The Hidden Place: Where Pain Shapes Calling Pt II

Are you working through your healing journey? This mini two-part series is for you! With love, care, and faith in mind--Brittany Janelle and Dr. Dequies reflect on their personal healing journey and share insights from lessons learned. Their goal is simple: to help women navigate The Hidden Place: Where Pain Shapes Calling

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:28

Hello and welcome back to We Sweet Podcast, ladies. This is part two of the hidden place where pain shapes calling. If you missed part one, I really want you guys to pause right here and make sure you go listen to that because the show was so great that we literally paused it and chopped it right in half. So it will feel like you're missing something if you don't catch part one. So make sure you do that. For those of you that are back, welcome back. And we are so grateful that you're sticking with us on this journey. This was truly a labor of love for myself and Brittany. And um, I don't think either of us could be more excited to share the lessons that we've learned as well as our faith. Um, we're certainly not perfect by any means, and we we know that this is just a journey for all of us. What we want to do, though, is invite you into this space, this space of community, of healing, of love and empowerment. So the goal is just to live more intentionally. With that being said, we are picking up right where we left off in part two, which was how can we get God's word in our hearts, hear his desire for our lives more clearly, and how do we really turn pain into purpose? So, ladies, let's talk about it. Yeah, so very first and foremost, for those who are in a church somewhere, like attending, let me not say in a church, attending a church, because we are the church, right? But if you are a churchgoer, let me start with that audience first. Beautiful question. I'm loving this. God cover me in the world. He knew what he was doing. You got a girl. Lord, cover me in what I'm about to say. And and and pause with what I'm about to say, try what I say by the word. Do not just say, oh, the key said this. Try it by the word. But here is what I would say. If you are attending a church because it's your church family that you grew up with, this is my home church. Um, when I went to college, all my friends were going to this church, and we just felt so moved from the first time we went, and we all had a good time. We went out to eat after church, and I just felt so good to call my parents and say, like, in college, we found this church. All right. Um, I moved to a new city, and it was the church in the city everybody goes to. Like it was on social media, the pastor has this huge following, and it was the church to be at, right? I hope you're paying attention to how I'm describing this thing. When you go to this church, what do you feel in your spirit? What are you learning? Are you edified? You know, are you gaining more understanding? Is it a beautiful experience or are you learning? Um, even if your cousin is in the pulpit, right? That's my cousin, my cousin preacher. So of course I gotta go to that church. I can't live in this city and not go to my cousin's church. Are you growing when you come home Monday, not just Sunday, not just Wednesday or Thursday, whenever your Bible study is? Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, every single day of the week. And I started with Monday, but we know Sunday is the first day of the week, y'all. But, you know, do you have a thirst for studying God's word outside of this is the church that everybody goes to in this town? I gotta go. This is my family church, I gotta go, you know. Do you have a thirst to study? Do you feel like you're growing or do you feel like you're still on milk at this point? What are you digesting from the word of God? Do you feel challenged by what you're studying? Do you feel convicted by what you're studying? Do you read the scripture and you read it three and four times and it's still falling on deaf ears? Have you read multiple versions of that scripture? Have you read or passage of that particular chapter that you're reading? How does that apply to modern day right now? Have you sat with other spiritual leaders outside of your home church to get different viewpoints and varying trying of the word? And have you prayed for God to give you wisdom and understanding and clarity to digest his word? Have you asked for God to surround you with iron sharpening iron type of people? Now, I would say if you are a churchgoer, I would start there. Because if I am not growing in this space, that doesn't make the church a bad church. Let me say that. That doesn't mean that that's not a great minister in the pulpit, that doesn't mean it's not a good church family and home, but you need to be growing. If you are in soil and you are not nourished and growing, that's not the environment for you. You you gotta be plucked up and planted somewhere else. You need to be growing. And I would say first, sometimes we are doing church, but we're not learning. So uh the first thing would be that, you know, if we are in an environment that we are not being stretched, we're not being challenged, we're not taking the word and really having a thirst and a desire in our heart to break down the scripture and understand the scripture and do studies on why they say, uh, uh, uh, and then shift to we. That's real talk, y'all. That happened to me last night. I was reading, I believe something, it might have been in Corinthians uh or Philippians, one of the two. And he shifted, he shifted from eye to we, and I said, wait a minute, you gotta catch stuff like that. You can't just read the scripture and say, oh, this would this mean. No, no, no. So I, I, and then shift to we. Oh, yeah, I was in Corinthians. I think I was first Corinthians 13, maybe 12. Don't quote me on that though, but it was a shift from eye to we, and my body was like, oh, wait a minute. It's coming. You got you gotta be able to study. So if someone feels like, but what if I don't, I feel like maybe I got the word of God, but maybe it's not in me like I thought it was. Start with the environment where you're learning and developing and growing in Christ. Are you learning? Or are you a part of the latest Bible study because y'all have a good time? And Sister So-and-so do a good job of just doing the Bible study. You just like her class. Do you like her class? Are you learning? So, you know, I I would start with that aspect first. Now, for people who are not going to a church home or anything like that, they are what the Bible may say wise in their own way because I don't do church, but I read my Bible. Well, there's scripture for that. You're wise in your own way. Um, and I'm not trying to be me. I'm just, um like, I'm just gonna give it to you straight. So I definitely feel like you need to be surrounded by the body of Christ, you know. Um, and I'm not speaking to people that's on a pew Sunday to Sunday. I understand people are doctors, I understand people are um, you know, might be entertainers or in just certain career career fields where, you know, every single Sunday at a church, they may not, you know, they may have to shift their schedule and all types of things. Um, but I'm saying that you do not intentionally isolate yourself to learn God according to how you want to learn God. I'm speaking to that group. I think that you definitely need to make sure that you're surrounded by the body, um, so that you can you can receive support, you can receive instruction, you can receive guidance, you can try the word because you're able to learn in a community of of other believers. So if you feel like you have the word because you read your Bible, reading and digesting the wisdom of God is not the same thing. So I I would say that, and I think experience as well is the third one. So those were the first two of just how do I know I'm even in an environment to cultivate learning. The third one that I would speak to is experience. And this isn't something you can bypass. This is something that you have to live life. Um, this whole conversation we're having today is by way of living. Yeah. I can't help a woman experiencing emotional pain from a relationship when I really haven't lived that life. I can encourage her, I can try to empower her with my words, I can even comfort her with my arm and my hands and holding her physically, but unless I have felt that pain, there's only so far my words and my arms are gonna reach into the depths of her experience. So the other part is like you just can't expedite it. You know, it's like being a baby. You you can't go from, you know, learning how to crawl and walk to just being 15 years old. You gotta go through the adolescent stage. There's pieces of the adolescent stage you need for age 15 and 16. You know, so I think you have to have you have to have the experience. The word comes to you because God sharpens you through experience.

SPEAKER_03 10:26

That's that's really good. And I think one other thing that I also want to add to that when you're talking, relationship just came to mind. And for me, what I personally think about is my relationship was strengthened through my prayer life. And I previously used to feel pretty intimidated to pray in front of other people or even by myself, to be honest with you, because I'm like, what do I even say? Right. But then once I start to build the relationship and just understood that I can just talk to God, right? Before I do anything now, sometimes I'll feel like little things just creep up on me and I'm like, nope, God, you have not given me the spirit of fear. It's one of the first things I say, right? And as I'm able to continue to apply his word into my life and just prayer life, that strengthens me and it strengthens our connection. So that's the last thing that I want to add to that.

SPEAKER_02 11:12

Yeah, no, I think that was a good spot for us to kind of slow down and deal with because it's true, like not everybody really feels like they're at a strong space in their faith. And even those who may feel strong, there's gonna come a season where you don't feel strong. It's it's a you know, it's a constant sanctification process. So uh I think it was good for us to slow down there to say, how do I know I'm I have enough of God's word in me to discern truth? How do I know I have enough of God's word in me to try it by the word? And um, I think it's also important, as much as it's important to be around a body of believers, it's also important to know when God is calling you to stillness. It's also important to know when God is saying you have too much of the world's voice, you need to only hear my voice. And the only way for you to do that is just to fast and be with me. Be with me. There's there's scripture for that. It's a lot of times in the Bible where God took some of the leaders that he grew up into kings and all sorts of things, or queens, you know, Esther, hey girl. Uh there are seasons where God had to isolate and prepare them. And so sometimes you gotta pull away from the world to go through that sharpening process and really sit with God, not well, this is what my mom is telling me to do, this is what my dad is telling me to do, this is what my sister and brother are advising me to do, this is what my minister is telling me to do, um, or my, you know, church leader that's a part of my small group is is taking me on and discipling me through some things. And so I just really trust them. Let me call them and get their opinion. When you are at a space where all of these voices are drowned out the Holy Spirit within you, and I think that's a sign. When the Holy Spirit is not ringing as loud for you, but the voice of others is, that's a time to kind of pull into isolation and say, Okay, Holy Spirit, have your way with me. And this is this is so important. It's a very hard thing to do. And I I just did it recently. It's a very hard thing to do to say, God, search my heart. To pull into isolation and then say, God, search my heart. And it's hard to do because God will show you you. And I don't know if you are like not want to know. He will reveal to you some of the um immaturity still in you, emotional immaturity. Um, you know, like going coming back to the the relationship conversation, like if you are constantly like calling somebody, blowing up their phone, you have anxiety, you're triggered by this person, God will show that level of immaturity in you. And and that really brings me to my next thing I wrote down while you were talking, honey, was can you sit with yourself? So we started this conversation dealing with the silence and and how God uses the silence as just kind of that sanctification process. And sometimes one of the biggest issues, particularly with women, I can't speak for men, is a lot of women, especially from emotional pains, struggle to sit in silence with themselves. Silence is the loudest place where your fear and your anxiety magnify. And you become hyper-vigilant, you go down this rabbit hole of thoughts and ideas and the assumptions and beliefs, and the pain magnifies. And what you experience, not only you have the pain from the experience, but now you have the pain from every other conceivable thought popping up in your head. And sitting in that silence, it feels impossible to do. And so you may, you know, try to call a friend that day. Friend don't answer the phone, may call a parent today, parent don't answer the phone. Decide, okay, let me go to brunch with friends. I gotta get out of the house. I can't keep sitting up in here. No, this ain't like I'm done being sad. You try to go to brunch today, nobody available. Then after that, you say, okay, well, what's going on down here at the church? Let me just go down there for a few hours. I go be in the house of God and get a word, and I'm just feel better, right? And you do all of these things, and even whatever was supposed to be going on at your church got rescheduled or whatever it is, and you like, oh my gosh, like, ain't nothing available today? Nothing? I gotta sit here. And that is your opportunity to realize that God is saying, come close to me. Getting your attention, close to me, everything and everybody else that you're trying to zone out with or numb out with, emphasis on numb out, because you don't want to sit with yourself. You don't want to sit with your pain, you don't want to sit with your thoughts and the anxiety and that your chest is rising and falling, and then the behaviors start. The behaviors to, okay, I gotta call this person, you know, I gotta text him, I gotta, I gotta, and especially if you're done with the person, you know, and this is early healing stages. We're not talking about the people who kind of veterans in this thing because you like, I ain't calling that man. But the early stages, it's like, okay, well, let me just call him, let me just reach out, and you're in the early stages of where you haven't fully released that. So sitting with yourself in the silence is a lesson in and of itself. God will allow, my belief is that God will allow a season of stillness and silence. Catch this, to see where your dependency really lies.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

Girl, that's the one. You guys rewind that. Just say it one more time. Say it one more time.

SPEAKER_02 17:18

You know, I really want people to understand that I ain't I'm not perfect. I want them to understand that this is coming from lessons, okay? So, yeah, um, when you can't sit in silence, when your anxiety stirs up so bad that you become reactive in your communication style. You need to call, you need to text, you need to strive, you need to chase, you need to try to put a band-aid on the situation, whatever it is. Um, or you just desire the support of your community, even if you're not contacting the man, whatever that may be. And then you go through those early stages of the healing journey. You're no longer even in communication with this man. You've totally blocked, cut him off, whatever the case may be. But now you're in the waiting of just the desert season where nothing is growing. I haven't met anyone new. Um, it just feels quiet. I I just feel like I can't even start a new project idea. I just I'm in this, I'm in this just quiet space, and heaven feeling feels so loud and silent at the same time. This is the space that God intentionally will not, he will not do anything miraculous for you to feel his presence. One, because he's teaching you how to have faith beyond what you see. Because sometimes it's like, girl, I had a dream last night, or I talked to someone in the grocery store and I know that was God. And then sometimes you're praying, God, just I need you to show up in my season right now. Like I'm in so much pain, I just need you to show up in my season right now. Like, if I could just hear a word from you today, Lord, if I could just, and you're just searching for God's presence so much, and you just feel like okay, he's just not answering me at this point. No, the answer is there. The answer is you cannot receive yet what you're asking for because you have not learned where your dependency lies. So if your dependent, let's make this practical. If your dependence lies on whether or not this person calls you back, the dependency is not on God. If your dependency lies on whether or not, you know, a friend shows up for you, a parent shows up for you to comfort you in that moment, nobody is here for me. I've been here for all these people and they were struggling. Now I'm going through something, they're not even answering the phone. Who are you dependent on right now? God has a way of pulling everything away to teach you that everything that you're striving after to be there for you, to support you, to love you, to say the right thing, to give you encouragement, to give you advice is not there on purpose for a purpose. Well, it's the dependency. You have to learn how to sit in stillness and the weight of God not really releasing your overflow and was meant to come for you, the new partner, the new husband, whatever it is. You gotta learn to sit in silence. One in a posture of thanksgiving and praising him for what he has already done and what you know he will do. You gotta learn how to sit in, you said it earlier, gratitude. You gotta learn how to sit in gratitude. I think it was after the forgiveness piece you said gratitude. You gotta learn how to sit in gratitude. Then you gotta learn how to sit, sit, and surrender. That's another good word, says that's a whole nother one. That's a whole nother one. You gotta learn how to sit and surrender. Surrender is God, even if I do not get the thing I think I want. I still walk with you. If I lose friends, I still walk with you. If I gotta let this relationship go, and that means I gotta give up the life that I was building, I gotta live, I gotta give up my community, I gotta give up my old friends, I gotta give up even the people that was attached to him, his family members that I bonded with. I might have to pull back and give up some of that. I will walk with you. If I'm walking through the Sahara Desert and it ain't nobody but you and me, I will do that. There has to be that level of surrender, not okay, God, I'm gonna surrender this season of my life to you, but I'm gonna do it if you give me the thing that I'm asking for. No, even if you don't give me what I'm asking for, even if this relationship if the new relationship don't work out, I'm good, God. If the new you know, marriage don't work out, I still am walking with. If you there has to be a level of surrender at that point. And I'm going to tell you something, that is one of the hardest things that a person can do. And it's one of the hardest things that a person can do because it is as far as sanctification, becoming more like Christ. We know we will never be Christ, but it requires you to love the way God loves. And his love was sacrificial for us. So what am I willing to sacrifice? What am I willing to release? What am I willing to give up? And what am I willing to give up even if I don't see nothing else coming?

SPEAKER_03 22:36

Girl. Okay, I gotta ask something real quick. It's interesting because several years ago, I remember there was something on uh social media about this little girl holding this teddy bear, and um God had a big teddy bear behind him, and she was like, but I wanted God, yeah, right? Yeah, and that's what I think about with surrender. Sometimes we want something so much, but it's like if we just surrender to what to surrender to God, he has so much more in store for us. It's not even always about like what we should receive, but it could just be like a lifestyle, a mindset, all these different things. So it's like whatever you're holding on to so tightly, just surrendering to God, and he will guide your steps in the way that you're meant to go.

SPEAKER_01 23:23

Hold on.

SPEAKER_02 23:24

We we we can go and listen. This is so this is so much built work. This is built work, you know. This was brick by brick by brick of silence, okay? This is not coming from oh my gosh, like, you know, you you're just the best like coach ever. Like, no, this is this is coming from brick by brick by brick, and this is coming from, you know, for me, 10 years of silence.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

Can you sit through 10 years of silence? Can you sit through 14? Can you sit through 15?

SPEAKER_02 24:08

Can you sit through 20? Can you sit through 40? There, there, there is something that happens to you in the silent ground where it feels like absolutely nothing happening. And I'm gonna give another example because so many people do talk about the teddy bear, and so many people also talk about the seed. The seed underground that you see nothing above ground, but what is happening underneath the roots, and they've been spreading for a very long time, but there's nothing above ground. You could be standing there checking uh this month, next month, the next month, the end of the year, you might see a little peg of a leaf, but underneath the roots have stretched very far wide. Because if we see the stalk of the leaf just pop up and there's no roof, soon as the rain comes, what's gonna happen? So, so we we talk about these examples that most people you know are familiar with or know because it's so real. But if you can't sit in silence and and you are striving after other things to fill the void, some people numb out with sex, some people numb out with how many girls they can get, how many men they can get, some people numb out with spending money, they're just they're just having their best life. They just travel, travel, travel. Nothing wrong with that, nothing wrong with a good travel now, honey. Nothing wrong with that. But when you are not even stewarding your money anymore, like you're you're just numbing out, you know, like I I I can't feel anything right now, so I'm gonna numb out with all this other stuff. Um, and that's that's that's for the people who take that approach. Not everybody takes that approach, other people take their approach of no, I'm gonna still study my word, I'm gonna still try to heal from this thing, I'm still gonna go to church, I'm still gonna do the things, but you still may struggle to sit in silence, even if you're not numbing out, because you are striving in your heart and even in prayer to God. God, I just want this, I just want this, I just want this, I just, God, if you could just make this happen, I'm just ready for my husband, God, I'm just ready for my children, I'm just ready for my family. And so now you're not the person numbing out through six, you're not the person numbing out by blowing your money all over the place, but you might be the person that is still striving from a place of not surrendering. So even what you think looks like the right posture, even in that, you're still growing, you're still learning, and he's still pruning something from you. And sometimes you got to give the desires of your heart over, you know, to him. And people love to say, you know, oh, well, the Lord will, you know, fulfill the desires of your heart. Yes, God will fulfill them, but he will fulfill them according to his will. So align your desires with his will. Um and so I definitely think can you sit with silence is one of the biggest questions of the healing journey and the waiting season because it shows you where you are dependent. And most times when people are in that space, it's not God, it's not Him, it's anything, and it's conditional. Sitting in silence teaches you how to love the way God loves. It pulls you from those early attachment styles that we talked about, you know, anxious attachment, avoidant attachment, uh, fearful avoidant, also called disorganized, you know, like you will you will attach in an unhealthy way until you learn that your dependency isn't attached to the person or this freedom of this fear of your freedom. You will learn that your wholeness is in God and your dependency has to rest there, regardless of someone else's someone else's actions or inactions.

SPEAKER_01 28:08

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 28:14

There's only one other piece to what you said. There's only one other piece. Oh, go ahead. And that was obedience in small spaces. You talked about obedience with the small things. If we don't have obedience, which I also there's obedience and then there's like the close line of stewardship. If we don't have obedience and stewardship with little, why would God give you a relationship to steward, a husband, a chick children from that partnership? Why would God build any of that in your life or in our lives, right? If I can't practice obedience in this season?

SPEAKER_03 28:58

The thing about obedience is that most times it feels so uncomfortable. I did an episode a few weeks ago on my platform called Unlearning Survival, and it was so uncomfortable to do this that several times I almost want to be like, yeah, no, I'm not even gonna do it. But a lot for real. But here's the thing though, when God is telling you something, a lot of times it's not just for you, it's for other people, right? Yeah, sometimes you don't know who needs to hear what God is putting inside of you. You don't know who's gonna be blessed by what you have to say or what you're gonna create or what you're going to do, right? And for me in that moment, after the fact, I was like, God, I see what you were doing. I see what you're doing. Dakis reaching out to you a few months ago, I was like, lying, it makes sense. But the conversations that you and I have had, we touched base a couple couple weeks ago, and after we had a teens call, um, we spoke for maybe two hours after that. Just connecting, right? And I'm sitting here now, like, oh my gosh, God, I see what you were doing.

SPEAKER_02 30:14

So it's it's so much that people don't even understand about the the moment right now, the seed of right now. Um, we did talk for two hours and lots of tears. Just just it really burnt this show. And you reached out to me on faith, right? And I reached out to you again on faith. On faith. I just remember the show that we did before and the conversation we had after, my heart was so pricked, and I was just like, God, there's more to this. And I searched you for it. Like, if you desire for me and Brittany to have another conversation, I need you just to give me the sign. I was standing in my kitchen and I was like, I just need you to give me the sign. Like, if there so much happens in the kitchen. If there is another conversation that I'm meant to have with her, and if there is like community and sisterhood that I'm building with her, I need you to make that known to me. And I think maybe an hour or two later, I opened up my business page on Instagram, and the very, you know, your feed, the very first thing on my feed was you. And I just looked up to the ceiling and I was like, message received. And I said, okay, God, I'm gonna reach out to her today. I'm gonna, I'm gonna make the pitch and and just let her know where my head's at. And so I sent the message, and it was so beautiful, even from that message, um, of just talking about what we wanted to talk about, and we felt so much fire that it happened like within the week. And and um, this is where I might, I'm trying like I feel myself getting emotional because my heart really wants to help women. Your heart really wants to help people, wants to help women. And so many people walk around with so much hurt that they've experienced and not feeling like they're understood in that pain. And that why did I have to go through something so heavy? Why was this so hard? And will I ever feel better? Will my triggers ever leave? Will I ever, and it's it's just this constant weight, and I know I wanted and you wanted to bring light to such that dark space, and I just felt it immediately in our first conversation where I felt God doing something, and I didn't know what, you know, I still don't fully know what, but I know that God is moving, and so my hope is not that people think we've got it all together or that our faith is so strong and we're this like whatever. My hope is that people say, I feel seen, I feel understood, and I'm not in this by myself, and I will get through this. That that is my hope for women everywhere. And um I think that there's more to a person's story than the deepest hurt, and we can't live forever in the hurt. It does take time and we have to move at our pace, but we do also have to ask ourselves the question, what is God doing? Um, and that really brings me to you know another question, Brittany, which is how do we separate who we are from what happened to us?

SPEAKER_01 34:19

That is such a good question.

SPEAKER_03 34:22

Um, I would say how we separate it is by honoring our story. I for a long time was so embarrassed by my story. I didn't want to tell it, I didn't want people to know. And then I got to a place where I'm like, okay, now I'm sharing my story so much. Am I doing too much, right? But honoring what's made me me. And that's the advice that I would share with anybody. Because the thing that we've been talking about throughout this entire thing is certain things happen in our life to help get us to where we need to go and where we need to be, right? I was not this Brittany three years ago, and I feel like I'm about to get emotional. Um, but I'm so grateful for it because I can sit here now and I'm just like, God, I see what you're doing throughout it. Throughout all the tears, throughout all the pain, throughout how I felt about myself. I see what you were doing. Yeah. You know, and that's how I'm able to see my story as something so beautiful now, because I'm able to give back and help other people, right? And I feel like I'm losing track training thought of what you specifically asked me. But I would say that that's the biggest thing by honoring my story and continuing to tell my story, because in my story, God will always get the glory. Amen.

SPEAKER_02 35:51

Amen to that. Yeah. Um yeah, this this is deep. This is deep. So, how we don't let basically the pain just become who we are, how we kind of move beyond that and not let it just be our essence. And I think that we can't be afraid of the truth. Because the truth is what built you, and um, you know, I'll be honest, this episode I was very nervous and afraid to do. I was very nervous and afraid to do because it was very hard to come out of some of the pain that I experienced. And I did not want that to get the glory. I did not want the pain that I experienced to be what was positioned on the mic as the result. Yeah. I I I experienced that, and I can speak to that as by way of an example. Um, but I I was like, Lord, I want to help women, but I don't want to help them by building off the back of someone else. Like, that's not what I want to do. And so it was very challenging to get on here and do this. And for a long time, you know, I've had We Sweet Podcast for a couple of years now. For a long time, like I just never wanted to have that conversation. Along with some shame, you know, of course, because there is embarrassment. There is like, you know, people taking your story and creating their own version of it too. Um, or people projecting onto you how you may feel now or what you may still be feeling. And, you know, the little warrior prince is still in there, y'all. So don't get twisted. Right. It's just like you don't get to tell my story, you don't get to tell me how I feel, you know. So I was just very careful with how to even approach this show. And of course, you know, people they they didn't see before we hopped on here. We both were touching an agreement in prayer, but it's it was really, it was really, this show has been done with the most care, the most amount of intentionality that we could bring to it. But it was tough because I know that I did not want things from my past to be what this show is. I knew I wanted to be what God is doing in your waiting. And the only way to tell you that was to tell you me. The only way that was to tell you what I went through, what I experienced. And there was a lot of just hard, hard moments, a lot of sadness, a lot of feeling like this pain will forever be with me. And um, that dealt with the forgiveness, um, that dealt with the being able to sit in the silence, but reshaping the pain, not as where you live, but what birthed the version of you today. So I definitely think being able to speak from that is healing. Being able to see that this was the thing that, you know, was hard for me. Um, and then being able to move from that and highlight what God was showing you. What God and you said something, you said something earlier. Um, much, much earlier, you said uh that you got to a point in your healing journey where you were like, maybe I don't need to be too kind, maybe I don't need to always try to be so helpful to others, or or you know, and I felt that. I felt like, you know, you're you're too empathetic, you're too, you know, and you get into this different dynamic of being too much and not enough all at the same time. And so that is where too, a very pivotal moment in the healing journey, um, that you have to realize that the enemy's voice is there. You got to recognize that it's not God's voice, you gotta recognize if the enemy is telling me these things, then how much greater is my purpose in life that he wants me to believe that? Because you are this empathetic, soulful being, caring, helpful, nurturing being, because that is the ministry. The ministry is that you go out with that heart and you help other hearts that are in a deeply hurt space. The thing that I've guilt tripped in myself for, you know, picking up the folks who was going through something and trying to heal them through it. Like back then, yeah, back then, but being in that space and learning how much I was over-functioning, right? That was the lesson. The gift is always the gift, it's not the problem, it's not the burden, is learning to exercise and steward the gift. So maybe I really tried to like make this love work out and it just was not pouring equally back into me. The the gift is that you have the capacity to love unconditionally. The gift is that you can see people at their highs, their lows, their their strengths, their weaknesses. The the gift is there, but you gotta learn to steward the gift, or your ego takes place instead, and then you start becoming in the role of God. You cannot be someone's savior, and someone can't be your savior either. Yeah, so when you learn that these relationships had to break down and fall apart because it was strengthening and sharpening a discernment within me, it was showing me where I was over-functioning, it was showing me where I was over-giving, it was showing me where I was trying to take a seat that did not belong to me.

SPEAKER_01 42:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:53

And once we have that, then we understand that the gift is not the problem. Learning to steward the gift is what has to happen. And sometimes you got to go through your crushing experience to learn that.

SPEAKER_03 43:12

One thing I want to say real quick, even about gifts. I just thank you as we talked about obedience for your your obedience and even reaching out to me and proposing this idea because you didn't have to, right? As you mentioned, that it was you were a bit afraid to even have this conversation. But I sit back now and I reflect on this conversation, and it's just been so beautiful, right? Your gift is so beautiful how you're able to connect with people, and even how you mentioned like you didn't necessarily want to even share parts of your story from the past. But this is what people need to hear. I feel so connected to you just by the things that you've shared and how you've been able to just speak, and I feel like you're important into me just by sharing your. Story. So just don't allow certain things like fear or worry or what certain people may say, do, whatever. Let that happen. People gonna talk, people gonna do whatever, but your gift is so important and people need that in today's time.

SPEAKER_02 44:19

Sister, sister, likewise, likewise, um part of the strength in being here was because of who God partnered me with to do this journey, you know, like the things that you're sharing, the things that I'm sharing. There is somebody that is ready to tap out. But because we are on a side of it that they will get to, we're still going through some things, right? But we are on a side of it where we can at least be here to talk to you. You know, we're not under the bed today. So uh I feel like there's somebody that can see and hear where we are and say, okay, if they felt this low, if they felt this shame, if they felt this humiliation, if they felt this weight of the pain, and they're they're here to do this today, I can get that. And they can. And so I thank you for seeing that in me, for loving on me, for um, you know, continuing to pour into me against my fear. Because when you get platforms, your fear does not stop. It increases. When your audience grows, your fear increases. You know, it's it's it's your faith has to increase more, though. So just as much as that fear is kind of back there, you gotta, as they say, do a scare. You gotta walk, even though you don't know halftime where you're walking to. Um, and that is to me the beautiful thing is that your surrender is where God's glory just shows up so beautifully. It does. So thank you, thank you, Brittany. And I I'm gonna I'm gonna end us out with this last one, um, which is still kind of a big one. And it is why does healing so often feel like you're falling apart instead of coming together?

SPEAKER_03 46:19

Um I would say from my experience, it felt like I in the moment, it felt like things are falling apart because kind of what we talked about previously, it was going against the will that I have in my life.

SPEAKER_01 46:34

Right.

SPEAKER_03 46:34

And I only talked about relationships, but I've had trauma in multiple different areas of my life. And every time I experienced something that was heavy, it's like, well, that's not what I envisioned. This wasn't supposed to be my story, right? That was a mindset that I had and a lot of the heaviness that I had to endure. And that's why it felt like for me that things were falling apart, and I think like how I was able to maneuver past that is just by sitting in it, everything that we already talked about and having faith. As I mentioned, I grew up um going to church, right? Christian. Um, but I personally had to get to a place of having my own faith to know that God is showing me something even in the midst of this storm. So it may have felt like it was falling apart, but I had faith big enough to know that God showed me certain things. It was crazy because when I was a little girl and uh girl, I I swear I didn't like cry like this mess.

SPEAKER_02 47:37

But I used to tell my mom. I've been tearing up. It's okay, it's okay.

SPEAKER_03 47:43

I've had to sit here and just pause halfway through statements to get through this. Man, I remember I used to tell my mom, mom, I see visions of myself speaking to people and even interviewing people, like very specific things, even when I was like 10, 11 years old, and I never understood it, right? So to be at this point now and to be like, God, when I felt like I was at my lowest and like things were falling apart, you knew. You knew. Yeah. I may have thought it was falling apart, but you were preparing me for what I needed to step into. I've mentioned this on my platform, but I used to be a massive people pleaser, right? How I used to maneuver was based on what other people might say, think, or do. But I even had to work through those certain things and just have faith enough to know that God's called me to something bigger than I even think that I'm capable of. So, for anyone that's listening, if you're going through something, you feel like things are falling apart, there's so much more. There's so much more than the moment that you're sitting in right now. So, what you have to do is continue to pick yourself up one day at a time, and sometimes it's not even a day. Sometimes you have to go moment by moment and just speak light into yourself. This may sound so silly, but the Radiance Effect Podcast. Okay, I was recording myself in the mirror doing affirmations because I had to see myself speaking into myself on days I may not have actually been able to do it. I found this video last summer and I said, You're radiant. Years later, created something that was called the Radiance Effect Podcast that was birthed out of something that was so painful to say, despite what I've endured, there's something radiant in me. And my radiance, I hope that I'm able to affect other people based on who I am as a person.

SPEAKER_02 49:44

So this is big stuff. Yeah, this is big stuff. Um, thank you for sharing that. Thank you for sharing the realities of when it's hard to push through and get started, and that we birthed something from the pain. We birthed something, and the waiting, silent ground that it appears, God is not silent, God is strategic. And I think God, you don't hear me. I'm hurting right now. Um, when is this gonna take a shift? Like this is the most humiliating moment of my life, and God shows up in a space and he's right there beside you, he's right there holding your hand, but it doesn't feel like that because the way he shows up is part of the process. He cannot, I mean, he can, but he does not show up in the way that you want him to, because he needs to build something in you, and whatever it is, because he's building something in all of us, ultimately reliance on him and faith in him will be a byproduct for everybody, but then there's something unique to your purpose, there's something very unique to your purpose, and if you really peel back those layers to look at it, you'll find it. And for me, it was just that emotional, internal resilience. And I used to suppress my emotions a lot. I used to do a lot of people pleasing too. I used to focus on everybody else's needs more than my own to the point of denying that I even had my own needs. And I was sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice, thinking that I was being some type of martyr when really I was acting as if I didn't have the need for dependency on Christ. And I did, and God had to teach me those things and to stop uh partnering with people that I thought could give me the thing that only God could give me. And um, you know, it does take owning the part of you that you're not ready to face. There's a part of you that you're not really ready to face, um, and you gotta be willing to go there. And so in this last little question, um, I call it the pivot point, you know. Uh I call it the pivot point. And and I know that that's you know a phrase people have used before, but we're speaking on why healing feels like you're falling apart instead of together, but it's because it requires a sacrifice of the vision you had to live the vision God has for you. Can you sacrifice what you thought and expected things to be? I chose this God, and I've already, for some, walked down the aisle. For others, I was planning, so I've already, you know, merged myself with this person in certain ways. Even if I haven't walked down an aisle, I've I've gotten myself so deep off into this connection and this relationship that the next step has to be marriage, the next step has to be a family, the next step has to look like this because this is what I've been building. Like I've been in this, you know, partnership for X amount of years, and you know, we know each other, getting to know somebody new is just gonna be like I gotta start all over, and you are attached to the vision you set, and then we get upset and say, but God, this was supposed to work out, but that may not have been what God ordained, that's what you chose, and so we have to be willing to release it, and it's very tough because the pivot point means that you got to be ready to walk with God and God alone into the place that he's taking you, and that just reminds me of where Abraham was called to sacrifice Isaac, he was called to get up and leave and go from the place that he knew, and um we have to go into new territory sometime, and the new and the unknown territory is scary, but you're not going into it alone, you're going into it with the person that is creating you exactly according to what they designed for you. Can we release our version of what was supposed to be in our mind to accept the the greatness, the abundance, the far greater than we can think or imagine that God always promised was supposed to be for us, not what we said was supposed to be. So the pivot point is that because the process is unfolding God's way, and that is hard because we have to be pruned.

SPEAKER_03 54:53

Girl, I I just sit here and I listen to that because you're right, the pivot point is so important, and the pruning is not easy, it's not pretty, you know. Like when you're going through, you're like, why me guy? As if there's just some certain certain target, or you always hear that I want to be on God's strongest soldier list this year. But it's it's so true. The pruning is helping you to maneuver to become the person that you're meant to be. And I look at the keys, you I look at myself, right? And I'm so grateful for this because we live in a society today where so many women are in competition, where so many women can actually have conversations like this or pour into each other. And I just thank God, right, for the pivot point for both of us because now we have this story to be able to share on both of our platforms about how we are now. And we're still growing, we're still evolving. Hopefully, throughout this conversation, it hasn't been painted that either of us think that we're perfect because we still have a lot to learn and to heal and evolve from. Right. But I'm just so grateful because what we did today, I feel is so impactful and that people need to hear it.

SPEAKER_02 56:05

Amen. Amen. Amen. And I do want to end with this. Um, the pruning process is hard, the pivot point is hard. You feel like you're breaking before you feel like you're healing, but this is the beauty. When you do get to a true place of surrender, not the faking God out surrender, because we'll do that too. We'll say we surrender and then we don't. But the real surrender, when you get there, when you get to a place in your healing journey where you can truly give it over to God and trust Him with your life that comes after the journey of the pain and processing that. And the sanctification is starting to like really do its thing, you're becoming more like Christ. You only desire what Christ has for you. So you go from clinging on to what he's pruning and having difficulty letting go what he's pruning, and you somewhere in that journey, there's a fire that happens in you, and you just burst out with all this energy that God, I only want what you want for me. I only want what you want for me. If that friendship gotta go, cool, let it go. Uh, if that relationship gotta go, cool, let it go. If that job gotta go, cool, let it go. And you start to run, you know, you start to go from a job to like, okay, I'm trekking with you, Lord. And you get so you get so zealous for it that the part that felt like I was breaking starts to truly feel like I'm healing. And the healing journey is ongoing. I think me and Britney both would say that, like we're always like moving through different stages of it, is a process, but there is a point in the process where you pick up that next baton to run the race, and you running with a zeal because you know I know now what it looks like to want what's not for me. I know what it looks like when God turns that thing around. And because I now know that it's a lot easier and faster to say no to what's not it. Heart coming into alignment. There's your heart coming into agreement with him, which means he can bring into your life the thing that's meant for you because you're starting to move into alignment with his rhythm and not your own.

SPEAKER_03 58:36

I'm just so I ain't got another sec.

SPEAKER_02 58:38

So I I wanna I wanna just wrap this up with where people can connect with us, Brittany. Um, this episode, which will really be broken into two, um this one I feel is a great one for you to get done with this and then go hear some other work that we both have done that goes deeper into the healing journey where we narrate certain ways that we both have processed through and speak to others on healing. So I will say um with We Sweep, there is a season that I did on heart wounds. Find that season from beginning to end and listen to heart wounds and marry that with what you heard here today. And then Brittany has some work on hers that she can tell you where to kind of connect with her.

SPEAKER_03 59:30

Yeah, so for the Radiance Effect podcast, there's an episode that I did in season one called Distering the Counterfeit. Go listen to that. And um, yes, yes. And last month I did an episode called On Learning Survival, so impactful. Please go listen to that, okay? It's so important. Do the inner work and just keep evolving, y'all.

SPEAKER_02 59:52

And this is not let me tell y'all something. This is not a sales pitch because I listened to her discerning counterfeit, and baby, let me tell you something. God blessed her, and you will be blessed. I am not a sales pitch. I thank you. We we like let me tell you, sister, you did your big one. You did your big one. Um God used you. We used you. So, yes, you guys. So plug into us that way. Go listen to the certain the counterfeit. Um, the other one was unlearning survival with the radiance effect, and then with we sweep, y'all can plug into, I think it's uh eight shows on heart wounds. If this episode landed for you, those are others we would encourage you to meditate on in this season. And just know that the wait is purposeful every step of the way, and it is not forever. So we love y'all. Thank y'all for giving us this opportunity. Thank y'all. Bye.