069- Stripping Away Idols: A Journey of Surrender with Rachel Meyer

In this episode, Rachel Meyer shares her journey as a mother, entrepreneur, and outdoor enthusiast. She discusses her business, Summit Fit, which focuses on helping women get fit for life's adventures, and reflects on her family's transient lifestyle before settling in Boise. Rachel emphasizes the importance of connecting with nature and how it grounds her faith in Christ. She also shares insights on encouraging children to embrace the outdoors and the lasting impact it can have on their lives. In this conversation, Rachel Meyer shares her journey of embracing outdoor adventures with her family, the lessons learned during the COVID pandemic, and the process of surrendering her idols to God. She reflects on how her identity became intertwined with her outdoor pursuits and how a pivotal moment on a trail led her to reevaluate her priorities. Rachel emphasizes the importance of enjoying the journey, finding peace in surrender, and the transformative power of faith.

@summitfitlifestyle
www.summitfit.com

Transcript

McKenzie Smith (00:04)
On today's episode of my Valley, his victory, have Rachel Meyer. She is a follower of Jesus coffee snob, wife, and a mom of three who calls Idaho home. As an avid hiker and outdoor enthusiasts, she founded summit fit where she helps women get strong and trail ready for their next adventure. When she's not coaching or homeschooling her kids, you'll find her skiing, mountain biking, or backcountry camping with her family, embracing the wild beauty of the great outdoors.

Thanks so much for being with us today, Rachel.

Rachel Meyer (00:34)
Yeah, thanks so much for having me on. I'm super excited to have this conversation. I feel like I've known you for a while with being on social media. So it's just fun to like have like a real life conversation here. So.

McKenzie Smith (00:49)
Yeah, absolutely. I always love getting to chat with people that I'm like, I feel like I've known through social media, but I just get to hear more and more in depth and just learn about you. So go ahead and just share with us a little more about yourself and here you are.

Rachel Meyer (01:04)
Yeah, well, I am a mom of three. Wife, like the bio said there, I had a business called Summit Fit for about a decade. Nothing like super serious, but you know, in my spare time as a mom, that's what I kind of work on doing. And of course, love the outdoors. We've been pretty transient for the past.

five years, which you'll kind of hear a little bit about through the podcast. So we've been all over the place. We've been in the RV, in and out of the RV for like three years, finally like in a house. But yeah, we just love to adventure with our kiddos and yeah, follow whatever the Lord has for us.

So it's kind of been fly by the seat of our pants since the COVID years, which a lot of people can relate with that a lot. But yeah, that's kind of a little bit of what I do.

McKenzie Smith (02:13)
Yeah, so you guys are in Boise now, is that correct? Okay, and you said you were doing the transient thing for a while. Where was the last place that you guys called home before the whole like transient thing?

Rachel Meyer (02:17)
Yes, we are in Boise.

Yeah, we were in Colorado, so actually Southwest part in Durango. We had lived in Colorado for seven years and then moved out during COVID and then ended up coming back. So we did some traveling in the Midwest sort of, but most of our trips were out West in the Colorado, Utah, Idaho area and kind of just bouncing between, between those states.

Yeah, we decided to spend the whole summer in Durango and then head up to Idaho. Let's see, it would have been like late, late fall that we came up here. So yeah, that was fun.

McKenzie Smith (03:06)
Yeah. And

you guys are in a house again, which means you're putting down at least a little bit of roots.

Rachel Meyer (03:14)
Yeah, we have a real life

lease. So we can't move for at least a little bit over a year. yeah, that's, guess, if you're an RVer and you're somebody who moves around a lot, signing a lease will definitely force you to put down some roots and when your children get braces also. Yeah.

McKenzie Smith (03:21)
Yeah.

Okay, good to know when your children get braces. Yeah, I guess you probably

need a solid, like consistent orthodontist for that process.

Rachel Meyer (03:43)
You

do. mean, you can leave like for eight weeks and come back for your orthodontist appointment. But yeah, I definitely want your kids to get older. There are things that, you know, kind of put your craziest adventures maybe to rest for a bit. So yeah.

McKenzie Smith (04:00)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. So why Boise? What drew you guys to Boise?

Rachel Meyer (04:06)
⁓ the community here is just unlike anything we've ever experienced. We are from the Midwest. So, you the Midwest definitely has that kind of Southern hospitality kind of feel still not quite like the South, and we wanted to be in the mountains still because, you know, we were in the mountains for many years and really wanted that again.

But Idaho just had like such a good fit for our family just with the community experience that we've had here. Yeah, it's like the Midwest, but with mountains. So it's like the best of both worlds.

McKenzie Smith (04:45)
Okay, I like it. That was one of the places that me and my husband considered moving whenever we did our little stint too. So I totally understand the draw, but I always love hearing about it from someone else.

Rachel Meyer (04:50)
yeah.

Yeah,

well, Utah is one of the other places we looked at. you know, maybe we'll see.

McKenzie Smith (05:03)
Can't go wrong. Can't go wrong. Yeah. So how old are

your kids? You said you have three. How old are they?

Rachel Meyer (05:11)
Yeah, I have a one year old, just turned one and a 10 year old and a 12 year old. So we have the full spectrum going on right now. Yeah.

McKenzie Smith (05:23)
Okay, okay, very

cool. Yeah, that's like, you're getting into that almost middle school age and then you have a newborn. That's a lot of things happening, puberty and then a newborn.

Rachel Meyer (05:34)
Oh, it is.

is. It's like, yeah, you're really thinking about polar opposite things during the day. It's like my my 12 year old the other day was like, my husband asked him something. He's like, Yeah, I'm just, you know, excited to get my life started. I'm like, What are you talking about? You're 12. I mean, I want you, you know, to mature and all of that. But like, are you ready to leave the house? You know, and then we've got this baby like

walking around, you know, throwing things at everybody. So it's pretty hilarious.

McKenzie Smith (06:06)
my goodness. So talk

to us a little bit about SummitFit and what that is and how you serve people through that endeavor.

Rachel Meyer (06:16)
Yeah, it's it has definitely evolved over the years. But you know, I've always been so big on teaching women how to nourish themselves. You know, you can't enjoy the outdoors and really enjoy life and all the adventures that it throws at you if you are not, you know, you don't feel your best. so using food and what I call my daily power habits to really help people fuel

their life adventures. So, you know, for some moms that just looks like adventuring to the park and hitting the local trails for other students I have, you know, they're literally summiting, you know, 14,000 foot mountains and going on long backpacking trips. so, you know, having kind of a foundation where they can build upon, you know, wherever they're headed with their endeavors. But yeah, so

It's mostly been online, but I've led some backpacking trips in Colorado and done some in-person like sunrise hikes in Arizona and led a few of those. So, but in general, the focus is getting fit for life's adventures. So that looks different for all of my students, but, ⁓ yeah, building those daily habits, I think is just so important for anybody who's into the outdoors.

McKenzie Smith (07:42)
Yeah, absolutely. And where did this passion come from? Is this something that you went to school for, like nutrition and all of that? Or is this something that just kind of evolved over time?

Rachel Meyer (07:59)
Yeah, I've always been super into working out and eating healthy. I didn't eat so healthy as a kid, but I was always into the, you know, working outside of things and did all the sports as a kid. I did actually get a four year degree in nutrition science and started out like as a personal trainer, but quickly realized I didn't want to work in a gym per se. And, know, did.

some other like holistic certifications, you know, kind of took my own path with it. But I kind of converged my love of the outdoors with, you know, fitness, working out, healthy eating, all of that kind of into one, which is where Summit Fit, you know, the name comes from. I got really into like hiking and stuff when we moved to Colorado. So that's when I actually founded the business, came up with the name. So I kind of converged all of those passions.

into one thing. And so that's where that kind of came from. But yeah, it's always been kind of a passion of my life. So

McKenzie Smith (09:09)
Yeah, yeah, no, that's cool. I didn't know if it was something that you were doing before you had kids and then, you you said you did a four year degree in it. So it sounds like that was kind of the plan. And then you had kids and you're like, how can I make this a, you know, more like stay at home mom kind of thing where I can raise my kids and do this. And so it looks like you, you built something that is circulating around your, your favorite things and that's always fun. So.

Rachel Meyer (09:23)
Right.

Yeah, I think I think

a lot of people, you know get their degree and realize a lot of what they learned they don't necessarily agree with nor want to like teach but you know, you have that piece of paper and gotta have that but I I really went with like my own path like after I graduated from college and that's kind of when I tell people the learning started like what I actually teach my students today. I didn't learn in college so I did like a

McKenzie Smith (10:01)
Yeah

Rachel Meyer (10:04)
I did a apprenticeship on the largest urban farm in the United States, which is in Kansas City, and learned kind of like the food aspect of things, like outside of like learning about the USDA food pyramid, which is what they teach you in college for nutrition science, you know. So lots of like really fun things that I was able to learn and experience that I've integrated into my philosophy as a coach today.

McKenzie Smith (10:33)
Yeah, absolutely. So I know that you mentioned that you really like hiking and backpacking. You've led some backpacking trips. Where is one of your favorite places that you've ever gotten to do that?

Rachel Meyer (10:47)
man, so many good spots. The backpacking trips that I led in Colorado were in the northern part of it. I'm actually blanking on the name of the wilderness, Indian Peak Wilderness is what it was. Just like stunning. So those were beautiful trips. But honestly, like I'm a total like desert person.

⁓ and I don't know when that happened because I used to just like, I mean, I still love being in like the true mountains and the pine trees and having like the waterfalls and all of that. But I just loved, we took a trip to Moab. We were in the desert for quite a while last fall and the hiking we did there was just my favorite and I can't like pinpoint a specific trail. were kind of all over the place, but, ⁓ Moab kind of has.

my heart with hiking right now. And we didn't get to explore a lot of the desert when we lived in Colorado, because we were in the Crested Butte area, and there was so much to see there. We didn't get to the desert as much as we wanted to. So I feel like I still have a lot of exploring to do in that terrain. yeah, would say Moab would be maybe a favorite spot as of right now.

McKenzie Smith (11:57)
Thank

Yeah, absolutely. The desert is something I feel like you definitely come to appreciate the more time you spend in it. I feel like there's a lot of people who are like, ⁓ the desert. Why would you ever want to go there? You know, but the more time I spend there, the more I'm just like, man, this place is awesome. And, you know, like you said, the mountains are great, too. It's hard to choose, but there is definitely a respect and an appreciation. And it's different, but the desert is really special.

Rachel Meyer (12:21)
Right.

Yeah.

It

is.

McKenzie Smith (12:41)
I get you. I get you on that one.

So I would love for you to share with us a little bit about how maybe being in the outdoors or being on some of these awesome trips play a role specifically in your relationship with Christ.

Rachel Meyer (12:55)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think, you know, in our digital world where we're so connected to, you know, screens and we live so much of our life in this online space now, I think as an, you know, in this time in my life, the outdoors specifically, like, grounds me back to reality, you know, in both the good and bad, reminding you both of the good and bad, you know, like, things die and...

things thrive and you have some of both and you have seasons that are cold and seasons that are warm and things never stay the same with nature. And I teach this a lot with my students, seasonal living, really embracing each of the seasons and not wishing one of them away to get to your favorite one, but really being in the moment.

the one that you were in. I think being outdoors is just such a good reminder that Jesus is ultimately the author of things and the way that he has set things in motion is the best way. And I think we lose touch with that in our digital life that's...

They're pretentious, you know, in a lot of ways, the way that we live our life, because everything's kind of handed to us, handed to us now. You know, we don't have to go out and get our food. We just go to the grocery store and get it. But when you're out, you know, backpacking, you have hunger pains and you...

you know, have the reality of I don't have a hospital like right down the road, you know, and so those types of things too. I think in just general, we get grounded with the Lord, I get grounded with the Lord when I'm outside. And I get good reality checks, you know, that bring me back to him and humble me in ways that like

day-to-day life maybe doesn't do as much.

McKenzie Smith (15:14)
Yeah, absolutely. I think we have so many things just accessible at our fingertips all the time and we have all this like anxiety and nervousness about things that are.

that are small, you know, in the grand scheme of things. And it's like in the outdoors, a lot of, feel like we get like, it's like a reset button. It's like, no, this is really what you should be stressed about. the daily needs of your life. You know what I mean? Not the, not, you know, the, the, there are millions of random things that we stress about and that we worry about and, and all of the things it's, it's funny. Cause I feel like it's, takes you back to those like.

Rachel Meyer (15:37)
Mm-hmm.

Right. Right.

McKenzie Smith (15:57)
you know, just like basic means, you know, your survival, your food, your water, your, you know, those types of things. so, yeah, I totally, totally understand that. And it it also I feel like pushes us to rely on Jesus more. You know, it's like when you're out there, sometimes you realize like there's literally nothing I could do to change the situation, you know, whereas whereas at home we can like kind of pat ourselves with like.

Rachel Meyer (16:02)
Right.

Exactly.

Right. No.

McKenzie Smith (16:26)
you know, buffers, buffers for certain things. So totally, totally understand that. Can you share a story with us about a way in which maybe God has revealed himself to you or spoken to you through the outdoors?

Rachel Meyer (16:29)
Mm-hmm. Yep. Right.

Yeah, I have a couple, one of them that will probably like be good for sharing maybe a little later in the conversation. But you know, as a kid, I remember I lived on a 300 acre farm. So I was always outside. I probably got in trouble more for not coming back inside for dinner at the right time than anything else that I got in trouble for as a kid. But I would go down.

the road and up this like big hill. I lived in the Ozarks of Missouri, so it's very hilly there. And I would go and sit on top of this hill and that was kind of my spot to go when I had a bad day or just felt, you know, like the world was caving in as you often did as a teenager and you know, all of the things that, all of the tumultuous things that, you know, we go through as kids and teenagers in school and all of that.

I would sit on this hill and like watch sunsets and, you know, just look out over the valley. And I always just felt like I could go there and be with the Lord. And there was just nothing to distract me. know, nothing, nothing bad could happen at that moment. Like that was like my spot of, of peace, you know, as a kid. ⁓ and I think I carried that, you know, into adulthood, you know,

with my time in the outdoors, you know, just really understanding who the Lord is when I'm outside more so than when I'm, you know, distracted with all of the things that kind of life throws at you. But yeah, just maybe just moments of moments of peace that you're able to kind of like latch onto and hear his voice. So I would say that one as a kid could be like my most prominent.

ongoing reoccurring one that I could depend on, you And it's funny, like the outdoors looks so different now. Like I kind of had to get back to that over the last five or so years because the outdoors took on a different look that I don't, that wasn't necessarily a good thing, which I'll talk more about here a little bit.

McKenzie Smith (18:42)
Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (19:06)
when we moved to Colorado and I kind of got into a different realm with how I approached the outdoors. But I think that innocence that I had as a kid with going outside, like I didn't look at it as an Instagram post or, you know, I'm gonna go find the next best place and then tell someone about it. Like it was just me and the Lord, you know? that, don't think I, other than my husband, I don't think I've ever even shared this.

McKenzie Smith (19:27)
Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (19:33)
with anyone that I had that spot. I don't even know if I told my parents like where I went on the farm, know, 300 acres is a lot. So there's a lot of different places you can go and wander off to. But I think as I'm talking this out, yeah, just the innocence that the outdoors had for me to connect with him and no one else and just share that moment, you know, in a relationship with him. So.

McKenzie Smith (19:42)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, you had a go-to spot where you know that you could be, you know, alone and be in silence and be able to connect. And I think that that's, that's really valuable. We all need that spot. We all need a place where we can go and just like unplug, disconnect, and just, you know, sit in.

in peace and you know in just knowing knowing who God is and knowing that he created everything around us and so I think that that's that's really helpful and I can't wait for us to chat a little bit more about that later because I feel like I have gone through a similar season with the outdoors and you know and just like

Rachel Meyer (20:33)
Yeah.

McKenzie Smith (20:40)
It's changed a little bit for me in some ways. And so, I'm excited to come back to that topic a little bit later. Circle back. Well, usually I ask the question here about how to connect with God through an everyday basis in nature, in an urban environment. But I'm going to ask you a little bit different question because I feel like switching it up today.

Rachel Meyer (20:47)
Yeah, circle back.

Okay, all right.

McKenzie Smith (21:06)
I would love to hear how you have kind of...

Let me go back. I would love to hear like a piece of advice or encouragement to a mom.

who is looking to get their kiddos outside because I feel like so many people have really great hobbies. They have really good routines. Kids come into the picture and all of that gets mashed up. And then now going outside is like a hassle, right? Because now we have two extra bodies to wrangle and all of the things. And so just would love to hear some advice or encouragement from you and maybe it relates to

a way in which you feel like your kids are, it fulfills a need for them or you know, it fulfills a need for you to get out there and to take those kiddos into the outdoors.

Rachel Meyer (22:03)
Yeah, absolutely. That's a great question. You know, my first thought is just getting them outside when they're young. Like we took our kids, we actually moved to the mountains when our kids were, our first two kids were super little. So that's when we started hiking. You know, we had never done any of that kind of stuff before. We honestly hadn't spent a lot of time outside doing that kind of stuff before we were in a city. And when we moved to Colorado,

You know, we immediately just started taking them on trails, you know, and hiking, going, camping. And it was difficult. One of our kiddos behaviorally has always been really difficult, just lots of stuff going on. And, you know, the meltdowns were horrific, you know, too, but it lightly, lots of anxiety, lots of struggles, getting

to do what we wanted to do in the outdoors. You know, on the other side of that, he is an avid outdoor person now. I mean, avid. So my point with this story really is just starting young. Like it is harder when they're young, for sure. You've got diapers, you've got nap stuff, you you've got all those different things, but it is so worth it in the long run because that was part of their life. That was...

a normal thing for them, you know, to go on a hike, to be in a tent camping. And even though it felt difficult in those moments, and of course, we had lots of great moments, but you will have hard moments and be like, why are we doing this? What is the point of this? But I think to, you know, pivot, like you don't have to go hike some, you know, grand trail with your kids, like they don't know the difference between

hiking with a beautiful waterfall or going and seeing a trickle, you know, at the park down the hill. They don't know the difference when they're young like that. So it can be simple things that are close to you, local to you. You know, it is exhausting to like plan trips without kids. Then you add kids into it. And sometimes that can just completely deter people.

from taking their kids into the outdoors. So I always tell my clients just find stuff locally because there's lots of great things in your area that you probably don't even know are there and get outside and set just a simple amount of time. Like we're gonna go out for 30 minutes and it will likely turn into like two hours, but it's kind of like a workout, like putting your shoes on and getting out the door is the hardest part.

⁓ it's the same thing with getting outside regardless. Kids are not, you know, just say you're going to go out for 30 minutes and see what that turns into. But, ⁓ one story I have, we took our kids snowshoeing when they were really little, ended up running out of water. We were like the first people on the trail after it had dumped like three foot of snow. was extremely difficult and we had them both on our backs, obviously in packs and.

the kiddo that we've struggled with, you know, was screaming half of the time. mean, just and we had our sister-in-law, my sister-in-law with us and she was like, my gosh, like freaking out like altitude sickness from out of state. So it was just this nightmare. Well, just last month, we took all three of our kiddos, snowshoeing, baby included their new baby and

We had two hours of the most peaceful, fun, like the older two kiddos were just crushing it. They loved it. And I was just reminded again, like, that's why you take your kiddos outdoors when they're young, because they're only going to be young for a short amount of time. And then you have the rest of their life to enjoy the outdoors with them. And it was just like, I was almost like tearing up.

at a couple points because I was remembering like how hard the snow shoeing was, you know, a decade ago and just how fun that trip was. Even with an extra kiddo, you know, we have the experience of, you know, getting the gear on and getting ready because we did that so many times when they were younger. It's just kind of second nature for us to take them out into the outdoors now because we've been doing it so long. So it's both for them to, you know, form

kind of familiar patterns getting outside and also for the parents because loading up your stuff and knowing what gear to take and knowing how to be prepared and not run out of water and all of those things is a whole learning curve in and of itself. And so you're doing it for everyone so that eventually when your kids are a little bit older, it's this really, really enjoyable experience that you couldn't have, you know, otherwise because you'd be.

on a learning curve if you hadn't started till they were 10. So you got to learn at some point. That's kind of what I'm saying.

McKenzie Smith (27:23)
Yeah. Yeah.

No, absolutely. The younger the better. Get them out there and at some point it will be rewarding and it will be peaceful and it will be all the things.

Rachel Meyer (27:34)
Right. Yeah.

And I think sometimes people like, you know, you got to pivot and maybe slow down a little bit. Like kids like to really stop and look at things and really take it in. And us adults, we're like, we have somewhere to be, you know? So I think having kids like really slows you down and you're able to actually take in more of nature than you are when you don't have kids. you know, it's okay to have like a

a summit that you want to get to, but it's also okay if you only make it halfway. It might actually be more enjoyable to do that. just create new expectations.

McKenzie Smith (28:13)
Yeah, absolutely. And I'm sure with you homeschooling your kids, you can also bake some education pieces into those adventures and use it as some learning opportunities.

Rachel Meyer (28:27)
yeah, always. Always.

McKenzie Smith (28:31)
Well, Rachel, switching gears a little bit into the title of this podcast, My Valley, His Victory, would love for you to share, you know, you've hinted at it a little bit already, but would love for you to share a valley or season of wilderness that you've experienced and just what God maybe taught you or prepared you for in that season.

Rachel Meyer (28:50)
Yeah, so like many people, COVID, you know, threw life off of its rocker. And for myself, and you know, honestly, so many people we've met, just such similar like testimonies that came out of the 2020, 2021 years, but the Lord really started to shake us up.

as the world began to shake up. we, like I said, had moved to Colorado. We started in Denver, but then we're in like a small mountain town when COVID hit. And had really just centered my entire life and basically created an idol out of, you know, my whole summit fit, adventure, outdoors, hiking.

kind of identity that I had created for myself, I had turned that into an idol. And you you can turn anything into an idol, right? know, hiking in the outdoors is not like a bad thing in and of itself, but you can certainly take Jesus off of his throne and put that there. I had a moment on a trail where, and you know, certainly things had just been building internally where I knew like,

I was, I was missing the mark with the Lord and I was on this trail and I just was stopped in my tracks and broke down in tears and the Lord just like really was able to get my attention and just, I just heard him say like, what are you doing? Like, why are you on this trail right now? Like, you know, you're just going to post some pictures when you're done for everybody to see your nice trail on, but it's like,

all for you. You it's not, you're not doing this for me. You're not ultimately accomplishing anything for the kingdom in the way that you are pursuing the outdoors currently. You know, it was just kind of that wake up moment of like, I'm kind of wasting my time here, you know, on this trail because it's, it had become a show for the world, you know, like.

my fitness, the vanity kind of piece of it was something I'd always struggled with. You know, fitness and vanity often go together, unfortunately. And then the outdoors played into that, you know, just like, look at me on my trail and how cool I am. And my views are better than yours. And of course I didn't like, it's not like I, you know, said that stuff online, but the heart, you you know, heart, the Lord knows your heart and

I kind of got to that place on the trail that day and completely lost interest after that moment in hiking. I don't think I did another hike that was in the fall. And then we moved out of Colorado that January. I don't think I did a hike till we left. It was just like gone and I had to come to grips. You know, it was lots of processing, but just coming to grips with like, um,

what was the point of it, you know? And I think with COVID, kind of like we talked earlier, the outdoors have a way of reminding you about reality. And I think I had become, you know, detached from reality in a way. And I think the world shutting down brought us back to like things that actually matter. And I had been pursuing things that didn't have eternal value.

I felt dead inside because of it and you know, he showed me, you know, I had that moment on the trail where I saw a different way, you know, to do like pursue the outdoors, but I wasn't currently living that and I had to go through, you know, several years. We moved out of Colorado. We weren't near, you know, mountains. We moved back to the Midwest. We were...

in and out of the RV, super unsettled, both leaving the place we'd been for seven years, leaving the mountains. It was just this total stripping process of everything that I had idolized. I actually got off of social media completely. I didn't do anything with my business. I went totally dark there and just kind of laid those things at

the of the cross and didn't thought that I didn't think about them. certainly had moments of just like ache inside of me of missing the mountains, missing that old way of life that had become so ingrained in my identity. I had to kind of become a new person, if you will. And we obviously ended up back out West, but

It took years to get back here and be in a place now where I don't have this idolization of, you know, posting my grand pictures on Instagram and, you know, having this show for the world. When I go into nature, it really is, you know, kind of like that pure, that purest form like it was when I was a kid, when I was describing being on the hill. I've gotten back to that place with it.

And it's been a weird and wild ride, but like Jesus, you know, is on the throne of my heart now and I have his light and I have his joy and I'm able to actually enjoy like being outside again versus this tension and like kind of darkness that I had in me before, even though I was a proclaimed Christian.

You know, it was just kind of that side dish for me. And it brought me to a place of kind of a really dark place. And I'm so happy that like, it took COVID to wake me up, but you know, we all have that moment of like something waking us up, you know, and that was mine.

McKenzie Smith (35:24)
Yeah.

Yeah. What was it, if you know, like specifically about COVID or like the season of life that you were in?

that, you know, kind of kind of made the switch. I know obviously you had this moment on this trail, but was there was there something something else there that was like causing you to like reconsider everything? I mean, I know we all kind of reconsidered life during COVID, but I hope you understand what I'm asking.

Rachel Meyer (35:56)
Yeah, it's, and it's sort of hard to explain. You know, it was, my husband certainly felt it too. Like we, like both of us just, you know, the clearest way I can describe it is just that we had really reoriented our lives around this Colorado living. And, you know, there were lots of things in our life that just were,

not, we didn't have the piece, you know, that we had had before. Like it had kind of been stolen from us. Like my husband, you know, did a lot of traveling with his job and, you know, made good money and all of that. And we were able to buy like, you know, our dream mountain house, kind of all of the kind of traditional path, you know, that seems.

lovely. You know, have your dream mountain house and your husband has a great job and you know, your kids are at a good school and you know, we were just kind of pursuing the road that, you know, we're all told to take like that'll make you happy, right? You know, more money and a bigger house and you know, better trails and better views. But what we found was it was actually

just empty, you and you can certainly obviously have those things and, you know, have Jesus on your throne, but we did not. And so I think that's the difference is like, we moved to Colorado and had a completely different experience, you know, than maybe some other people have, and we had to be stripped of that. Like we couldn't continue down the path that we were on and

McKenzie Smith (37:29)
Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (37:47)
follow the Lord at that moment. You know, we had to strip that kind of stuff away. So I think COVID just, it just, you know, reshaped life in a way that you had to sit with those things that we had been ignoring for a long time. You know, we didn't have, our marriage wasn't good. And my relationship with my kids, you know, was very fragmented because I was very much focused on the kind of my stuff.

McKenzie Smith (37:53)
Yeah.

Yep.

Rachel Meyer (38:17)
and hiking and my SummitFit stuff. And I was just very much hard as a person. It had hardened me. And I wasn't able to connect with people like I should. So I don't know if that explains it, but it's...

McKenzie Smith (38:39)
Yeah, yeah, no, it,

your eyes were opened because of the situation that you were in and you actually had to, you know, sit with some of the things that had been building maybe for years. But, you know, you just weren't distracted in your normal day life like you were before. And so it was just the, the culmination of, of, of maybe, you know, could have been months, could have been years, who knows, but, know, just, just the situation that you were in.

Rachel Meyer (38:56)
Right.

Right.

McKenzie Smith (39:07)
totally makes sense and I think that you know like we were talking about earlier we're so busy and we're so distracted and we're you know in this digital world and so it is easy to not see some things that are you know cruising down the wrong path sometimes and so

Rachel Meyer (39:19)
Right, exactly.

Yeah, one of the questions that I remembered I was going to mention was that moment on the trail kind of prompted me to think about like, if social media didn't exist, and I couldn't share any of these adventures with people, would I actually still enjoy them to the capacity that I do? Would I go to these places and go to the effort to

know, summit this mountain if social media didn't exist. And it was just something I had never thought about before. And I think that question kind of crystallizes all of it is that I didn't, the online world had kind of turned me into someone I didn't really know anymore. You know, it made me a different kind of human being. And I think,

you know, we all have to face that like reality at some point because we're so connected to it is like, who am I? Like, who would I be if social media didn't exist? And has it turned me into a better person? Or has it turned me into somebody I don't like? And, you know, that's when a lot of people end up exiting it for a while or, you know, taking breaks from it because it's just so hard to detach from that world at times. So

McKenzie Smith (40:41)
Yeah.

Yeah. I would love to ask you if you're comfortable answering. So you had this moment on the trail. I assume you go home and you, you know, kind of talk to your husband about it. I'm going to assume I don't know that, but you go home, you talk to your husband about it. You guys, you know, hadn't really been like living a life committed to the Lord.

Kind of walk us through that process and like, was he immediately on board? Was he immediately like, no, like we like our lives the way we are. Like, what do we have to give up? You know, like, I don't know. Kind of talk to us about that, that season and was it, you know, God was pulling on both of your guys' hearts at the same time or yeah, just, just walk us through that commitment process to like take everything that you guys have been doing and shift it.

Rachel Meyer (41:38)
Mm hmm. Yeah. So yeah, I definitely told them about the experience after it happened. And we had started having more moments of what would it look like to leave Colorado? Because that was kind of the hinge point for all of this was the environment that we were currently in.

And so those conversations definitely started to happen more. I mean, we had just bought like our dream house, uh, less than a year prior to this happening. So we were not planning on moving. Like we were staying longterm in that spot. And so those kinds of conversations started to happen, you know, and he was raised, um, as a believer. I was not in the capacity that he was.

And he had a much

He was still very much walking with the Lord in a way that I wasn't. We definitely weren't doing that together. You know, he was, he was actually reading some really challenging books. He was reading a book by Rod Dreher at the time called Live Not By Lies. And that's a tough book if you've ever read it, if anybody in the audience listening to this has read it, it's a tough book. And it

He was, he had started to kind of talk to me about some of the things in the book and I was, I was resistant to them. Like that, that's too much for me. Like, you know, there was one story in the book where I think it was William, I'm blanking on his name, but he, gosh, what is his, Tindale, sorry, William Tindale. So he had.

The Bible, think correctly, I'm saying this correctly, he wanted to translate it to be more correct with the life of Jesus. And he actually ended up being in prison for that. And his wife, he had an opportunity to get out and his wife was like, no, like, you're not going to cave so that you can just get out of prison and we can

you know, be more comfortable and, you know, be under the same roof again. And he brought that story up to me and was like, what would you do? And I was just like angry. Like I was not in the place where I could entertain ideas or thoughts like that. Like I was very much in the, you know, the Lord had spoke to me. I'm super hard. I'm not open to like following the Lord in that capacity. And he's reading like super intense books.

of like martyrdom and you know like people going to jail for their faith and you COVID is at its peak like we live in a place we lived in a place where it was extremely intense environment like you got the cops called on you if you didn't have your mask worn you know on the street in the right spot or you know it's very very tense at this time and so all of that happening plus these conversations with him you know

we somehow got to a place about three months later where we put our house on the market. So it was intense is like the best way I can, it wasn't this like nice Rosie like, ⁓ the Lord met me on the trail and then I just surrendered everything and it was all happy clapping. No, like we uprooted our entire lives three or four months later, had no idea where we were going, couldn't find a house to rent or buy. Like we were about,

be homeless at one point. We didn't know where we were going. And it was so hard. So there was nothing rosy about it. And so whenever the Lord wakes you up, you know, whether it's whether you've been a believer in and out of the faith, or you're just coming to the Lord for the first time, don't expect it to be this, you know, nice, easy thing. It is

You're literally stripping yourself of the things that you have clung to for maybe your whole life or years and that is difficult. That's why he says like, you know, the road is narrow and few find it because it it's not easy. So that's what it looked like.

McKenzie Smith (46:23)
Yeah, no,

thank you so much for sharing that. you know, just I'm always interested in couple dynamics, you know, in in seasons like this, because, you know, sometimes it's the woman, sometimes it's the man, sometimes God's working on each of them, you know, in their own way.

you know, I'm just marriage is just one of those tricky situations where there's two people involved, you know, and so, ⁓ yeah, I just think it's always helpful to, to hear and, know, it sounds like your, your husband was on a, ⁓ you know, maybe he was a couple of steps in front of you, you know, which is good. You know, he's supposed to be the leader of the household and, know, it's supposed to be, getting leading in that way. And so.

Rachel Meyer (46:49)
Right.

Yeah, for sure.

Right.

McKenzie Smith (47:12)
Yeah, that's really, really interesting dynamic, but thank you so much for sharing. So for a listener who's maybe going through a similar season, you know, and they are struggling with something that they have idolized or they are going through a season of, you know, I kind of know God and he's always been a part of my life, but I haven't like fully surrendered everything to him.

Rachel Meyer (47:17)
Yeah.

McKenzie Smith (47:41)
you know, and you go through that stripping process or you go through, ⁓ you know, just that having to get rid of some of those idols, what piece of advice or word of encouragement would you give to that person?

Rachel Meyer (47:54)
Yeah, one of the verses I kind of clung to during that time, and I'm liking on the reference, but it's in Proverbs. There's a way that seems right to man, but in the end it leads to death. And that's kind of where I had come to. Surrendering it all to the Lord is where life is. mean, the devil likes to convince us otherwise, but you will never find.

happiness or joy or whatever you know you want to call it contentment life you know following your own ways and we my husband and I had we were actually talking about I can't think of anyone's name the football player Tom Brady

Tom Brady did it, I didn't see this interview, my husband saw this interview where he was like, you know, I had it all. Like I got to a place where I had it all. Like I won all these Super Bowls, I had all this money, you know, I've got family, I've got this, you know, nice life. Surely this isn't it, you know? And just like such a cool like thing to see, you know, a celebrity.

pro football player, whatever, stay out loud because so many people are thinking that, but they don't say it out loud. You know, it's like, we're we're just going to pretend that we're happy with this life. But in reality, you know, following Jesus is the only thing that's going to bring you joy. And everybody's life and walk is going to look different as to what they give up, what they surrender. Like all of us have different idols. You know, that's why.

McKenzie Smith (49:24)
Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (49:45)
Jesus confronted the rich man and he confronted people with their specific things that they had going on because for some people money, didn't care about money. And for other people it was relationship and marital stuff. He confronts the things that are on the throne of our heart because until he's on the throne, we're gonna be living in darkness. And we can pretend for a while.

that it's not dark, but you know, like you're dying inside, you know, and you'll get to that breaking point. And unfortunately, some people, you know, just harden themselves and never get to that place where they surrender. But if you're at that place where you're feeling that tug, just like jump in. I mean, it was crazy leaving.

our house and selling it and like having no idea what we were doing, but we just knew like, can't do this anymore. We can't live in Colorado. We can't live in this house in this town. We have to go somewhere. And man, such a hard, but beautiful journey and you know, like the best years of my life for sure. And like,

McKenzie Smith (50:49)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (51:07)
the happiness on the other side, not like happiness like the world gives it, but like that inner peace, you know, that only Jesus can give us. So, yeah.

McKenzie Smith (51:16)
Yeah.

Yeah, I like what you said there at the end about you didn't know where you were going. You didn't know what was ahead of you, but you knew that you couldn't stay where you were. And I think that so often we feel like we just need to know what's next. We feel like we need to know what's, you know, where we're going to go or what we're going to do. And it's like, sometimes you just need to not be where you are. And sometimes you just need to not be doing the things that you're doing. And then that will come, you know? And I think about, I mean,

Rachel Meyer (51:25)
Yeah.

Right.

McKenzie Smith (51:48)
when you said that my brain jumped to like the Israelites you know whenever they left Egypt they didn't know where they were going they just knew that where they where they were was not good you know and they just let followed some guy out to the wilderness you know

Rachel Meyer (51:55)
I would totally.

Yeah,

now my husband brought that up. Like he's basically described the last five years of our life as being in the wilderness, we still feel like we're in the wilderness in a sense. But it's funny that you said that because that's exactly the, that's exactly the story that we have shared over and over. And I mean, the disciples like Jesus told them to follow me, like he literally told them nothing else. And most of them thought he was like insane. Most of their walk with him until he like

McKenzie Smith (52:27)
Yeah.

Rachel Meyer (52:33)
you know, actually was crucified and came back like even even then some of them were like, what is going on? Like you just like that's what following Jesus is like, you don't know what's going on sometimes. But he will he gives you like the peace that you need to have like, you're not going to get like there's not just like one way to do everything, you know, like, I don't believe that everything is just like planned out. Like, I think that there are

pivots and things that you can choose and not choose, but I think he's going to tell you, you know, it's kind of like feeling your way. There's actually a verse in Acts that talks about feeling your way. And I think that's what it's like. But when that piece is gone, I know like I need, I need to pivot, like something needs to move. And sometimes it's drastic, sometimes it's small. And in our case, it was, it was drastic.

McKenzie Smith (53:19)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah,

definitely. And I'm glad that you are, you know, speaking of it too of like, yeah, that wasn't a good season because I think, you know, so often we can, if our season right now isn't perfect and ideal, we can look back and we can start to like,

life was better when I was there, you know, or like you start to forget about the bad, you know, and just like the Israelites did, you know, they were like, why did we leave each other? It's like you are slaves there, you know. And so, yeah, I think it's always good just to remember like that was that was not good for us. And even though we may not feel like totally 100 percent settled and we know exactly what we're doing and, you know, everything feels super right.

Rachel Meyer (53:56)
yeah.

McKenzie Smith (54:11)
We just, yeah, can't glorify those places. But I appreciate you sharing all of that and giving us those words of encouragement and even those verses that you shared there. I would love for you to share with the listeners before we wrap up just where they can find you, where they can find more about Summit Fit and all the things.

Rachel Meyer (54:15)
Right.

Yeah, so I am on Instagram primarily. So SummitFit Lifestyle is my handle there. So that's where I share my day-to-day stuff, recipes, all of the outdoor adventures, all that goodness. So yeah, and I have a website, summitfit.com, but nobody uses websites anymore, okay? Nobody cares what my website is.

So yes, come say hi on Instagram. I would love to be friends.

McKenzie Smith (55:08)
Cool,

cool, cool, cool. Well, thank you again, Rachel, so much for being here and for sharing and for just walking us through this season of your life. And I'm just glad to know that you have committed fully to the Lord and dropped that idol. So thank you so much for sharing that with us.

Rachel Meyer (55:25)
Yeah, thanks for having me. It's been fun.