and then my grandfather passed at the top of the pandemic. And it definitely hits a nerve, and it brings up past traumas over and over again, but at the same time, I
With God, I just feel like God has always kept me in those moments and really helped me to find wisdom in those moments. Not always make sense of all the moments, but at least to find some wisdom, to be able to find some joy, and to be able to pivot and turn to have some type of gratitude in the meantime. And also to understand too that if you truly believe to be
absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, then you do find some sense of celebratory nature. It takes a while, but you do like, I know where my mom is. I know that she's at the right hand of God. You know, I know where my grandfather is. Um, the beautiful thing with my best friend, when she passed on her death bed, she asked her pastor at her funeral, um,
to do a call to the altar to bring people's lives to Jesus. I'm like, who even thinks of everybody else when you're about to transition? You know, I just, I just have to believe that my God is good in the midst of in between, you know, and that, that gives me some sense of, of peace, but I understand that it takes a little while to get there.
So, cause you know, I'm trying to finish the loss to priorities equation. And what I hear you saying is that when we are presented with loss, that there is an opportunity for us to become very bitter, for us to grieve, for us to be angry, for us to be disappointed or frustrated, or we can honor the loss by
by becoming better, by saying, this is what I learned as a result of that loss. This is what I still have me. This is what was not lost because when you have a loss, you think that you've lost everything. But the truth is that even in loss, you haven't lost everything. And so taking the time to say, this is what I still have. I may not have my mother with
me, but I still have these lessons. I still remember her spirit. I still remember her energy. I may not have this job, but I remember the skills and the tactics that I learned on this position. Not every loss equals total zero. There's some gain. And if you're careful and honest and vulnerable, you can find the better in the loss, not the bitter. Yeah.
That's why you Sarah Jakes Roberts. Now I'm just trying to figure out your math equation because you didn't throw on us.
You hit the nail on the head. Exactly. I just like to take inventory and you take stock of what you do have in the meantime, because it starts to shine a lot brighter if you can see it that way. So absolutely. That's exactly what I mean. That's so good because, you know, this is like halfway through the year and we've had people whose momentum is...
threatened or it is lessened as a result of loss. I lost time, I lost money, I lost energy, and now I feel like my goal is even further away. How do you find a way to balance your passion and your purpose while also making space for the loss of time and the loss of energy while still hanging on to the promise that this purpose or this passion has a place in the world?
That's so good. I'm still working on that one. Yeah, I'm still working on that one. Because when I had baby girl, I was just honed in. I'm like, oh, my gosh, she's perfect. Look at her. She's so pure. I was just all into her. And I suppose I still want to be. But then you kind of want to look from an aerial view and say, OK, OK.
I'm a mom, but I'm also a wife. I'm also, you know, a producer. I'm so many things. And it was almost just recently I was thinking about this and I'm like, how do I get that like fervor and passion back into my storytelling, back into producing? And I feel like God was telling me, you want to have a full life for a baby girl too. Hmm.
You know, I saw my mom live a very full life. She had a lot going on. She had her friendships. She had her little friends weekends. They go to Palm Springs. Her and my dad had date night. And I love seeing that. I love seeing a woman who has a full life, who has lots of passions. And I want my daughter to see that, too.
So even if at the time my motivation is for her, you know, I ultimately want it to be for me. But, you know, find the things that you have currently that do motivate you or do inspire you and use that to gas you up for your passions, for the things that you're excited about.
Okay, so I feel like we almost need to have separate sets of priorities. We need to have our aerial view priorities, right? This is what the big picture is. And then I have to have seasonal priorities because in some seasons, I'm not able to... I just have to survive. I just need to roll up my sleeves and figure out what this is and learn and grow and become better. So I guess my question to you is what is your aerial view priority?
for your life at this time, right? Knowing it may change, but like, what is your day-to-day priority for yourself? I would say aerial priorities right now, definitely my relationship with God.
my family huge priorities and then some of the things that me and my husband are trying to do with our own company you know a family-owned business we want to grow some things those are some huge like top tier priorities that we know are going to create a better life for our family for my daughter generationally we're excited about that and I think that's important to kind of
Tie your values in with your priorities. What are the things that, you know, you see value in or your values and principles? That's important. And then day to day, if you had talked to me a couple months ago, it would have been just to survive, to get a good nap in, to drink some water. But now I'm kind of, you know,
I got a groove going now. So my priorities from day to day are really business oriented with my husband and our company. And then baby girl, you know, she has needs. Like I was telling you, you know, with COVID that shifted my day-to-day priority. I'm like, okay, she has a fever. I need to pivot here. So I honed into her. What does she need? What do you want me to do? And then you find a way to come back in to find balance. But I,
I found that being so rigid with my priorities was really causing me a lot of stress. Oh, that's so good because I was going to ask you about like having grace for those seasons where you don't, you don't hit it. Like I didn't practice
Prioritized properly today or I didn't accomplish the goals that I had in mind without allowing it to communicate failure or that you're behind right because that's what we end up feeling like if I didn't accomplish this if I didn't make this a priority Then maybe i'm behind. How do you have grace for yourself in those seasons where their priorities like you should have them? But you don't have them or they're not aligned or maybe they're misaligned and you don't know how to fix them
I am working on that too. Okay. Especially with my therapist. You know, we talked about perfectionism and I am a perfectionist and
And I think the misconception is that if you're a perfectionist, that you get all these things done and they're superb, but it can have the opposite effect. It can be really paralyzing because I found that my perfectionism was giving myself no grace. That if I felt like I wasn't hitting it to this marker, then I was failing. So just stop altogether. So that was really challenging for me too. So I really am working on giving myself grace, you
You know, I make my to do list for the day of my priorities, what I want to get done. And then what doesn't get done, we can go ahead and shift it to the next day, you know, and so forth and so on. I think that having a little check in with yourself periodically about how you're doing is great. But the day to day stuff like I can't be that hard on myself. I'm trying my best to let that go.
You know what I'm learning about those days where like my priorities are just gone. Like the things that I set out to accomplish for the day, I miss altogether. I am learning to ask myself like one bottom line question. And that is like, did you do the best that you could?
Like, did you do the best that you could? And if you didn't, what was keeping you from doing the best? Were you tired? Were you weary? Are you going through a depression? But if you can say, I did the best that I could, like, I didn't know that this was going to happen. I didn't know that that was going to happen, but I still brought my best to the day. Like maybe my priority is to just bring my best, not to get everything done because there are going to be days where I just can't get everything done. Yeah.
That is so good. That is so good. What, what do you do when, uh, getting in the way is your kids. I only have one. Yeah. I have one. You know what? I remember that it's a season that is a season. See, I am a little bit further down the motherhood road than you are. And, uh, they say the days are long, but the years are fast. Uh,
Yeah, like Kenzie's 12 and she is an emotional wreck. She is an emotional wreck. Like everything is wrong. Hardly anything is right. And when it's right, it's like super highlighted. And I be stressed. Now I feel like an emotional teenager because I'm trying to be a woke and conscious parenting, like trying to do the things that, you know, my parents didn't do where they was like, your feelings don't matter. Shut up. So.
So now I'm trying to be like in the trenches and this emotional rollercoaster with her. And I am reminding myself when I'm late for a meeting, when I can't be on time for my meeting because I'm sitting here breathing exercises with her. Is that like we're going to get through this and it won't last forever. Like she's not going to be an emotional wreck. Your baby's not going to be waking up every few hours. They're going to be walking and talking and going into the fridge themselves. And you realize like I'm still going to have time.
Yeah.
Right.
And I got pregnant with Ella and I was like, okay, so, you know, now I don't even know if I'm going to be able to tell my story anymore because I'm pregnant. I got to raise this baby. And then people go find another story. They're going to find someone else to talk to. Woman Evolved didn't exist. I didn't have this big booming social media platform.
And I was worried that like I had lost some momentum for what I felt like God was calling me to. And in that moment, still, I dared to just kind of like prioritize Ella. And what I learned is that God really does bring acceleration. And when we have to shift our priorities, I mean, we have to like I can't build.
the business and pay the bills right now. I got to shift. I can't take care of the baby. And like, there are some moments where you just have to shift your priorities. When you shift that priorities, you don't lose. That doesn't become stale. Your creativity doesn't wane. God allows you to show up fully in the area where you're needed while still allowing his spirit and most importantly, the world to be prepared for the gift that you have.
So that when it's time for you to jump back into it, it's like now I got all this fresh creativity and I have a channel and I have an opportunity with this community and with this group to release what God has given me. So when your priorities shift, just know that it hasn't changed God's priority for the gift that God's placed inside of you. You know?
I, that'll preach. Tell me, how is that helping you? It's good because I think that sometimes you, especially as a mom, you feel like you're out of the game for a while, that the hamster wheel for everybody else is still moving and everybody's still going around you and you're enjoying motherhood. Don't get me wrong, but you're looking like everybody's just zooming by and you wonder if
your dream has gone stale or what God had for you has gone stale. But like you said, God is a redeemer. And you know, the things that you feel are gone and the things that you feel have turned to dust, God is going to work with that. And like you said, I have more of a wealth of knowledge now than I did before that I'm bringing to the table. In the course of two years, I've experienced a lot.
So I just think that's so on point because I think motherhood for so many women can have this stigma attached. Like once you're in it, you're washed and you have nothing else to bring to the table. And that's just not true. That's why I love spaces like this to women of all, because I think that in a lot of male dominated spaces, um,
you feel like being a mother or being a wife or just being a business woman or whatever it is, it's invaluable. Yeah. That people are counting you out all the time. So that's beautiful. I love that. I'll tell you, even with woman involved, you know, we just finished with tour and I can tell you when we were first starting,
in the pandemic and we had to shift our priorities because our priorities were all in-person events. It's like, if you get in the room, we can create an atmosphere that makes you feel seen, loved, sisterhood and transformed. And then it's like, girl, if you pick up your phone, I'll, you know, I'm going to try and give you all of that, but I don't know how it's going to work. And, you know, we kept pressing in on like, how do we maintain this relationship and connection with the women who are at our in-person events now that they're in a pandemic? And,
And we learned a lot of things the hard way and we found a lot of different ways to serve them. And now going into tour, you know, before when we would like sell out certain cities, I would be like so nervous. I'm like, oh, my God, I didn't know that they were coming. But this last tour coming off of the pandemic, coming off of the shifting of our priorities and our focus as a community. When I first got the news that some of the shows were selling out, I was kind of like just grateful that.
that it still matters, that there's still a place for the grace that God has given me in the world. And whereas before I felt nervous and inadequate, like all I felt when I first got the news was just like grateful. And I think that that is also something that happens
when we're forced to reprioritize, maybe outside of our will or maybe unexpectedly, that when we do step back within the purpose and we're living in the momentum of our identity, that we do it with gratitude, not pressure.
That's so good. Especially the gratitude part. Like you said, you realize that God can give you more to work with than you initially thought. Sometimes when you're like strapped to the bare bones and the skeleton of something, you start to realize what the values are, the core values are. And like you say, with Women Evolve, it's about connection. It's about, you know, empowerment. And that can happen in person or on a phone, you know what I'm saying? On a podcast. And I
I think we learned that with the with the pandemic that your core values and principles really need to be prioritized because it was a stripping Yeah a major stripping and one that i'm grateful for and one that i'm I didn't think I was going to be grateful and I'm speaking from a place of privilege when I say i'm grateful because I did not experience Loss, like I know so many people did not as personal loss. Certainly. We knew some people but um
I can say that one of the gifts that we were able to mine in the pandemic was the ability to really prioritize what matters and what doesn't. So I'm grateful for that.
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Stevie, we have an advice question. Uh-oh, okay. And it's long. I love the long ones.
I love the long ones because when they just send me one question, I just be like, but what's the backstory? Like, I don't even feel equipped. So here we go. Okay. I hope this message finds you well. It may be a long one. I am a 25 year old from Dallas, Texas. My family and I started going to TPH when I was a preteen. Before then, we had to go to a smaller church home that we all grew up in. So you can say I grew up in church. Before going to college, I can probably count on two hands how many Sundays I missed. One,
Right.
Today, I find myself struggling with self-worth, negative self-talk, faith and confidence overall. I'm always told to pray, read the Bible, etc. I go to therapy, but not as frequently as I would like. My question after all of that is, do you have any suggestions for getting on a real walk with Christ for a girl who knows how the church works, but doesn't have her own true faith walk?
Do you think that having that kind of faith open up will help with some of the things I struggle with? Lastly, do you have any suggestions for working through your app? Oh, I currently scroll with my eyes closed and whatever my finger lands on is what I go with, which feeds me every time, but wanted to know if there was a more calculated way to go about it.
Lastly, thank you for we. I grew up watching your family, but didn't know your story until Woman Evolved. Since you launched this podcast slash movement, I've been changing for the better. I never watched you preach live until one Sunday last year, and it was just on time. Thank you again. That's great. I want you to kick it off, Stevie. That was beautiful. Especially the last part.
Yeah, I would definitely say I had the same kind of experience. You know, I also grew up in a small church. I call like a Southern Baptist church in California. The pastor was from Virginia and he would just be going. But I would definitely say to just be honest in prayer. I think that a lot of times when you grow up in a church background, I don't know if it was too strict or not, but at least mine was a little bit more rigid.
I found like I didn't want to go into prayer with God on my own because I was like, I don't have all the right language. I don't know if I'm saying the right things. I don't know all the scriptures by heart. But once I kind of got rid of that pretense, it was a lot easier for me to spend time with God. I came to God with my anger. I came to God with my frustration, my questions, and nothing was too big or too small. Nothing was petty, you know, with my time with God. If I was dating, I was dating.
I was bringing my dating mess to the Lord in my prayer closet. And for me, that really shifted things because it was just me and God and I could be honest. And that was a huge help for me. And then even when it comes to the scriptures, I had a similar way of handling things too. Like just close my eyes.
and see whatever hits when I let my finger land. But some devotionals on the Bible app were really good for me to help me to find topics that I was dealing with and what the word was saying. And then also getting into different groups and communities with my church was really helpful so I can learn more about the word. But definitely just being raw and honest in your prayer closet. That's my definite, definite advice. You know, Stevie, I've been going through...
in my relationship with God. And I'm trying to like communicate it because I know what I feel, but I don't know if I can fully express it. But I'm going to try anyway for the sake of this question. You know, I think that the most pivotal turning point in my life, I was walking out of a CPS office after I had been raggedy. Like you think you've been raggedy, but your raggedy sounds cute. Okay, my raggedy was real raggedy. And...
was walking out of child protective services and I just had this thought I can do better than this and from that moment forward I started doing better like I would make better decisions I wouldn't go against that little voice in my head that said don't do that like I started trusting that voice and that is how I built relationship with
God. It wasn't because I started digging into the Bible. It wasn't because I started volunteering in different places in the church. And that doesn't mean that that doesn't work for some people. I'm just sharing my story. And so I started trusting this still small voice within me. And what's happened to me recently, though, is it's less about doing better and more about
being better. Like I am better than this. And I always have been better than this, whatever that this is, if that, this feels like walking by fear, if that, this feels like putting myself on auction and relationships, like I am like my being is better than this. And I'm coming to that place. I'm actually reading this book. It's called love beyond reason.
And it's by John Ortberg. And it's moving God's love from your head to your heart. And in reading this book, I think that I have been able to just receive the...
the love of God in a way that I don't think I ever fully understood in church or maybe it wasn't explained in church. And I want to try and find the words so that I can go and help all of the girls like me who want to understand God's love for themselves. But I think if you can get the right consciousness about God's love for you,
If you can dare to believe that the same God that made the sun, the stars, the moon and the ocean created you and adores you and nothing has ever changed that. No sin, no shame, no lack of reading the Bible has changed the way that God feels about you.
If you would dare to believe that, it will change the way you feel about yourself because it's like having... I mean, we have such a celebrity culture these days. If you respond, if a celebrity responds back to them, they're like, oh my gosh, I can't believe you responded. Imagine if we had that same energy for God.
Like, oh, my gosh, I can't believe you responded to my prayers. I can't believe that you woke me up this morning. What must that mean about who I am? Maybe I am special and resting in that is beginning to change me. And so I'm trying to communicate it in a way that makes sense. But what I will say is to have a real relationship with God is to desire to know who God is.
and to allow who God is to be a reflection of what's inside of you. And then doing the work of saying, look at how I look like you today, right? This is what Jesus says. I only do what I see my father in heaven do. So how do I take who God is and allow it to show up in my life as a reflection of what I saw God say?
That's the work. And scripture supports that because scripture then becomes an opportunity for me to see God. And how did you interact with this person? How did you interact with that person? And then what did they give you in return?
I love that. And you, you spoke it out loud, but it made all the sense. I'm trying. I love that. It made all the sense because it is a hard thing. It's an identity thing. It's a hard thing to see yourself like Christ does or to love yourself like Christ does, you know? Um,
You know, God recently convicted me of that with my daughter because I was super anxious with her when I was pregnant. I was so nervous about every little thing. And God had to get me together. He was like, you think you love this little girl? Yeah. Let me tell you about how much I love this little girl. You know, I feel like I...
How much you love her is just like a speck compared to how much I love her. Like give her to me. Yeah. Let me show you about how much I love her. And I think sometimes when we see other people being loved out loud by God, we feel like that's just so far away from us or that there's some kind of favoritism or empathism with everybody else. But what God will do for somebody else will surely do for you. You know, and my husband always puts it like this too. It's like,
Your siblings, all of us are siblings. We are all sons and daughters of Christ. And if your mother gives your sister something, she don't give you the same thing too. She loved y'all just the same. So what you see somebody else receive or lay hold of that's you should be rejoicing because it can be yours too. But I think if we don't understand fully,
The love of god for us then you're right. It can be a little bit of a disconnect Yeah, that's what my my goal is to not be so focused on god's power or um
God's miracles, God's ability to give blessings, like who got what God can do. Right. Because because I measure myself by what I can do, then I measure God by what he does. So when God fails, I'm over him. And when I fail, I'm over me. But resting in this idea of like just who God is and allowing that to be the priority for my relationship with God.
That is my priority. There are no others after that. It's like, I just want to know who you are. I just want to see you and experience you in my life. And as a result of that, I know that I'll be better if I can just see you. Not give me, give me, give me, but if I can just see you. And it does create, I think, a purity and a hunger that changes the way we show up everywhere. So that's a reset in priorities for me and my relationship with God. Yeah.
Yeah, me too. That's huge. I love that. Yeah. I love this. Thank you for doing this podcast with me. Thank you for having me. I need to thank the baby for letting you do the podcast. This is nothing but the Holy Spirit. Okay?
I'm like, I'm going to borrow time. Anytime now I got to wake up. We made it. And this baby must have said, Auntie Sarah is on the call with Stevie. I don't know. I love it. Maybe you can get you five minutes of a nap before you dive back in. Amen. Amen. Thank you. I love you. And I'm on it. I think I'm on it. Maybe I'll see Darius tomorrow, but I got to get you your Mother's Day gift.
Okay. That sounds good. I'm excited. We love you too. Bye y'all. Stevie, friend, that was amazing. My cheeks are hurting from smiling, spending time with you. Thank you for letting us steal some time away from your sweet new family. You're a blessing to so many and I'm honored to have the delegation be in the number. Per year,
Usually my DMs are flooded with requests to answer advice questions or requests to be on the podcast. But I'm telling you, the easiest way to do either is to hit my inbox at podcast at woman evolve dot com with a one to two minute video about why you should be my next co-host. Or you can send me an advice question that you'd like for me to answer.
What's good? It's Colleen Witt and Eating While Broke is back for season three. Brought to you by the Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeart Radio. We're serving up some real stories and life lessons from people like Van Lathan, DC Youngfly, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, and many more.
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Hi, I'm Katie Lowes. And I'm Guillermo Diaz. And we're the hosts of Unpacking the Toolbox, the Scandal Rewatch podcast where we're talking about all the best moments of the show. Mesmerizing. But also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for an even more behind-the-scenes Scandal.
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