Trusting God’s Timing with Sazan Hendrix

WEBVTT
1
00:00:00.520 --> 00:00:03.919
Welcome to another episode of Now with Natalie. I'm your host,
2
00:00:04.080 --> 00:00:08.000
Natalie Manuely, and today we have a truly inspiring guest
3
00:00:08.080 --> 00:00:13.640
joining us. Y'all, Sazon Hendrix, a talented content creator, devoted mother,
4
00:00:13.880 --> 00:00:17.480
and loving wife. In this episode, we dive deep into
5
00:00:17.559 --> 00:00:21.960
Sazon's transformative journey in the world of content creation. We
6
00:00:22.039 --> 00:00:25.039
explore the incredible power of obedience and how it has
7
00:00:25.079 --> 00:00:29.160
shaped her path. Together, we'll discuss the importance of trusting
8
00:00:29.160 --> 00:00:32.719
God's timing and the significance of honoring the season that
9
00:00:32.759 --> 00:00:36.119
we are in. So, whether you're a fellow content creator,
10
00:00:36.320 --> 00:00:39.840
a busy mom, or simply someone looking for inspiration, this
11
00:00:40.039 --> 00:00:48.000
conversation is for you. Let's jump right in. Sazon Hendricks, y'all, Ah,
12
00:00:48.159 --> 00:00:51.079
thank you for being here. I was literally about to
13
00:00:51.119 --> 00:00:51.920
do the Middle East and.
14
00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:57.159
We do that at weddings. Thank I'm so happy to
15
00:00:57.240 --> 00:00:57.799
be here.
16
00:00:57.679 --> 00:00:59.759
Natalie, y'all, it's such an on.
17
00:01:00.679 --> 00:01:03.119
Truly, I can't even believe I'm here right now. This
18
00:01:03.159 --> 00:01:06.560
is a dream come true, it really is. Seriously, when's
19
00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:08.799
the last time I actually saw you other than running
20
00:01:08.840 --> 00:01:10.480
into I know a month ago.
21
00:01:10.719 --> 00:01:14.000
I know, it's amazing, But now we're here. Yes, let's
22
00:01:14.000 --> 00:01:20.000
get into it. You're a mother of three, an incredible wife, entrepreneur, author,
23
00:01:20.640 --> 00:01:25.439
and an amazing content creator. You are also a woman
24
00:01:25.560 --> 00:01:28.239
that is filled with faith, a woman that is filled
25
00:01:28.239 --> 00:01:31.599
with purpose, and a woman that is so bold and courageous.
26
00:01:32.040 --> 00:01:34.040
And I honor you for that and I look up
27
00:01:34.040 --> 00:01:38.920
to you for that. So I appreciate you. My gosh, stop, yes.
28
00:01:38.959 --> 00:01:41.719
Girl, you know, being a mama three, the hormones are raging.
29
00:01:42.040 --> 00:01:45.640
So that is such a sweet and kind introduction. And
30
00:01:45.680 --> 00:01:47.560
you know I feel the same exact way about you.
31
00:01:47.760 --> 00:01:51.840
Yes, So let's get into it. How did you collide
32
00:01:51.840 --> 00:01:54.120
into the path of content creation?
33
00:01:54.439 --> 00:01:57.959
Oh, collide into the bath. That's a great word, collide.
34
00:01:58.120 --> 00:02:02.439
That's exactly what happened. Is I fell into this whole world.
35
00:02:02.480 --> 00:02:06.200
At the time, which was over eleven years ago, maybe yeah,
36
00:02:06.519 --> 00:02:09.599
over a decade ago, it didn't look like what it
37
00:02:09.639 --> 00:02:13.159
looks like today. You know. I remember I was living
38
00:02:13.159 --> 00:02:15.520
in LA at the time, and I was studying radio,
39
00:02:15.560 --> 00:02:18.560
TV film. You know, I just graduated left Texas to
40
00:02:18.639 --> 00:02:22.360
come here. I remember I was coming to La so excited.
41
00:02:22.400 --> 00:02:26.960
I had all this you know, steam underneath me, thinking like, okay,
42
00:02:27.159 --> 00:02:28.840
this is it. You know, this is why I got
43
00:02:28.840 --> 00:02:31.039
my degree. I'm so excited to get into the whole
44
00:02:31.080 --> 00:02:34.680
broadcast journalism route and as you know, being able to
45
00:02:34.719 --> 00:02:38.680
tell stories and man. But when I got here, it
46
00:02:38.719 --> 00:02:41.400
was like a reality check. I was this small fish
47
00:02:41.520 --> 00:02:44.599
right in this really big pond. But that actually motivated
48
00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:46.360
me even more. I was like, Nope, I'm going to
49
00:02:46.439 --> 00:02:49.639
do this. And so I think what I the mistake
50
00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:52.560
I had made in that season was that I was
51
00:02:53.319 --> 00:02:56.360
really with my own will right trying to make something happen.
52
00:02:56.400 --> 00:02:59.479
I was trying to force doors to open. And six
53
00:02:59.560 --> 00:03:02.840
months to my time in LA, as the bank account
54
00:03:02.919 --> 00:03:07.719
was starting to dwindle, sadly, I was like, oh gosh,
55
00:03:07.599 --> 00:03:09.639
why why am I here? It was that moment of
56
00:03:09.759 --> 00:03:13.360
sort of coming to the end of myself and the
57
00:03:13.439 --> 00:03:15.840
excitement of being in LA had worn off, and now
58
00:03:15.840 --> 00:03:17.639
I was really faced with the reality of like, well,
59
00:03:17.639 --> 00:03:19.360
why am I here? And what am I doing with
60
00:03:19.400 --> 00:03:22.240
my life? Lord help you know? And I remember I
61
00:03:22.280 --> 00:03:25.240
was in the bathroom of my apartment and I started
62
00:03:25.240 --> 00:03:27.280
crying and I was just like this real moment with
63
00:03:27.360 --> 00:03:29.639
Jesus where I was like, here we are again, what
64
00:03:29.719 --> 00:03:32.680
do I do? You know? And I literally felt like
65
00:03:32.759 --> 00:03:36.479
the Lord told me to focus on this little teeny
66
00:03:36.520 --> 00:03:38.520
tiny blog that I had at the time that I
67
00:03:38.599 --> 00:03:41.240
was only using to sort of help get my name
68
00:03:41.280 --> 00:03:45.479
out there, writing little articles and things for fun. But
69
00:03:45.759 --> 00:03:48.360
God put that right in my vision, was this little
70
00:03:48.360 --> 00:03:51.560
teeny tiny blog, and so I remember when God put
71
00:03:51.599 --> 00:03:53.919
that before me, I thought, Yeah, this is not what
72
00:03:54.000 --> 00:03:56.800
I want to do. It's the harder route because I
73
00:03:56.840 --> 00:03:59.800
have to figure it out, whereas the other route would
74
00:03:59.840 --> 00:04:02.159
have been really great. I walk into an audition, I
75
00:04:02.199 --> 00:04:04.680
book a job, and I land on a network or
76
00:04:04.759 --> 00:04:07.719
something where there's sort of this gatekeeper and I can
77
00:04:07.759 --> 00:04:10.479
come through. This other path. Was sort of like, yeah,
78
00:04:10.520 --> 00:04:14.039
there is no gatekeeper. You're going to create this path
79
00:04:14.280 --> 00:04:17.120
for yourself alongside the Father. And it was like learning
80
00:04:17.160 --> 00:04:21.480
and understanding that process. And it was so hard, so taxing,
81
00:04:22.120 --> 00:04:26.319
but it was amazing how things started to just happen.
82
00:04:26.519 --> 00:04:28.480
You know, when you think, oh, my gosh, is it luck. No,
83
00:04:28.600 --> 00:04:32.439
it was totally God's favor because of sort of obeying
84
00:04:32.480 --> 00:04:35.360
that calling and not even knowing why, but you just
85
00:04:35.439 --> 00:04:37.680
know something's there and I have to obey this calling.
86
00:04:37.720 --> 00:04:40.439
And so that's what I did with this blog at
87
00:04:40.439 --> 00:04:45.879
the time, and ten years later, throughout the journey is
88
00:04:45.920 --> 00:04:48.399
when you saw social media right on the roller coaster
89
00:04:48.519 --> 00:04:51.560
from you know, the rise of Instagram and then YouTube,
90
00:04:51.639 --> 00:04:54.279
and you know, I dipped into all of it as
91
00:04:54.319 --> 00:04:56.959
I went. You adapt and you pivot, and you change
92
00:04:56.959 --> 00:05:00.439
and you grow. And so today I I feel so
93
00:05:00.560 --> 00:05:04.160
blessed and fortunate to continue to be a content creator,
94
00:05:04.720 --> 00:05:07.959
still telling stories, which is what my heart really wanted
95
00:05:08.000 --> 00:05:10.399
in the beginning, but getting to do it in this
96
00:05:10.480 --> 00:05:13.199
really unique, beautiful way that I would have never imagined
97
00:05:13.319 --> 00:05:16.240
would even be a career path ten years ago. Wow,
98
00:05:16.360 --> 00:05:17.000
it's crazy.
99
00:05:17.360 --> 00:05:19.360
And going back a little bit to what you said,
100
00:05:19.399 --> 00:05:21.800
it wasn't luck. It was simply because you took a
101
00:05:21.879 --> 00:05:24.199
step in faith. And I think a lot of times
102
00:05:24.240 --> 00:05:28.040
we don't realize that, we think that we're waiting on God,
103
00:05:28.079 --> 00:05:31.040
but God's really waiting on us. He's really waiting on
104
00:05:31.120 --> 00:05:33.720
us just to take that step and just to be obedient.
105
00:05:33.839 --> 00:05:36.920
So in my opinion, the fruit that I see in
106
00:05:36.959 --> 00:05:40.519
your life is due to your obedience and your faithfulness
107
00:05:40.519 --> 00:05:41.759
of what He's called you to do.
108
00:05:42.079 --> 00:05:42.959
Thank you, Natalie.
109
00:05:43.079 --> 00:05:45.600
So fast forwarding a little bit to you and Stevie
110
00:05:45.680 --> 00:05:49.319
and your guys's marriage and so as we know you
111
00:05:49.399 --> 00:05:54.000
come from a Kurdish family, and with that, the norm
112
00:05:54.560 --> 00:05:59.800
is to marry within the Kurdish community or the Kurdish culture. However,
113
00:06:00.560 --> 00:06:03.839
you had a decision to make to either choose essentially
114
00:06:03.879 --> 00:06:07.120
to choose your family or your parents, or to choose Stevie,
115
00:06:07.160 --> 00:06:09.680
the love of your life. And obviously, as we know,
116
00:06:09.759 --> 00:06:11.879
you chose Stevie. But I want to go back to
117
00:06:11.920 --> 00:06:15.480
that moment and dissect it a little bit. Yeah, where
118
00:06:15.480 --> 00:06:19.519
do you believe or how did you get the courage
119
00:06:20.079 --> 00:06:23.319
and how did you know that this was something that
120
00:06:23.399 --> 00:06:25.279
you were called to do. How did you know that
121
00:06:25.319 --> 00:06:27.680
this was the right decision that you were making.
122
00:06:28.000 --> 00:06:28.240
Wow?
123
00:06:28.399 --> 00:06:29.680
Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
124
00:06:30.680 --> 00:06:33.560
Oh. I know when I every time I go back
125
00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:35.800
down the memory lane, I'm like, okay, let me go
126
00:06:35.920 --> 00:06:39.399
back to that. You know, I was how old at
127
00:06:39.439 --> 00:06:41.439
the time, you know, when I met Stevie. We were
128
00:06:41.439 --> 00:06:45.079
in college, so I was, you know, twenty you know,
129
00:06:45.399 --> 00:06:47.959
twenty one is when I gave my life to Christ.
130
00:06:48.439 --> 00:06:51.639
So that was a love story journey in and of itself.
131
00:06:52.319 --> 00:06:56.000
And so while I was getting to know Stevie in college,
132
00:06:56.079 --> 00:06:59.800
in my mind, I thought, well, he's such an there's
133
00:06:59.839 --> 00:07:03.399
some about this human He's just like so radiant. There's
134
00:07:03.439 --> 00:07:05.680
this light, this energy about him that at the time
135
00:07:05.759 --> 00:07:08.319
I was very drawn to that. I was drawn to
136
00:07:08.360 --> 00:07:11.279
the light that was in him, which now we all
137
00:07:11.319 --> 00:07:15.000
know was Christ And back then I just knew that
138
00:07:15.000 --> 00:07:17.160
he exuded this joy, this happiness. I was like, what
139
00:07:17.360 --> 00:07:21.959
is that? And so as our relationship grew, our friendship grew,
140
00:07:22.600 --> 00:07:26.399
I was starting to uncover and unravel right, the beautiful
141
00:07:26.800 --> 00:07:29.399
mysteries of God. I started to go on that journey
142
00:07:29.399 --> 00:07:31.959
for myself and ask those questions like who are you really?
143
00:07:32.120 --> 00:07:32.360
Lord?
144
00:07:32.600 --> 00:07:36.399
Like you know, and so growing up in a home where, yes,
145
00:07:36.800 --> 00:07:39.959
the Kurdish roots and the culture was a very important
146
00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:42.279
part of my upbringing. You know, if you know about
147
00:07:42.319 --> 00:07:45.800
the Kurds, like, there's just I have so many family
148
00:07:45.839 --> 00:07:51.199
members and ancestors who have literally died for the Kurdish cause,
149
00:07:51.439 --> 00:07:55.040
you know, literally my grandfather, who I never got to meet,
150
00:07:55.800 --> 00:07:58.720
my dad's dad, died when he was eight years old,
151
00:07:58.720 --> 00:08:02.800
when my dad was eight, dying on the battlefield, you know,
152
00:08:03.360 --> 00:08:08.160
fighting for the Kurdish cause. My other grandfather, he you know,
153
00:08:08.319 --> 00:08:12.120
fought for the Kurdish cause using a paintbrush as his weapon.
154
00:08:12.240 --> 00:08:15.240
He was an artist that was ab you know, depicting
155
00:08:15.279 --> 00:08:18.560
what was happening, the cruelty and the punishment under the
156
00:08:18.560 --> 00:08:21.600
Saddam Hussein regime, and what was going on to the Kurds.
157
00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:24.720
He was depicting all of these things and his drawings
158
00:08:24.720 --> 00:08:27.959
and in his art that he was actually wanted to
159
00:08:28.040 --> 00:08:31.160
hang and so he had to flee and escape. And
160
00:08:31.199 --> 00:08:34.159
so you can I set that up because there's that
161
00:08:34.840 --> 00:08:37.799
I see now, Like my parents came to this country
162
00:08:37.840 --> 00:08:40.600
when they were eighteen and thirteen years old. Wow, and
163
00:08:40.639 --> 00:08:43.960
they came with so much trauma. They came as refugees,
164
00:08:44.039 --> 00:08:46.600
and so I think about that and I'm just like
165
00:08:47.440 --> 00:08:50.840
WHOA Like, I still had this amazing childhood and this
166
00:08:50.919 --> 00:08:53.559
amazing upbringing. But it makes sense why they really wanted
167
00:08:53.559 --> 00:08:56.480
to instill the Kurdish values. So when I met Stevie
168
00:08:56.559 --> 00:08:58.440
in college, I was like, yeah, well he's just an
169
00:08:58.480 --> 00:09:01.720
amazing person. I won't even allow myself to go there
170
00:09:01.759 --> 00:09:04.639
and even have a crush on him. But it happened, right,
171
00:09:04.720 --> 00:09:07.120
because we're humans, we have hearts. You fall in love.
172
00:09:07.720 --> 00:09:10.879
And I became really afraid of what that could turn
173
00:09:10.919 --> 00:09:13.600
into because I knew ultimately it would mean that I
174
00:09:13.600 --> 00:09:17.039
would have to walk away from my family and everything
175
00:09:17.080 --> 00:09:21.600
that I'd known my whole life because my parents wanted
176
00:09:21.639 --> 00:09:24.720
to keep that part of our legacy and family culture
177
00:09:24.799 --> 00:09:29.000
heritage alive. And so when that moment came when Stevie
178
00:09:29.039 --> 00:09:31.600
and I knew that, like, okay, I think we know
179
00:09:31.720 --> 00:09:34.639
that we want to get married. I think I found
180
00:09:34.679 --> 00:09:37.360
the one. I know I've found the one. I knew
181
00:09:37.360 --> 00:09:40.639
that the only way to truly allow God to really
182
00:09:40.639 --> 00:09:43.559
bless our marriage, we had to be honest. We had
183
00:09:43.600 --> 00:09:47.159
to tell my family about our relationship. And so you know,
184
00:09:47.360 --> 00:09:49.799
that was a big leap of faith right there, because
185
00:09:49.799 --> 00:09:51.559
it was the scariest thing I had ever had to
186
00:09:51.600 --> 00:09:53.879
do in my life at that point. Imagine just like
187
00:09:53.960 --> 00:09:56.399
being at the edge of a cliff when you come
188
00:09:56.440 --> 00:09:59.399
to the end of yourself. Again similar to my career stuff,
189
00:09:59.440 --> 00:10:01.519
but here I was now coming to the end of
190
00:10:01.559 --> 00:10:05.600
myself sort of spiritually feeling like all right, God, I
191
00:10:05.639 --> 00:10:07.360
had one foot in and one foot at because I
192
00:10:07.399 --> 00:10:10.200
was still controlling how I wanted to keep my family.
193
00:10:11.399 --> 00:10:13.840
But now it's like I got to both feed are out,
194
00:10:13.879 --> 00:10:16.080
Like I got a jump, and I don't even know
195
00:10:16.120 --> 00:10:18.679
where I found the courage. I don't necessarily think that
196
00:10:18.799 --> 00:10:22.720
you before you do the scariest thing that you've ever
197
00:10:22.759 --> 00:10:24.639
had to do in your life. I don't necessarily think
198
00:10:24.679 --> 00:10:26.759
you grab courage and bravery and you just do it
199
00:10:26.799 --> 00:10:30.240
with confidence. I actually think that you jump and you
200
00:10:30.320 --> 00:10:34.559
just truthfully hope and pray that through your faith, yea
201
00:10:34.639 --> 00:10:37.240
God is going to catch you no matter what. And
202
00:10:37.240 --> 00:10:38.679
that's what I had to do, was I just knew
203
00:10:38.679 --> 00:10:40.679
I couldn't stand at the edge anymore and look down.
204
00:10:40.720 --> 00:10:42.639
I needed to jump, and that's what I had to
205
00:10:42.679 --> 00:10:43.960
do by telling them.
206
00:10:43.960 --> 00:10:46.679
Yeah, and then they ended fast forward to the wedding.
207
00:10:47.440 --> 00:10:51.440
You're yes, my parents. So Stevie and I ended up
208
00:10:51.480 --> 00:10:55.120
telling you know, my parents about our relationship four months
209
00:10:55.120 --> 00:10:58.000
before we got married, and it was a lot for
210
00:10:58.080 --> 00:11:02.240
them to process because until that point they just thought
211
00:11:02.320 --> 00:11:04.360
Steve was a friend, you know what I mean. And
212
00:11:04.440 --> 00:11:07.200
I think a lot of people who come from honor
213
00:11:07.240 --> 00:11:13.360
and shame cultural backgrounds, they'll understand that it's not that
214
00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:16.960
we want to have to go behind our parents' backs
215
00:11:17.000 --> 00:11:20.039
and lie or keep secrets. But when you know that
216
00:11:20.120 --> 00:11:24.559
there's this like this pressure and this expectation that you
217
00:11:24.639 --> 00:11:27.919
have to honor your parents, you really do have a
218
00:11:28.000 --> 00:11:31.440
fear of disappointing them and It was really for me
219
00:11:32.120 --> 00:11:36.200
having to cling and tether myself to the father right
220
00:11:36.279 --> 00:11:38.799
in heaven to help me figure out how am I
221
00:11:38.879 --> 00:11:40.799
going to break? Like how am I going to be
222
00:11:40.799 --> 00:11:43.320
able to do this and be okay with breaking my
223
00:11:43.519 --> 00:11:47.000
earthly father's heart because this will break his heart. And
224
00:11:47.080 --> 00:11:49.960
it was a really hard thing for me as a
225
00:11:50.000 --> 00:11:53.279
twenty four year old to have to go through. When
226
00:11:53.320 --> 00:11:55.320
a lot of twenty four year olds, I feel like,
227
00:11:55.679 --> 00:11:57.759
naturally you're trying to figure out your life and your
228
00:11:57.840 --> 00:12:01.200
career at that point, and you're at that very independent
229
00:12:01.840 --> 00:12:04.679
graduated from college. I was still so tethered to my
230
00:12:04.840 --> 00:12:08.879
family and I to this day, like we're all so close.
231
00:12:09.120 --> 00:12:12.360
So it was hard the day of my wedding when
232
00:12:12.879 --> 00:12:17.039
you know they weren't there. Part of me knew it
233
00:12:17.080 --> 00:12:19.320
was like it was it came with the price. It
234
00:12:19.320 --> 00:12:21.279
came with the cost that I think I had to pay.
235
00:12:21.360 --> 00:12:24.799
It was like knowing that you just can't have at all,
236
00:12:25.120 --> 00:12:27.000
Like I think for me, I had to be okay
237
00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:29.919
to lay that down. I wasn't angry at them, ever,
238
00:12:31.600 --> 00:12:35.279
I was sad because it was the happiest day of
239
00:12:35.320 --> 00:12:37.600
my life and the biggest regret that I have on
240
00:12:37.639 --> 00:12:41.080
that day was that they weren't there. But to see
241
00:12:41.120 --> 00:12:45.879
how God used Stevie and I's marriage to bring my
242
00:12:46.080 --> 00:12:49.120
family back together. I mean, that's the side of the
243
00:12:49.480 --> 00:12:55.039
redemption story, that is I didn't I can seriously say, like,
244
00:12:55.320 --> 00:12:59.320
apart from prayer, there was nothing that I did tangibly
245
00:12:59.679 --> 00:13:01.799
to tried to bring my family. There was nothing I
246
00:13:01.840 --> 00:13:05.320
could do. It was literally releasing it to God and
247
00:13:05.480 --> 00:13:08.440
just hoping and praying that one day we would be reunited,
248
00:13:08.799 --> 00:13:12.200
that they would give this incredible human, my husband, a chance.
249
00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:16.919
And it was amazing because when my dad came around,
250
00:13:16.960 --> 00:13:19.159
it was about two and a half years after Stevie
251
00:13:19.159 --> 00:13:23.720
and I had already been married, and it was also
252
00:13:24.440 --> 00:13:28.080
the day he met Stevie was the same day that
253
00:13:28.159 --> 00:13:33.840
he met his first granddaughter, Valentina, who was eight months old,
254
00:13:34.120 --> 00:13:37.519
my daughter who I named after his mom. Wow, so
255
00:13:37.600 --> 00:13:43.559
imagine that day. That moment for me, it was like whoa.
256
00:13:43.080 --> 00:13:44.720
It was just full circle.
257
00:13:44.919 --> 00:13:47.919
It was everything. Yeah, it was everything. And what's crazy
258
00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:50.360
is in my mind I tried to plan how that
259
00:13:50.440 --> 00:13:52.360
day was going to go. Like leading up to that trip,
260
00:13:52.399 --> 00:13:55.480
we drove down Austin, you know, like I remember that
261
00:13:55.559 --> 00:13:57.679
day we drove down because we were in Austin, so
262
00:13:57.720 --> 00:13:59.799
we were going to going to Dallas, and I just
263
00:14:00.000 --> 00:14:02.000
remembered on the car right there, I was just like, okay,
264
00:14:02.600 --> 00:14:04.720
is he is my dad gonna come outside to greet?
265
00:14:04.799 --> 00:14:06.759
Like is STEVEE gonna walk up? Like do you shake
266
00:14:06.799 --> 00:14:09.559
his hand? Is hugging weird? Like we were Stevie and
267
00:14:09.639 --> 00:14:11.679
I on the way We're going over all the scenarios,
268
00:14:11.679 --> 00:14:14.480
and we were just both so excited to have that
269
00:14:15.080 --> 00:14:19.519
time and that that physical encounter. And so it's funny
270
00:14:19.519 --> 00:14:22.240
because when we pulled up to my mom's house, guess
271
00:14:22.279 --> 00:14:26.519
what happened. My eight month old projectile vomits all over
272
00:14:26.559 --> 00:14:29.440
herself in the car seat. It was like car sickness
273
00:14:29.559 --> 00:14:33.360
or something. So I just remembered thinking, oh mg, the
274
00:14:33.399 --> 00:14:36.799
Monica gell er me was like, where are the Lyle wife?
275
00:14:36.840 --> 00:14:38.120
She's gonna know what's happening.
276
00:14:38.279 --> 00:14:41.399
Guy. I was just like a she okay. And that
277
00:14:41.559 --> 00:14:44.279
is when I called my mom and I'm like, hey,
278
00:14:44.480 --> 00:14:46.480
you might need to bring a towel out, like this
279
00:14:46.639 --> 00:14:50.559
is a disaster. It was almost like that distraction was
280
00:14:50.840 --> 00:14:53.840
exactly what we needed, and it was set up somehow,
281
00:14:53.879 --> 00:14:56.639
some way by the Lord. Because my dad comes out,
282
00:14:57.960 --> 00:15:02.519
which was an amazing thing of him coming out. In
283
00:15:02.559 --> 00:15:07.720
my culture, there is something about the hospitality when people
284
00:15:07.720 --> 00:15:10.360
come to your home. My dad could have been sitting
285
00:15:10.360 --> 00:15:12.279
on the couch and we walked into the living room.
286
00:15:12.480 --> 00:15:15.639
Right my dad walks out towards to the garage where
287
00:15:15.639 --> 00:15:18.480
we were, and he comes outside and he greets Stevie.
288
00:15:18.960 --> 00:15:21.240
He gives me a hug, and then he grabs and
289
00:15:21.320 --> 00:15:24.879
helps with you know, his granddaughter now, who was so dirty.
290
00:15:24.879 --> 00:15:27.480
But that little scenario allowed us to all like have
291
00:15:27.559 --> 00:15:30.720
a really healthy distraction in that moment. So thank you
292
00:15:30.799 --> 00:15:31.720
teeny for few.
293
00:15:32.080 --> 00:15:36.320
Throwing up everywhere. But I feel like that's so indicative
294
00:15:36.480 --> 00:15:40.519
of there's so much power and trusting, you know, Like,
295
00:15:40.519 --> 00:15:42.200
like you said, it's like you had to come to
296
00:15:42.480 --> 00:15:44.799
the end of yourself. You were on the ledge, you
297
00:15:44.840 --> 00:15:46.879
put both feet out and you just trust it and
298
00:15:46.919 --> 00:15:49.480
you surrendered. And I think that if a lot of times,
299
00:15:49.519 --> 00:15:54.120
if we position ourselves, posture ourselves in those ways, we
300
00:15:54.200 --> 00:15:58.720
will collide into restoration, we will collide into redemption. But
301
00:15:58.840 --> 00:16:01.879
we have to first get ourselves into position.
302
00:16:02.039 --> 00:16:04.039
Yeah, and so that's.
303
00:16:03.919 --> 00:16:07.399
The hardest part, but you did it. Yeah, switching gears
304
00:16:07.399 --> 00:16:10.399
a bit. It's good. You live a life. A lot
305
00:16:10.440 --> 00:16:12.879
of your brand is on the good life. What the
306
00:16:12.879 --> 00:16:14.840
good life is? You and your husband wrote a book,
307
00:16:14.879 --> 00:16:17.080
The Real Good Life. You guys had a podcast, The
308
00:16:17.120 --> 00:16:21.120
Good Life. I want to kind of underscore that it's
309
00:16:21.159 --> 00:16:24.679
hard for our culture to believe that we can have
310
00:16:24.759 --> 00:16:28.519
the good when bad is existing. So good and bad
311
00:16:28.559 --> 00:16:30.759
when they coexist, a lot of us don't feel like
312
00:16:30.840 --> 00:16:33.120
we can. It's still things are still good during the
313
00:16:33.240 --> 00:16:36.120
arduous and challenging times. And there was a quote in
314
00:16:36.159 --> 00:16:41.519
your book that I want to eliminate the hard is
315
00:16:41.639 --> 00:16:44.399
the way to good. Can you expound on that?
316
00:16:45.840 --> 00:16:49.000
I think it goes without saying that, like, when you
317
00:16:49.080 --> 00:16:53.000
do the hard things in your life, now life does
318
00:16:53.000 --> 00:16:55.440
get a lot sweeter. But when you try to avoid
319
00:16:55.639 --> 00:16:59.360
the hard things, life really does get harder. And so
320
00:16:59.399 --> 00:17:02.080
when I look back back at just that season when
321
00:17:02.120 --> 00:17:04.799
I was in the book, in that specific chapter, when
322
00:17:04.839 --> 00:17:07.720
I was talking about good and hard co existing, it
323
00:17:07.759 --> 00:17:11.440
was like I was very excited to be marrying Stevie.
324
00:17:11.680 --> 00:17:13.680
It was like the happiest day of my life, the
325
00:17:13.759 --> 00:17:16.240
day that every young girl dreams about is her wedding day.
326
00:17:16.319 --> 00:17:18.880
So that emotion was there, it was real, it was raw,
327
00:17:19.359 --> 00:17:21.720
but on the other side of that, there was this grief.
328
00:17:22.279 --> 00:17:24.680
I was grieving that my family wasn't going to be there.
329
00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:28.599
I was grieving, you know, the changes that were happening
330
00:17:28.640 --> 00:17:30.799
around me and not being able to have my mom
331
00:17:30.960 --> 00:17:35.440
there to help me with the transition. And so sometimes
332
00:17:35.480 --> 00:17:40.000
in our good life, you know, the hard stuff come
333
00:17:40.079 --> 00:17:41.799
with it. And when you look at a river bank,
334
00:17:42.240 --> 00:17:47.839
it's almost like the murky waters and the pouring water
335
00:17:47.920 --> 00:17:51.240
coming from it all come bleeds together, and so you've
336
00:17:51.240 --> 00:17:55.759
got this beautiful blend of the two. And so I
337
00:17:55.799 --> 00:18:00.920
think like good and hard coexisting. To me, it just
338
00:18:01.039 --> 00:18:04.920
makes I think life that much more worth living. And
339
00:18:05.000 --> 00:18:10.680
that is ultimately right. What Jesus exemplified throughout his entire
340
00:18:10.759 --> 00:18:15.599
life when he came here was he did so much
341
00:18:15.640 --> 00:18:18.640
good when he was here, but then we saw all
342
00:18:18.759 --> 00:18:21.640
the hard that he had to go through and ultimately
343
00:18:21.720 --> 00:18:24.920
the most horrific death that he had to go through.
344
00:18:24.960 --> 00:18:26.640
And then on the other side of that, the hope
345
00:18:26.759 --> 00:18:28.839
that was waiting for us on the other side of
346
00:18:28.839 --> 00:18:31.599
his resurrection, and knowing that, wow, we can continue to
347
00:18:31.640 --> 00:18:34.960
still live and breathe and hope for a better tomorrow.
348
00:18:35.240 --> 00:18:36.960
So I really had to cling to that in that
349
00:18:37.000 --> 00:18:39.400
season is knowing that even when you're going through the
350
00:18:39.400 --> 00:18:41.960
hard stuff, there's still so much good right in front
351
00:18:42.000 --> 00:18:44.279
of you. And it's not these larger than life things.
352
00:18:44.559 --> 00:18:48.039
It's the little things. And when my parents weren't in
353
00:18:48.079 --> 00:18:50.960
my life in that season, I had to look some
354
00:18:51.079 --> 00:18:53.960
days hard to see the good. Yea. But the good
355
00:18:54.039 --> 00:18:58.319
is always there. We just have to, I think, open
356
00:18:58.359 --> 00:19:02.759
our hearts to it and allow ourselves to be humbled
357
00:19:02.839 --> 00:19:08.079
before the Father and to, if anything, believe that God
358
00:19:08.119 --> 00:19:10.519
has given us the gift of grace every morning when
359
00:19:10.559 --> 00:19:13.200
we wake up, and maybe that's today's good is that
360
00:19:13.319 --> 00:19:16.039
I woke up today with God's grace and that's good.
361
00:19:16.119 --> 00:19:18.079
It's going to be a good day. So it's not
362
00:19:18.119 --> 00:19:19.880
these larger than life yes, in.
363
00:19:19.839 --> 00:19:21.680
Which I feel like a lot of us are always
364
00:19:21.720 --> 00:19:24.960
looking for these larger than life things. In an interview
365
00:19:25.079 --> 00:19:28.960
that you did recently, you correlated use the analogy of
366
00:19:28.960 --> 00:19:32.680
a garden, and you're talking about also in order to
367
00:19:32.759 --> 00:19:34.680
have the good life, you have to go back into
368
00:19:34.680 --> 00:19:37.759
your garden. You see some flowers that are good and alive,
369
00:19:37.839 --> 00:19:39.920
and you also see some flowers that are dead and
370
00:19:39.920 --> 00:19:42.000
that need to be plucked away, weeds that need to
371
00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:45.000
be pulled out old flowers that need to be gone,
372
00:19:45.279 --> 00:19:48.960
and I would kind of correlate that to unbecoming, to become.
373
00:19:49.640 --> 00:19:53.839
So what have you unbecome in this season that has
374
00:19:53.880 --> 00:19:57.160
allowed you to collide into the good life and become
375
00:19:57.240 --> 00:19:59.200
who says on who God has called.
376
00:19:59.000 --> 00:20:03.400
You to be. Gosh, Natalie, you are the best interviewer ever.
377
00:20:04.400 --> 00:20:06.599
I told her this before. I was like, Okay, Barbara
378
00:20:06.640 --> 00:20:10.240
Walters of our generation, that is such a real question.
379
00:20:10.880 --> 00:20:14.680
And if I'm being honest, like what people may see
380
00:20:14.720 --> 00:20:17.880
on the outside is like, oh man, she's got so
381
00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:21.799
much success, like this Instagram following that's growing in these
382
00:20:21.920 --> 00:20:25.920
viral videos, and she wrote a book. Truthfully, what God
383
00:20:25.920 --> 00:20:29.559
has done in my life is he has completely humbled me.
384
00:20:29.759 --> 00:20:33.160
He has stripped me. Come on, and of all of
385
00:20:33.200 --> 00:20:36.759
the things that bring you comfort of this world, I've
386
00:20:36.759 --> 00:20:39.039
been so stripped of that to where I have felt
387
00:20:39.039 --> 00:20:41.680
so in a way naked. But to get to that
388
00:20:41.799 --> 00:20:44.839
place has actually made me look myself in the mirror
389
00:20:45.160 --> 00:20:47.240
and see exactly who God made me to be and
390
00:20:47.279 --> 00:20:50.960
who that person is today is I'm a mom of
391
00:20:51.079 --> 00:20:55.799
three and sometimes as women, as moms, you feel like
392
00:20:56.079 --> 00:20:58.240
the weight of the world is on your shoulders. You
393
00:20:58.359 --> 00:21:02.079
feel the mom guilt, feel the train just pass you
394
00:21:02.119 --> 00:21:04.279
by when you see other people on it, and you're
395
00:21:04.319 --> 00:21:06.279
just like, there they go live in their dreams, and
396
00:21:06.319 --> 00:21:09.000
you know, here I am just wiping up these diapers
397
00:21:09.079 --> 00:21:10.200
and cleaning up all this.
398
00:21:10.519 --> 00:21:12.160
Grow up the mundane, you know.
399
00:21:12.240 --> 00:21:16.400
And it's so easy in the mundane things to feel
400
00:21:16.400 --> 00:21:19.079
like maybe you're lacking purpose. But it's been in those
401
00:21:19.160 --> 00:21:22.839
mundane things when I've tucked away to go be with
402
00:21:22.880 --> 00:21:26.559
my kids, to go sit with them, be available to them,
403
00:21:26.720 --> 00:21:30.440
where God has shown me just my purpose as a woman,
404
00:21:31.000 --> 00:21:33.480
and how to not only mother my children, but to
405
00:21:33.559 --> 00:21:37.960
be a mother to the community of young girls that
406
00:21:38.079 --> 00:21:41.319
follow me, to try to be a good example by
407
00:21:41.359 --> 00:21:44.680
being my hot mess self and just sharing that journey
408
00:21:44.680 --> 00:21:47.720
with people as I'm living it. And I think that's
409
00:21:47.759 --> 00:21:53.279
where my passion has now collided with just the authenticity
410
00:21:53.319 --> 00:21:55.839
of where I'm at in the season of life. So
411
00:21:56.480 --> 00:21:58.960
my kids are my priority, and I never want to
412
00:21:59.000 --> 00:22:02.240
compromise who I am for what I want to be.
413
00:22:02.680 --> 00:22:05.519
And so it's so hard when you're ambitious, because I'm
414
00:22:05.720 --> 00:22:10.079
very ambitious, and I've had to really check that at
415
00:22:10.079 --> 00:22:12.000
the door. A lot of the times and check that
416
00:22:12.079 --> 00:22:14.359
before God and say, like, Lord, is this what you
417
00:22:14.400 --> 00:22:18.279
want me to do? And sometimes I overthink things. Sometimes
418
00:22:18.319 --> 00:22:21.200
I get so much anxiety and I can already feel
419
00:22:21.240 --> 00:22:24.279
the day stirring, and it's affecting even the way that
420
00:22:24.359 --> 00:22:27.240
I poured my kids cereal or just the way that
421
00:22:27.240 --> 00:22:29.279
I'm so quick to like shut them out. And that's
422
00:22:29.319 --> 00:22:31.759
when I feel right there, God checks me exactly where
423
00:22:31.839 --> 00:22:34.559
I am, and He's like, be present where you are
424
00:22:34.720 --> 00:22:37.880
right now, Oh love, where you are right now despite
425
00:22:37.920 --> 00:22:40.119
not being where you want that it's so.
426
00:22:40.920 --> 00:22:43.880
Hard because it's like and it's so funny because the
427
00:22:43.880 --> 00:22:46.079
other day I got convicted of that with May Jones,
428
00:22:46.119 --> 00:22:49.240
like she was asking for certain things in the moment,
429
00:22:49.319 --> 00:22:52.440
and I was preparing for either a conversation, an interview,
430
00:22:52.440 --> 00:22:54.880
doing edits whatever. So your mind as a mom is
431
00:22:55.160 --> 00:22:57.400
and you're an entrepreneurship mode. But at the end of
432
00:22:57.440 --> 00:22:59.440
the day, God is a god of order. Yeah, and
433
00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:04.240
it like, hey, you know, marriage, family, and then your work.
434
00:23:04.319 --> 00:23:07.200
And so that's been my conviction lately, is like saying,
435
00:23:07.359 --> 00:23:11.039
not only putting things in order, but being present with
436
00:23:11.119 --> 00:23:14.039
the things that you're putting in order, because I think that,
437
00:23:14.119 --> 00:23:15.799
like you said, earlier. We can have one foot in
438
00:23:15.880 --> 00:23:20.480
and one foot out. Yeah, entrepreneurship. I think one of
439
00:23:20.519 --> 00:23:25.640
the biggest pillars in entrepreneurship is decision making. And I
440
00:23:25.720 --> 00:23:27.799
saw and this to me, I think a lot of
441
00:23:27.839 --> 00:23:31.440
people can believe that it's either counterculture or counterproductive. You
442
00:23:31.640 --> 00:23:35.559
had an opportunity from one of the biggest publishing houses
443
00:23:35.920 --> 00:23:37.640
that there is, and I believe you still took the
444
00:23:37.680 --> 00:23:40.960
opportunity with them. They emailed you to write a book.
445
00:23:41.559 --> 00:23:44.079
You pretty much said, it's not a no, but it's
446
00:23:44.119 --> 00:23:48.519
not yet. That is very difficult for a lot of
447
00:23:48.759 --> 00:23:52.119
entrepreneurs to do if they are based in their foundation
448
00:23:52.319 --> 00:23:55.079
is in a scarcity mindset of how do I know
449
00:23:55.160 --> 00:23:57.359
that another opportunity is not going to come? How do
450
00:23:57.400 --> 00:24:00.559
I know that another thing that might This is what
451
00:24:00.559 --> 00:24:02.680
I'm looking for. It looks good, it smells good, it
452
00:24:02.720 --> 00:24:05.599
feels good. This is supposed to be for me, this opportunity.
453
00:24:05.640 --> 00:24:09.759
But we're so focused on filling up and being defined
454
00:24:09.759 --> 00:24:12.319
by these opportunities that were not focused on if this
455
00:24:12.400 --> 00:24:14.640
is what God's telling us to do in that moment
456
00:24:14.880 --> 00:24:18.799
or not. Wow, So how did you know or how
457
00:24:18.799 --> 00:24:22.119
did you not allow fear to overtake you and that
458
00:24:22.240 --> 00:24:24.039
you believe that. You know, what if I let this
459
00:24:24.119 --> 00:24:27.319
publishing house know that it's not a no, but it's
460
00:24:27.319 --> 00:24:27.920
not yet.
461
00:24:28.559 --> 00:24:29.240
Yeah, how do you.
462
00:24:29.240 --> 00:24:33.920
Debunk that fear of believing and knowing that something else
463
00:24:34.079 --> 00:24:36.000
won't just pass you by?
464
00:24:36.039 --> 00:24:38.559
You know? I think everything comes in seasons. When I
465
00:24:38.599 --> 00:24:42.319
look back twenty eighteen, that season of my life, I
466
00:24:42.559 --> 00:24:45.599
had just become a new mom, and it was through
467
00:24:46.519 --> 00:24:50.799
actually navigating that season of being a new mom when
468
00:24:50.839 --> 00:24:53.480
I was going back into the entrepreneurial side of business.
469
00:24:53.559 --> 00:24:56.440
So you know, it took six weeks off postpartum with
470
00:24:56.480 --> 00:24:58.799
my first and I was like, okay, time to get
471
00:24:58.799 --> 00:25:01.279
back into it, because that's how people do it, right,
472
00:25:01.400 --> 00:25:03.640
six weeks off and then somehow, some way you flip
473
00:25:03.680 --> 00:25:06.599
the ship. You flip the you flip a switch, and
474
00:25:06.640 --> 00:25:09.480
you start moving the ship. But when it was time
475
00:25:09.519 --> 00:25:13.599
to flip that switch, I actually did not feel like,
476
00:25:13.680 --> 00:25:17.200
wait this, this is not like what everybody says. It
477
00:25:17.240 --> 00:25:19.519
is like how do women do it? Because I don't
478
00:25:19.559 --> 00:25:25.640
actually feel mentally ready, physically ready, and spiritually I feel
479
00:25:25.680 --> 00:25:29.119
so depleted. How am I going to jump back into
480
00:25:29.119 --> 00:25:32.480
And at the time in twenty eighteen, I was predominantly
481
00:25:32.599 --> 00:25:37.240
a beauty influencier influencer. I was sharing mostly beauty videos,
482
00:25:37.319 --> 00:25:40.039
tutorials at the time, things like that, because that was
483
00:25:40.079 --> 00:25:42.559
the season of my life before I had kids. It
484
00:25:42.640 --> 00:25:46.920
was all about sharing the tutorials and the how to
485
00:25:47.640 --> 00:25:51.240
do the contour and the smoky eye. And so I
486
00:25:51.319 --> 00:25:54.759
remember Stevie remembers this. If he was here, he would
487
00:25:54.799 --> 00:25:57.079
tell you. I remember that exact day. I'm in the
488
00:25:57.119 --> 00:25:59.720
little guest room, my camera. He set up the cameras
489
00:25:59.720 --> 00:26:02.359
for me. Similarly, He's like, Okay, I got your light's ready, babe,
490
00:26:02.400 --> 00:26:04.279
are you ready to get back into it? And I
491
00:26:04.319 --> 00:26:06.440
thought it was gonna be this, like, yeah, I'm ready
492
00:26:06.440 --> 00:26:09.240
to perform, you know, like you just so, I'm sitting
493
00:26:09.279 --> 00:26:12.839
in that room getting ready to do the whole bit.
494
00:26:13.160 --> 00:26:16.680
It was a glittery, smoky eye girl. I had not
495
00:26:16.720 --> 00:26:18.799
been wearing makeup in that season. This was the first
496
00:26:18.839 --> 00:26:20.960
time I had even seen my makeup brushes in like
497
00:26:21.319 --> 00:26:22.720
six weeks postpartum.
498
00:26:22.960 --> 00:26:23.440
Yeah.
499
00:26:23.519 --> 00:26:25.920
Plus I'm on a feeding schedule, so baby girl's gonna
500
00:26:25.920 --> 00:26:27.480
be up any minute now. And I had a nurser,
501
00:26:27.559 --> 00:26:29.519
so I'm just like, let me knock this out real quick.
502
00:26:30.400 --> 00:26:33.400
I did not in that moment I did not feel
503
00:26:33.440 --> 00:26:37.039
more inauthentic in my craft than ever before. Like I
504
00:26:37.200 --> 00:26:39.880
just was sitting there as I'm doing this glittery arts
505
00:26:39.880 --> 00:26:43.119
and crafts project on my eye, and I just stopped
506
00:26:43.160 --> 00:26:46.079
and I started crying, and I just walked out of
507
00:26:46.119 --> 00:26:48.440
the room. And I'm sitting in the kitchen. I've got
508
00:26:48.480 --> 00:26:50.920
one glittery eye and the other one's naked, and I'm
509
00:26:50.960 --> 00:26:53.839
just sobbing now with glitter everywhere. And Stevie's like, what's
510
00:26:53.880 --> 00:26:56.960
going on? And you know, bless my husband's heart, the
511
00:26:57.440 --> 00:26:59.680
hormones he had to deal with in that season. I'm
512
00:26:59.680 --> 00:27:02.720
just like, what am I doing? I was like this,
513
00:27:03.160 --> 00:27:06.079
I can't do these makeup videos, Like this is not
514
00:27:06.480 --> 00:27:08.920
who I am anymore. In fact, I don't even know
515
00:27:08.960 --> 00:27:11.000
who I am right now because I just became a
516
00:27:11.039 --> 00:27:14.000
new mom. And then I had team members. At the time,
517
00:27:14.599 --> 00:27:18.519
in that era, there wasn't tons of influencers having babies,
518
00:27:18.839 --> 00:27:22.640
so when I had Valentina, it was kind of a
519
00:27:23.359 --> 00:27:25.480
not as many people would like talk about it, share it.
520
00:27:25.920 --> 00:27:27.839
So I had team members saying, like, just make sure
521
00:27:27.880 --> 00:27:29.720
you don't talk too much about motherhood when you get
522
00:27:29.759 --> 00:27:31.799
back into it, Like, let's really flip the switch so
523
00:27:31.839 --> 00:27:34.240
that we can make sure this is lucrative. So if
524
00:27:34.240 --> 00:27:36.480
you want the beauty brands to come, you can't just
525
00:27:36.480 --> 00:27:41.319
become this mommy blogger. I had legit people who worked
526
00:27:41.559 --> 00:27:44.240
with me at the time no longer who were speaking
527
00:27:44.279 --> 00:27:47.519
that over me. So imagine that pressure and then going
528
00:27:47.559 --> 00:27:50.039
into the room to film, and I'm just like, this
529
00:27:50.079 --> 00:27:53.599
doesn't feel like me. So I talked to Stevie in
530
00:27:53.640 --> 00:27:55.680
the kitchen and he said something to me. He goes,
531
00:27:55.680 --> 00:27:58.319
what you love more than anything sas is like when
532
00:27:58.359 --> 00:28:00.960
I noticed when you do your makeup video, you love
533
00:28:01.400 --> 00:28:04.920
speaking to the girl watching you love somehow someway making
534
00:28:04.960 --> 00:28:07.920
her laugh or encouraging her, sharing a hot mess story
535
00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:10.079
or like the realness. He said, why don't you just
536
00:28:10.160 --> 00:28:12.359
use makeup as the gimmick and just talk to people
537
00:28:12.400 --> 00:28:15.000
about what you're really going through right now? And I said,
538
00:28:15.880 --> 00:28:17.759
I was like a light bulb moment. I'm so ambitious.
539
00:28:17.759 --> 00:28:19.559
I was like, that's a great idea. I'll call it
540
00:28:19.599 --> 00:28:22.519
makeup and motivate. And I don't know why, but I
541
00:28:22.599 --> 00:28:25.359
needed that. It was like the spark that I needed
542
00:28:25.559 --> 00:28:27.400
to just go in the room and do something new
543
00:28:27.440 --> 00:28:29.960
and fresh. I go in the room, I did the
544
00:28:30.000 --> 00:28:32.359
whole bit, and it was like I ended up telling
545
00:28:32.400 --> 00:28:35.759
them real talk, I'm going through this stuff postpartum. I'm
546
00:28:35.799 --> 00:28:38.119
not going to do a smoky eye today. Went through
547
00:28:38.160 --> 00:28:40.079
the whole thing with my community, and I titled the
548
00:28:40.160 --> 00:28:43.240
video just be you and it's walking them through it.
549
00:28:44.079 --> 00:28:49.480
That was the video that HarperCollins saw that then tugged
550
00:28:49.519 --> 00:28:54.440
at their heart to reach out to me. And they
551
00:28:54.480 --> 00:28:57.839
said to me, they said, you know, we saw this
552
00:28:58.000 --> 00:29:01.240
video of yours. Been following you for while, but something
553
00:29:01.279 --> 00:29:03.480
about this video just said we have to reach out
554
00:29:03.480 --> 00:29:05.880
to her right now. And so when they reached out
555
00:29:05.920 --> 00:29:07.960
to me, and I saw the opportunity of like, would
556
00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:10.279
you ever be interested in writing a book at that
557
00:29:10.400 --> 00:29:13.319
time in twenty eighteen, I was like what? Also, I
558
00:29:13.400 --> 00:29:15.720
was like, wait, the only writing I'm good at is
559
00:29:15.759 --> 00:29:18.359
like blog post style. I don't even know grammatically if
560
00:29:18.359 --> 00:29:21.160
I could do this, but I'm down. So I was
561
00:29:21.279 --> 00:29:24.319
very excited. But as I was going through the process
562
00:29:24.359 --> 00:29:26.680
with them, it was a lot. It was more than
563
00:29:26.720 --> 00:29:29.200
what I thought it would be, and I realized that
564
00:29:29.240 --> 00:29:32.359
the direction of where that original concept was going was
565
00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:35.200
so far from what I felt in my heart God
566
00:29:35.279 --> 00:29:37.480
wanted me to share and so it was more of
567
00:29:37.480 --> 00:29:42.640
a devotional style gift book. And that's great, you know,
568
00:29:42.720 --> 00:29:45.359
I love devotional style gift books. But in that season,
569
00:29:45.599 --> 00:29:47.640
the more that I kept trying to do it with them,
570
00:29:48.079 --> 00:29:51.359
I signed contracts, the check was going to come in,
571
00:29:52.119 --> 00:29:54.880
I literally pulled the plug and was just like, right now,
572
00:29:54.960 --> 00:29:57.839
is not it. I needed to focus on my new
573
00:29:57.920 --> 00:29:59.759
daughter at the time, and I needed to hone in
574
00:30:00.839 --> 00:30:02.720
and I needed to ask the Lord and I need
575
00:30:02.720 --> 00:30:04.359
to be like, God, is this actually for me? If
576
00:30:04.400 --> 00:30:06.839
I'm going to write one book in my lifetime assumingly,
577
00:30:07.240 --> 00:30:08.680
is this the book that you want me to share
578
00:30:08.720 --> 00:30:10.640
with people that lives on the bookshelves forever?
579
00:30:10.759 --> 00:30:11.000
Is this?
580
00:30:11.039 --> 00:30:11.720
What did you want?
581
00:30:11.960 --> 00:30:15.319
What did you feel when you knew it wasn't the time?
582
00:30:17.000 --> 00:30:18.960
I think it was when they sent me the outline
583
00:30:19.319 --> 00:30:21.839
of like what after taking all the calls because you
584
00:30:21.880 --> 00:30:24.119
do a lot of calls with the publisher and they
585
00:30:24.160 --> 00:30:26.440
kind of help you so you're not alone, which is nice,
586
00:30:26.880 --> 00:30:29.160
but they kind of like drafted up this little outline
587
00:30:29.200 --> 00:30:32.200
and I looked at it and I was like, Wow,
588
00:30:33.039 --> 00:30:35.960
this sounds really great. But I looked at it and
589
00:30:36.039 --> 00:30:38.440
I was like, but it doesn't feel like it's me.
590
00:30:38.880 --> 00:30:40.519
It doesn't feel like it was written it would be
591
00:30:40.599 --> 00:30:43.200
written by me, and it doesn't feel like it's authentic
592
00:30:43.279 --> 00:30:44.960
to what God is calling me to do. And in
593
00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:47.720
that season, he was now pulling my heart to do
594
00:30:47.799 --> 00:30:51.599
our Good Life podcast. So I knew that God was
595
00:30:51.599 --> 00:30:55.480
telling me, you're You've been a very visual creator up
596
00:30:55.519 --> 00:30:59.000
until this point. He I had specific visions from the
597
00:30:59.039 --> 00:31:02.759
Lord where I saw him removing tape over the mouths
598
00:31:02.759 --> 00:31:06.839
of our generation. I saw all of like millennials specifically,
599
00:31:07.400 --> 00:31:10.519
just tape being like so much tape over people's mouths,
600
00:31:10.880 --> 00:31:13.000
and God said, I want you to remove the tape.
601
00:31:13.039 --> 00:31:15.400
And I thought he was clearly telling me to do
602
00:31:15.440 --> 00:31:18.880
that for myself. So I started to use more of
603
00:31:18.920 --> 00:31:21.359
my voice on my platform. I started to be a
604
00:31:21.359 --> 00:31:25.799
little bit more bold, courageous, brave, And that's when I
605
00:31:25.880 --> 00:31:28.759
launched the podcast with my husband, which was all about
606
00:31:29.839 --> 00:31:32.799
what is a good life? You can't spell good without God,
607
00:31:33.039 --> 00:31:35.519
and we would talk more about our faith journey, share
608
00:31:35.559 --> 00:31:40.720
more of those stories. And so that's when fast forward
609
00:31:40.799 --> 00:31:44.680
to three years later. Even from that, from having the podcast,
610
00:31:45.759 --> 00:31:49.720
that's when the whole concept changed and we met with
611
00:31:50.079 --> 00:31:52.839
the publisher again and I remember sitting in that room
612
00:31:52.880 --> 00:31:56.279
in Nashville, Tennessee. We sat with all the different departments
613
00:31:56.279 --> 00:31:59.839
of HarperCollins, like they've got w books. Thomas Nelson and
614
00:32:00.079 --> 00:32:04.279
I went in there with my blazer. I had my proposal, like,
615
00:32:04.359 --> 00:32:07.079
we're gonna pitch this book that's going to be like
616
00:32:07.119 --> 00:32:10.559
a really cute creative style coffee table book because I'm
617
00:32:10.559 --> 00:32:12.920
an influencer with creatives. And then I'm gonna have stories
618
00:32:12.920 --> 00:32:15.279
in there. It's gonna be really pretty. And when I
619
00:32:15.319 --> 00:32:19.680
went into that meeting with my proposal, I'll never forget
620
00:32:20.000 --> 00:32:23.079
the publisher that we ended up signing with. He said
621
00:32:23.119 --> 00:32:25.559
to me and Stevie, He goes, you know, this is
622
00:32:25.559 --> 00:32:28.160
a really great this is a really great proposal, and
623
00:32:28.200 --> 00:32:31.839
it's a really great book, really beautiful. I can imagine
624
00:32:32.119 --> 00:32:34.799
the visuals of this book. But he said to us,
625
00:32:34.839 --> 00:32:37.839
and this is in twenty twenty, He said, but you
626
00:32:37.880 --> 00:32:42.559
guys have stories. The stories that you have can carry
627
00:32:42.599 --> 00:32:43.759
the weight of this book alone.
628
00:32:44.240 --> 00:32:47.079
Oh and you do. And I said, it's a fantastic.
629
00:32:47.119 --> 00:32:49.160
It was like he gave us the It was weird.
630
00:32:49.200 --> 00:32:51.519
You know, God gives you certain people at the right time.
631
00:32:52.200 --> 00:32:55.079
It's like he gave us the permission to now unravel
632
00:32:55.119 --> 00:32:56.880
some of those stories, and we had been sharing a
633
00:32:56.960 --> 00:32:59.799
lot on the podcast at that point. The podcast, too
634
00:33:00.319 --> 00:33:03.440
helped us sell the book in a whole another way.
635
00:33:03.799 --> 00:33:04.119
For sure.
636
00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:07.039
The second time around ended up being way more successful
637
00:33:07.079 --> 00:33:10.000
for us because we did take a walk, don't run approach,
638
00:33:10.400 --> 00:33:13.200
and I'm glad looking back now that we did that
639
00:33:13.279 --> 00:33:15.400
because the book is everything I would have ever wanted.
640
00:33:15.440 --> 00:33:18.680
And it took five years to it took breaking hour
641
00:33:18.759 --> 00:33:23.039
into the world from start five years. Yeah, but it
642
00:33:23.079 --> 00:33:25.200
was for a time such as this, for such.
643
00:33:25.039 --> 00:33:28.400
A time as this, And kudos to you for honoring
644
00:33:29.039 --> 00:33:31.440
the season that you were in, because I think a
645
00:33:31.519 --> 00:33:33.519
lot of times it's hard for us to honor the
646
00:33:33.559 --> 00:33:36.279
season that we're in when something else looks better or
647
00:33:36.279 --> 00:33:40.160
something else looks good. And now, look, we needed the book.
648
00:33:40.200 --> 00:33:40.480
Now.
649
00:33:41.000 --> 00:33:46.119
You know, you and your family live such a public life.
650
00:33:46.400 --> 00:33:49.359
You guys are very open and honest about your ups
651
00:33:49.400 --> 00:33:51.799
and downs, and you're very vocal about the things that
652
00:33:51.839 --> 00:33:55.759
you go through. How have you or have you broken
653
00:33:55.880 --> 00:33:58.160
free from the opinions of others.
654
00:33:58.920 --> 00:34:00.839
I feel like we are living in time right now
655
00:34:00.880 --> 00:34:05.519
where it is so hard it is hard not only
656
00:34:05.960 --> 00:34:09.400
be yourself in these places in spaces called social media,
657
00:34:09.800 --> 00:34:12.760
but to also share like the convictions in your heart,
658
00:34:12.880 --> 00:34:16.039
the things that you stand behind, the things that you support,
659
00:34:16.239 --> 00:34:19.719
your morals, your faith, all of it. It's all up
660
00:34:19.760 --> 00:34:22.599
for questioning when you put it on social media. And
661
00:34:22.679 --> 00:34:24.719
I think over the last decade of me being in
662
00:34:24.719 --> 00:34:28.119
this space, I have seen myself quote unquote canceled so
663
00:34:28.280 --> 00:34:30.920
many times. And when I look back at those little
664
00:34:30.960 --> 00:34:34.000
seasons of my life, like I remember one time I
665
00:34:34.039 --> 00:34:37.159
did a tutorial and I was just like playing with
666
00:34:38.000 --> 00:34:39.880
well Stevie walks in the room and he was playing
667
00:34:39.880 --> 00:34:42.000
with this accent and I'm not even to get into it,
668
00:34:42.360 --> 00:34:46.760
but the Internet was outraged because of the way that
669
00:34:46.840 --> 00:34:48.920
he was doing this accent and they were just like,
670
00:34:49.199 --> 00:34:52.119
it's like cultural appropriation and all this stuff. And I
671
00:34:52.159 --> 00:34:54.400
remember in that moment, it was like twenty sixteen or
672
00:34:54.400 --> 00:34:57.599
twenty seventeen, I was like, it's over for us, this
673
00:34:57.639 --> 00:35:00.440
is it. Oh my god, people think I'm like the
674
00:35:00.480 --> 00:35:03.079
worst human. I felt so bad in that moment. And
675
00:35:03.119 --> 00:35:06.519
then you see that take shape in other seasons and
676
00:35:06.599 --> 00:35:09.679
other ways as we've grown and adapted right to the
677
00:35:09.800 --> 00:35:13.519
times and what Stevie and I have seen why I
678
00:35:13.559 --> 00:35:16.280
think why we've been able to continue and to want
679
00:35:16.320 --> 00:35:19.079
to continue to put our lives out there on social
680
00:35:19.119 --> 00:35:23.559
media is because we have truthfully learned that it is
681
00:35:23.719 --> 00:35:29.000
not about us, Like God is the one who called
682
00:35:29.079 --> 00:35:32.480
me to follow this path once upon a time ago
683
00:35:32.639 --> 00:35:35.360
for his glory, for what he was going to do
684
00:35:35.519 --> 00:35:39.159
through the platform and through our stories. And that's why
685
00:35:39.199 --> 00:35:41.159
I'm still here. I think because if it was up
686
00:35:41.159 --> 00:35:43.559
to me, I probably would have quit a long time ago.
687
00:35:43.599 --> 00:35:44.960
I would have just been like, let me hoard my
688
00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:47.599
cute little family and join my family, my kids, and
689
00:35:47.719 --> 00:35:50.480
just I'll find another job. I'm so good with marketing
690
00:35:50.559 --> 00:35:52.920
and I love entrepreneur I could be behind the scenes
691
00:35:52.920 --> 00:35:55.679
and help build other people's career like I'm fine not
692
00:35:55.840 --> 00:35:58.679
being in front of it. But time and time again,
693
00:35:59.320 --> 00:36:01.719
the Lord and time I've tried to stray or try
694
00:36:01.719 --> 00:36:05.840
something else, God brings me right back to this whole
695
00:36:06.239 --> 00:36:09.960
medium of content creation, which I love, but I don't
696
00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:12.519
love it when it gets icky or it gets like
697
00:36:12.559 --> 00:36:16.679
you said, hard, and people can be so judgmental. But
698
00:36:16.800 --> 00:36:20.599
what God has given me clarity on is that he
699
00:36:20.760 --> 00:36:23.840
has literally shown me time and time again, like just
700
00:36:23.880 --> 00:36:27.400
like Jesus had to die for us in public, there's
701
00:36:27.480 --> 00:36:32.719
just certain things in what we believe, the desires, the gifts,
702
00:36:32.760 --> 00:36:35.400
the talents that God puts in us that you have
703
00:36:35.480 --> 00:36:37.360
to put out there on display, that you have to
704
00:36:37.400 --> 00:36:40.519
share with others and know that you could get attacked.
705
00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:43.119
But I think as believers, we also know that that
706
00:36:44.039 --> 00:36:46.159
from the moment I gave my life to Christ, I
707
00:36:46.199 --> 00:36:48.400
knew it wasn't going to be an easy walk, yea,
708
00:36:48.679 --> 00:36:51.159
whether it was in my family dynamic or in the
709
00:36:51.199 --> 00:36:55.119
worldly sense. And so I really tether myself to the Lord.
710
00:36:55.159 --> 00:37:00.480
When I feel like offended or attacked on social media,
711
00:37:00.800 --> 00:37:04.119
it's bothered, yep. And every time I go to the Lord,
712
00:37:04.199 --> 00:37:07.119
he just he allows me to be all sturry and
713
00:37:07.159 --> 00:37:09.719
like pissed about it, you know, but then he always
714
00:37:09.760 --> 00:37:12.960
calms me and reminds me like I'm still gonna use you,
715
00:37:14.280 --> 00:37:14.719
to use you.
716
00:37:15.039 --> 00:37:18.000
And I think too, what I've learned, you know, over
717
00:37:18.000 --> 00:37:20.440
the last few years and just in therapy, is like
718
00:37:21.079 --> 00:37:25.880
realizing that the external validation was something that I was
719
00:37:25.920 --> 00:37:28.760
looking for and that I liked and I desired, but
720
00:37:28.800 --> 00:37:31.960
in all reality that means nothing. That means nothing, and
721
00:37:32.000 --> 00:37:36.880
so it's literally debunking and defying my default system what
722
00:37:37.039 --> 00:37:39.280
I used to go to. Okay, well if this is good,
723
00:37:39.280 --> 00:37:41.639
that means I'm gonna have a million million likes or
724
00:37:41.639 --> 00:37:44.960
a million whatever or a million views. And all reality
725
00:37:45.079 --> 00:37:49.079
is like if if your content just reaches one, that's enough. Yeah,
726
00:37:49.119 --> 00:37:51.800
you know, but I had to rewire because it's a
727
00:37:51.880 --> 00:37:55.679
my faking. It's a battle field. And like you said,
728
00:37:55.719 --> 00:37:57.840
if this is what your call to, this is what
729
00:37:57.880 --> 00:38:01.159
you're called to. Yeah, and the external valid means.
730
00:38:00.920 --> 00:38:03.760
Nothing, Natalie, that is That's it right there. And I
731
00:38:03.800 --> 00:38:08.559
think whether you have a million followers or ten, sometimes
732
00:38:08.599 --> 00:38:13.199
we measure ourselves based off of those numbers. And I
733
00:38:13.239 --> 00:38:16.679
think what Stevie and I have learned in this rat
734
00:38:16.760 --> 00:38:20.639
race called social media, like we love it, but it
735
00:38:20.719 --> 00:38:22.800
is like in a way, it feels like you're a
736
00:38:22.880 --> 00:38:26.000
craft Like just like an athlete, I say, like, you know,
737
00:38:26.239 --> 00:38:29.280
has to condition and train to like be at the
738
00:38:29.320 --> 00:38:31.639
top of their game. I feel like with being a
739
00:38:31.679 --> 00:38:35.599
content creator today, in order for you to really truly
740
00:38:35.679 --> 00:38:38.320
survive and to love what you do, you have to
741
00:38:38.400 --> 00:38:40.679
treat it like and it's like it's an art form. Yeah,
742
00:38:40.719 --> 00:38:42.599
And there's times in the craft where you have to
743
00:38:42.599 --> 00:38:44.719
take a step back and you have to go meander,
744
00:38:44.800 --> 00:38:47.440
to be a creative thinker, you know. And so I've
745
00:38:47.480 --> 00:38:49.840
thought of that too, And I think for us, what
746
00:38:49.880 --> 00:38:53.480
we're learning is show, don't tell. So if we can
747
00:38:54.119 --> 00:38:57.159
show our lives, if we can just be authentic in
748
00:38:57.239 --> 00:39:00.519
the good seasons and just be author take in the
749
00:39:00.559 --> 00:39:03.679
hard seasons, and just be real with people out there,
750
00:39:03.719 --> 00:39:09.559
because people are hurting. There are real struggles beyond your bubble,
751
00:39:09.960 --> 00:39:12.239
you know what I mean. And so I'm constantly humbled
752
00:39:12.239 --> 00:39:15.079
by the community that does follow me. I feel so
753
00:39:15.159 --> 00:39:19.199
blessed and fortunate that in the crowd. Yes, there's always
754
00:39:19.199 --> 00:39:24.440
going to be haters, yep, but always it's learning how
755
00:39:24.440 --> 00:39:27.559
to love on those people. And so I've also learned
756
00:39:27.599 --> 00:39:29.760
and when you go in your DMS and you start
757
00:39:29.800 --> 00:39:33.159
to see the when you put something out there, uh oh,
758
00:39:33.320 --> 00:39:36.639
here comes the flood. The floodgates have opened. Everyone has
759
00:39:36.679 --> 00:39:40.400
an opinion. I try not to be bothered by it
760
00:39:40.440 --> 00:39:41.800
in the sense where it's like, when you know you're
761
00:39:41.800 --> 00:39:44.519
being authentically who God has called you to be, you
762
00:39:44.679 --> 00:39:46.840
have to share the convictions in your heart with others.
763
00:39:46.840 --> 00:39:49.679
You have to share the joys, the blessings. But I've
764
00:39:49.719 --> 00:39:53.159
also learned that God is never going to do this.
765
00:39:53.440 --> 00:39:55.800
He's never going to bring you down. God is always
766
00:39:55.800 --> 00:39:58.039
going to call you higher and bring you up. So
767
00:39:58.079 --> 00:40:00.920
when you hear the noise, when you're trying to shuffle
768
00:40:00.960 --> 00:40:03.920
through it all, look for that. Look for the ones
769
00:40:04.000 --> 00:40:07.320
calling you hire. Focus on the good and the positivity
770
00:40:07.360 --> 00:40:08.199
because it is there.
771
00:40:08.440 --> 00:40:11.159
Yeah. Oh that's good motherhood.
772
00:40:12.320 --> 00:40:13.119
Yeah, tell me about that.
773
00:40:13.519 --> 00:40:17.360
You are three little kids. Oh my goodness, they're just little,
774
00:40:17.440 --> 00:40:21.559
cheeky's all the things motherhood for me? God, it has
775
00:40:21.679 --> 00:40:23.320
exposed all of me.
776
00:40:23.679 --> 00:40:25.719
It's exposed all would you say is the best part
777
00:40:25.760 --> 00:40:27.159
of motherhood and the hardest.
778
00:40:26.880 --> 00:40:29.119
Part I want Ooh, she's switching it on me. The
779
00:40:29.159 --> 00:40:32.920
best part of motherhood for me is it's gonna sound.
780
00:40:33.480 --> 00:40:35.239
It goes back to the good and the bad. The
781
00:40:35.280 --> 00:40:40.880
best part for me is undoing and unbecoming the things
782
00:40:40.880 --> 00:40:43.159
that I need to become to be the mother that
783
00:40:43.239 --> 00:40:46.440
made Jones. Needs Wow, that has but that has helped
784
00:40:46.480 --> 00:40:50.000
me in every area of my life, from marriage to entrepreneurship,
785
00:40:50.039 --> 00:40:52.480
to my work, just my being in general. And so
786
00:40:52.559 --> 00:40:55.800
I think after having made Jones, I mean I was
787
00:40:55.880 --> 00:40:58.440
forced to look at all of me. I was forced
788
00:40:58.480 --> 00:41:00.960
to look at every area of my life.
789
00:41:01.360 --> 00:41:01.719
Wow.
790
00:41:01.800 --> 00:41:04.480
And so I would say that's probably the best. The
791
00:41:04.519 --> 00:41:08.360
hardest is the patients working on the patience.
792
00:41:08.480 --> 00:41:11.920
Girl, do you snap? I snap? And I'm like, what
793
00:41:12.199 --> 00:41:12.559
is that in?
794
00:41:12.880 --> 00:41:16.039
I have to go in the bathroom and just fully
795
00:41:16.280 --> 00:41:19.840
process out. And then I us, you got process I snap?
796
00:41:19.960 --> 00:41:22.079
Oh no, no, no, I snapped. But then I after I snapped,
797
00:41:22.079 --> 00:41:24.880
I go, please forgive me. You know you feel convicted
798
00:41:24.960 --> 00:41:25.760
by it, you know what?
799
00:41:26.039 --> 00:41:26.239
Yeah?
800
00:41:26.480 --> 00:41:28.800
Yeah, but I also knew, I mean, if we want
801
00:41:28.800 --> 00:41:31.480
to go there. A part of this me snapping was
802
00:41:31.960 --> 00:41:35.960
understanding that I was my foundation was anxiousness, and was
803
00:41:36.000 --> 00:41:39.840
anxiety and was urgency and was rushing. And so in
804
00:41:39.920 --> 00:41:42.039
that snapping, I'm like, here, we gotta do this. We
805
00:41:42.119 --> 00:41:43.840
got to do that. And so that's a part of
806
00:41:43.880 --> 00:41:48.000
the unbecoming that like I don't have everything is not urgent. Everything,
807
00:41:48.440 --> 00:41:51.599
you don't have to pull from a place of anxiousness constantly.
808
00:41:51.960 --> 00:41:53.760
It's like, in all reality, I just have to pull
809
00:41:53.800 --> 00:41:56.400
from a place of rest, pull from a place of faith.
810
00:41:56.639 --> 00:42:01.159
In my motherhood, so I noticed the way that I've
811
00:42:01.199 --> 00:42:03.719
been with her, and why if I have those moments
812
00:42:03.719 --> 00:42:06.559
of snapping and yeah, we're human beings, We're gonna snap.
813
00:42:07.039 --> 00:42:09.400
But if I'm doing it more times than not, I
814
00:42:09.480 --> 00:42:11.280
have to see where am I pulling from?
815
00:42:11.599 --> 00:42:15.400
Yeah, that right there, because for me, you know, it's summertime,
816
00:42:15.639 --> 00:42:19.440
the kids are not in school, the routines are all
817
00:42:19.480 --> 00:42:22.480
over the place, and the reality is is things still
818
00:42:22.519 --> 00:42:25.320
have to get done. It just piles up on your plate.
819
00:42:25.559 --> 00:42:28.400
And that's where I've had to even take a step
820
00:42:28.440 --> 00:42:31.920
back and really process too. Like that foundation that you're
821
00:42:31.920 --> 00:42:35.079
talking about built on anxiety. And I've learned, like you know,
822
00:42:35.239 --> 00:42:38.719
God gives us a partner in this game called marriage
823
00:42:38.920 --> 00:42:41.599
and life and parenting so that we can lean on them.
824
00:42:41.679 --> 00:42:44.239
And what I have found is that there are times
825
00:42:44.280 --> 00:42:47.440
where I've had to go to Stevie and say, Babe,
826
00:42:47.440 --> 00:42:50.239
I'm at like two percent day, I need you to
827
00:42:50.280 --> 00:42:52.719
carry me through. Or I'll even tell him, I'll say
828
00:42:53.039 --> 00:42:55.320
he'll help me work through. He's like, well, what is
829
00:42:55.440 --> 00:42:58.440
making you kind of like you're little on edge? I
830
00:42:58.480 --> 00:43:01.400
can tell He's like, what is at the root of that?
831
00:43:02.239 --> 00:43:06.840
And for me, I'm realizing is motherhood is over stimulation.
832
00:43:06.960 --> 00:43:08.960
It feels like there's so many touch points. And then
833
00:43:09.000 --> 00:43:12.840
on top of that, when you are also a creative entrepreneur,
834
00:43:13.079 --> 00:43:15.960
you've got touch points there and that you eventually go
835
00:43:16.199 --> 00:43:18.360
may day may day, and you go crazy. And so
836
00:43:18.599 --> 00:43:22.320
I'm noticing the over stimulation. We were not created to
837
00:43:22.360 --> 00:43:25.440
be that overstimulated. Yes, so sometimes I need to just
838
00:43:25.480 --> 00:43:28.599
go away for two an hour. Two hours is great,
839
00:43:29.079 --> 00:43:30.679
but if I could just go away for an hour
840
00:43:30.800 --> 00:43:33.519
to just like check myself, I'd always come back a
841
00:43:33.559 --> 00:43:36.400
better person. And anytime I do snap, because like she said,
842
00:43:36.440 --> 00:43:39.199
we snap. I got the best advice from one of
843
00:43:39.199 --> 00:43:42.880
my mentors and she said to me, everybody snaps is on. Yeah,
844
00:43:43.000 --> 00:43:47.199
And here's the thing you can use that as a
845
00:43:47.320 --> 00:43:50.800
beautiful learning opportunity, even for your kids to see, is
846
00:43:50.840 --> 00:43:52.920
that when you do snap, or you do say something
847
00:43:52.920 --> 00:43:55.599
that you know was not right, that you're convicted about,
848
00:43:56.079 --> 00:43:59.679
go to your child, sit with them and say I
849
00:43:59.679 --> 00:44:02.800
am so sorry that I just yelled at you or
850
00:44:02.840 --> 00:44:04.519
I'm so sorry that I was so short with you
851
00:44:04.559 --> 00:44:06.639
the way that was. They're three or four years old,
852
00:44:06.639 --> 00:44:09.920
they'd be like, okay, right. But what that does over
853
00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:13.880
time it shows them that mom and dad have humility,
854
00:44:14.400 --> 00:44:16.920
that they're not perfect, and neither am I. And so
855
00:44:16.960 --> 00:44:19.800
hopefully it teaches them one day that when they snap,
856
00:44:20.079 --> 00:44:23.119
they can apologize to others and just humbly own it.
857
00:44:23.480 --> 00:44:25.599
So that's what I'm learning because I did not have
858
00:44:25.639 --> 00:44:27.840
that growing up. It was just like mom and dad
859
00:44:27.880 --> 00:44:30.239
say what goes, and it is what it is, you
860
00:44:30.239 --> 00:44:32.679
know what I mean? And so I think just verbally
861
00:44:32.719 --> 00:44:35.800
communicating that for me has been it's helped me sleep
862
00:44:35.840 --> 00:44:36.719
a little easier.
863
00:44:36.480 --> 00:44:41.360
To at night. Lastly, how do you prioritize rest?
864
00:44:41.760 --> 00:44:44.199
Well, that's a great question, and I will tell you
865
00:44:44.480 --> 00:44:47.320
this year. You know, Stevie and I in January we said,
866
00:44:47.360 --> 00:44:50.760
you know, we're going to go ahead and take on
867
00:44:50.840 --> 00:44:54.679
this whole parenting thing and business thing together. So we
868
00:44:55.079 --> 00:44:57.719
kind of like parted ways with the nanny. We just
869
00:44:57.760 --> 00:45:00.079
decided we're going to just take this on. You know,
870
00:45:01.039 --> 00:45:04.320
they're only this young once. Let's just do it. And girl,
871
00:45:04.360 --> 00:45:06.199
a week into it, I was like, really, God, what
872
00:45:06.239 --> 00:45:06.440
was that?
873
00:45:06.840 --> 00:45:07.119
Okay?
874
00:45:07.519 --> 00:45:09.679
But it was obviously very uncomfortable in the beginning. But
875
00:45:09.760 --> 00:45:12.519
what that forced us to do was to really look
876
00:45:12.519 --> 00:45:14.960
at our life from an aerial perspective and say, what
877
00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:18.079
are the things that are inevitable? What are the things
878
00:45:18.079 --> 00:45:21.480
that have to happen on the Monday through Friday schedule, meeting, schools,
879
00:45:21.559 --> 00:45:25.119
drop offs things like that work assignment. But then what
880
00:45:25.159 --> 00:45:27.559
are the things that we need in order to cultivate
881
00:45:27.599 --> 00:45:30.000
our good life right as a family. And so Stevie
882
00:45:30.039 --> 00:45:32.079
and I had to sit down and we had to say, well,
883
00:45:32.480 --> 00:45:35.599
we definitely are going to need pockets throughout the year
884
00:45:35.880 --> 00:45:38.320
where we can tuck away. So that's what we were
885
00:45:38.320 --> 00:45:41.199
doing this summer, going to California, just tucking away. We
886
00:45:41.320 --> 00:45:44.840
carved out that we made time, budgeted all that, but
887
00:45:44.960 --> 00:45:47.960
then on a more granular level, we looked at our weekend.
888
00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:51.480
We said we need a true sabbatical day. And we
889
00:45:51.559 --> 00:45:53.719
had to be super real with ourselves and say, is
890
00:45:53.760 --> 00:45:57.400
Sunday really the sabbatical for us? And I said, honestly no,
891
00:45:57.719 --> 00:46:01.599
because Sundays I already a thinking about Monday. You have
892
00:46:01.679 --> 00:46:07.079
to prepare lunches. So we started making Saturdays our sabbaticals
893
00:46:07.119 --> 00:46:10.400
where it is a complete rest day. I'm not even
894
00:46:10.480 --> 00:46:13.000
posting on social media, which for me is also like
895
00:46:13.079 --> 00:46:15.840
my job, but I'm like, I'm not posting on Saturdays.
896
00:46:16.440 --> 00:46:18.719
Even when we love to be active, we love to
897
00:46:18.760 --> 00:46:21.119
work out, Saturdays are the one day a week where
898
00:46:21.159 --> 00:46:24.559
it's like, no, we're not working out. It is the
899
00:46:24.599 --> 00:46:29.159
one day a week to truly rest, because true faith
900
00:46:29.239 --> 00:46:32.119
is at rest. And so how is the Lord going
901
00:46:32.199 --> 00:46:35.800
to truly operate if panic and worry and go go
902
00:46:35.800 --> 00:46:38.199
go go is in the way. And so that spirit
903
00:46:38.320 --> 00:46:42.480
that God wants to move in and through you, that
904
00:46:42.679 --> 00:46:46.840
rest needs to be in place. All systems go. Rest
905
00:46:47.199 --> 00:46:50.039
allows God to actually move at a faster speed. And
906
00:46:50.119 --> 00:46:53.360
it sounds crazy, it sounds like it really totally doesn't
907
00:46:53.360 --> 00:46:55.480
make sense. But I have found that to be so true.
908
00:46:55.519 --> 00:46:59.079
And then the other thing is our family nights, my mentor,
909
00:47:00.039 --> 00:47:01.719
which I just got a mentor this year. I'd never
910
00:47:01.760 --> 00:47:03.880
had one, so I'm so excited to say, like my mentor.
911
00:47:04.800 --> 00:47:07.800
But she is a woman who has had five kids.
912
00:47:07.880 --> 00:47:09.719
I look at her life and I in her marriage,
913
00:47:09.719 --> 00:47:11.599
and I say, I want to be like you when
914
00:47:11.639 --> 00:47:14.159
I'm fifty, I want to be like you. You figured
915
00:47:14.159 --> 00:47:16.480
something out. So I get on calls with her every
916
00:47:16.519 --> 00:47:19.000
month and I said, what is it about like all
917
00:47:19.039 --> 00:47:21.360
five of your kids, like in their thirties, Like they
918
00:47:21.360 --> 00:47:24.320
all want to come back. They all genuinely want to
919
00:47:24.360 --> 00:47:26.960
come back to spend time with you and your husband
920
00:47:26.960 --> 00:47:30.079
and be with the family. Like that is the ultimate
921
00:47:30.119 --> 00:47:33.039
hashtag goals. Yeah, if you're a parent. What did you do?
922
00:47:33.159 --> 00:47:36.079
How do you do that? She said something that we
923
00:47:36.239 --> 00:47:38.960
did ever and they worked in ministry, but they said
924
00:47:39.000 --> 00:47:42.039
our schedules were always off. It was never consistent. But
925
00:47:42.079 --> 00:47:45.400
we said one night a week was family night. Nothing
926
00:47:45.440 --> 00:47:46.920
would get in the way a family night. And she
927
00:47:46.920 --> 00:47:49.599
said it wasn't larger than life. Like some family nights
928
00:47:49.599 --> 00:47:51.360
we would just get take out and go to the park.
929
00:47:51.679 --> 00:47:53.679
Some family knights we would just watch a movie together.
930
00:47:53.760 --> 00:47:57.199
But she said we had these. It was like it
931
00:47:57.320 --> 00:48:00.679
had to be. It was ingrained in their calendar family knights.
932
00:48:00.679 --> 00:48:02.719
And so Stevie and I have now found like our
933
00:48:02.800 --> 00:48:06.360
family nights are Thursdays when we're at home. And that
934
00:48:06.519 --> 00:48:09.239
is so important for your kids, I think, because they're
935
00:48:09.280 --> 00:48:12.000
going to see that the togetherness was cultivated. It was
936
00:48:12.119 --> 00:48:14.159
very important for us to have that and it will
937
00:48:14.159 --> 00:48:17.800
bring them back one day and hopefully they'll also take
938
00:48:17.880 --> 00:48:21.320
that and carry it on the tradition into their families,
939
00:48:21.840 --> 00:48:25.440
because today families aren't sitting together at the table, they're
940
00:48:25.440 --> 00:48:28.679
not eating dinner together. There's a lot of access to
941
00:48:28.760 --> 00:48:31.360
technology at an early age, and as you know, the
942
00:48:31.440 --> 00:48:34.119
list goes on, and so just to cultivate those little
943
00:48:34.119 --> 00:48:37.119
traditions in your home. I think it's going to make
944
00:48:37.159 --> 00:48:38.760
a difference for generations to come.
945
00:48:39.079 --> 00:48:41.679
And what you said I think is so profound and
946
00:48:41.760 --> 00:48:47.039
so key, is that true rest requires faith, it requires trust,
947
00:48:47.519 --> 00:48:52.559
and I do believe that we accelerate if we prioritize rest.
948
00:48:53.360 --> 00:48:55.679
So thank you so much for this.
949
00:48:55.920 --> 00:48:58.239
Thank you so much for doing this.
950
00:48:58.519 --> 00:49:01.639
I appreciate you. Like I said, I honor you. Thank
951
00:49:01.679 --> 00:49:04.840
you for your wisdom, your clarity, your insight. Thank you
952
00:49:04.880 --> 00:49:08.239
for continuing to be the light that we need in
953
00:49:08.280 --> 00:49:08.800
this world.
954
00:49:09.039 --> 00:49:11.280
Right back at you, let me pingpong that right back
955
00:49:11.320 --> 00:49:14.400
at you. I mean, Natalie, come on, I'm just gonna
956
00:49:14.400 --> 00:49:16.440
take a second, because this is just the Middle Eastern
957
00:49:16.480 --> 00:49:21.360
in me. I met you your I mean, I don't
958
00:49:21.360 --> 00:49:23.360
even know how long ago it was, but you we
959
00:49:23.440 --> 00:49:26.360
reached out. You came on our podcast at the time,
960
00:49:26.519 --> 00:49:29.440
years ago, and I just remember when you walked into
961
00:49:29.559 --> 00:49:33.960
that studio. I just was like, WHOA, there's something really
962
00:49:34.000 --> 00:49:35.880
special about this girl.
963
00:49:36.000 --> 00:49:39.280
Like I need to know her, you know. But sometimes
964
00:49:39.280 --> 00:49:42.280
when you're just you're just yourself. You probably you're just
965
00:49:42.320 --> 00:49:45.880
like I'm just being me. But like that light that
966
00:49:45.960 --> 00:49:49.800
you carry, it just like transpires everywhere that you go,
967
00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:53.679
and so I'm so excited for everything that God has
968
00:49:53.719 --> 00:49:55.320
in the store for you, and I feel like this,
969
00:49:55.320 --> 00:49:56.199
this isn't it for us.
970
00:49:56.400 --> 00:49:59.719
No it's not. We'll be back, y'all. We'll be back.
971
00:50:00.519 --> 00:50:03.480
I appreciate you, I'm so good, love you.
972
00:50:06.880 --> 00:50:06.920
M