What Makes You Come Alive? | The Essential Grace Series, Pt. 1

Ever feel like you’re stuck in survival mode, just grinding through life? What if your deepest passions aren’t distractions but actually divine breadcrumbs leading you toward your purpose? In this kickoff episode of The Essential Grace Series, we’re reclaiming your sacred rhythm and tuning into what truly makes you come alive. 

Drawing from spiritual coaching and soul-deep wisdom, we’ll explore how moments of joy, flow, and deep gladness are more than just emotional highs. They’re holy clues. Whether it’s creativity, service, or simple stillness, your aliveness is not optional — it’s your calling. Get ready to ditch the grind and design a life that radiates the energy of heaven. 

Today’s Reflection Question: 

• When was the last time you felt truly alive? 

Chapters

• 0:00 Happy Monday!
• 6:52 What Makes You Come Alive?

Transcript

Michele: 0:00

It's Monday, May 12th, and this is Today's Kus Word. Welcome to Today's Kus Word, where this week we are launching into a fresh new series called Essential Grace. We're going to be exploring some big life coaching topics this week, like uncovering your values, clarifying your purpose, designing an intentional life, juicy stuff like that. I'm Michele Kus, your spiritual growth coach. Let's get into it. Well, happy Monday. I hope all of you had a wonderful Mother's Day yesterday and we're going to be kicking off a new series this week called Essential Grace. I'm pretty excited about it.

Michele: 0:43

Most of you know, well some of you know, that I got certified in life coaching a few years back and I also have a certification in Myers-Briggs, so this is an area that I really like walking people through is clarifying their values, their purpose and designing a life that feels intentional, rather than just a life that kind of fell together by accident. So we're gonna be talking about those things this week. And here's a something for you to chew on right off the bat. So you were not created to just grind through life. You were actually made to come alive and to light up and to radiate the life and the energy of heaven. Think about that for a sec. So let's be real, we don't always feel that way, right? That we're lighting up and radiating the life and energy of heaven, because sometimes we learn to survive, we learn to adapt, we learn to hustle, we learn to perform, we learn to numb, we learn to people please. We pick up on the cues around us and we adapt so that we feel like we can survive whatever environment we're in, and sometimes we just downright forget who we are or what we actually love doing. I've been through seasons in my life like this where I had to take a step back and think, what do I actually love doing?

Michele: 2:20

Actually, covid, during the lockdowns, was a great example of this, because for most of us, everything was stripped off of our calendars, right? And it was a great opportunity for me anyway, now that my calendar is bare, to think about the question, what do I miss? And what do I not miss? Honestly, I didn't miss going to the gym. This particular gym was just a little bit of an overload on my nervous system and so love the people there, but just the lights and the music and the energy was just a little bit too much for me, and I didn't miss going at all. The only thing that I truly missed during the COVID lockdowns was playing keys on a live worship team for, like, a live service. That was the only thing I missed doing that was taken out of my calendar. So I was like thrilled and ecstatic when I was able to get back in and start playing again.

Michele: 3:26

So are there things like that for you that you maybe even realized during the COVID lockdown era, like, oh, I really missed this, or, wow, I didn't miss that at all? Those little things give us clues in our life and sometimes the most alive parts of us will get buried under a to-do list. Sometimes it's not even our to-do list. Sometimes it's someone else's to-do list or a mental playbook that we have going in our mind, saying I should do this and I should do that. So today I want to ask you a really important question and it could change the trajectory of everything, and that's, I don't know, maybe a dramatic statement, but it does for me and that is: What makes you come alive? So Today's Kus Word is this: I was designed to thrive and come alive! And I'm particularly proud of that Kus Word because it rhymes.

Michele: 4:30

So the theologian Howard Thurman once said this. He said, Don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive. That is a powerful quote. So we think passion is a luxury, especially in our culture. Passion is not a luxury, passion is a clue. It is a clue to the call and destiny God has on your life, the divine design that he's created you with. Your passion is direction and that sense of deep gladness, that spark in your spirit, that is often the Spirit of God whispering to you: This is the way beloved, this is the way I have for you. So we want to pay attention to those things. We want to pay attention to the things that make us come alive, that spark, that passion inside of us. So Jesus said in John 10, verse 10, I came that they may have life and have it to the full. So that's not just eternal life someday out there. That refers to aliveness that is meant for you now, today. That's an abundant life for you now, and it's the difference between just existing and being fully, gloriously, divinely alive. So the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives inside of you. That's in Romans, chapter 8, verse 11. And that means any part of you that feels half alive or numbed out or barely surviving. That is not God's best for you. He's got so much more for you than that.

Michele: 6:52

So think back to a moment. It might be a big moment, it might be a small moment. Think back when you were fully present, fully engaged, fully yourself, and you were fully awake and alive. Where were you? What were you doing? Who were you with? Maybe you were creating, maybe you were resting, maybe you were in an environment that gave you life, maybe you were serving in a way that you felt like you were in a flow.

Michele: 7:40

The last time, for me personally, was when I was playing keys during a service that our church calls a worship experience, and it's a time where we have more songs and like an extended time of worship. And it was not very long ago, actually, and I felt so in the flow during that service and so alive, I almost forgot where I was. I almost forgot that there were people there who were watching and listening and engaging with this music. I was so fully caught up in the experience that I, like, lost myself in a good way.

Michele: 8:27

So how about you? When was the last time you had that feeling? Because that feeling is worth paying attention to. We call that flow and in the kingdom, your joy, your flow when you're in that space, that's not distraction, that is direction, right? When you are alive, when you're coming alive like that, that's telling you something.

Michele: 9:01

So here's another quote. This is Frederick Buechner. He said, The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet. I'll give it to you one more time: The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet. I love that quote. So I want to wrap up here.

Michele: 9:33

This is just the beginning of what I'm calling The Essential Grace Series. This is going to be a sacred, grace-based life coaching journey, just all about designing a life around what matters most to you. And I want to combine spiritual formation ideas with life coaching and some pull on some stuff from essentialism and really help you get at what matters most to you and also challenge you to let go of the extra fluff and stuff that is no longer serving you. Even if that extra fluff and stuff is just mindsets and limiting beliefs, those are very powerful things to get rid of. So we're going to talk through that stuff this week and we're not going to chase hustle anymore. We are going to be aligned and tuning into heaven.

Michele: 10:31

What is heaven saying? Because when you show up fully alive, God moves powerfully through you and his Kingdom is advanced on the earth. Right? Cool! All right. Well, that's what I got for you today, my friend. Make sure you're subscribed and following the show so you don't miss the rest of the episodes, and we will unpack this thing in a fun way and hopefully, in a way that's life-giving to you. Hope you loved this episode. If you did, make sure you share it with a friend, and I will see you on the next one. Have a great day.