Under Heaven Podcast: Ly Smith (Part 2) - When God Interrupts Your Plans

Under Heaven Podcast host, Trish, sits down for Part 2 of her interview with Ly Smith: mindset coach, keynote speaker, and founder of Upcycle Coaching. They continue to talk about God’s timing, mindset, and the stories we tell ourselves.

She shares how God redirected her path from engineering to public speaking. Ly also talks about an unexpected direction from God - A little like Abraham- to leave North Carolina and relocate out West.

Together, Patricia and Lee discuss how to acknowledge feelings without judgment, the holy humor of God’s timing and why your identity must be rooted in how God sees you

God can redirect your story at any moment, and His timing is always perfect.

Ly:  hello@upcyclecoaching.com                                                  www.rewriteyourselftalk.com

Trish:  patricia@lookingup24.org                                                            www.lookingup24.org

Faith Podcast, Christian Women, God’s Timing, Mindset Coach, Emotional Healing, Christian Encouragement, Testimony Podcast, Purpose, Calling, Depression to Purpose, Rewrite Your Self Talk, Women of Faith, Spiritual Growth

Under Heaven Podcast, Faith, Trish Hodges, Testimony, Christian Women, Encouragement, Testimony

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome to Under Heaven, the podcast where we glorify God and celebrate the beautiful stories of women whose lives have been transformed by his goodness and grace. I'm your host, Trish, and each week we share real conversations about faith, hope, and purpose. This is a place for encouragement and truth where every story matters and every listener is welcome. No matter where you are in your journey, let's grow together under heaven. Welcome to Under Heaven Podcast. I'm your host, Trish, and today I have a returning guest. I know you'll be so happy to see her again. She tells us about talking to ourselves and being God aligned. Lee Smith is a mindset and self-talk strategist, and she's the founder of Upcycling Coaching and the creator of the C A N D method, which she talked about last time. If you missed it, be sure to catch part one. Today we're going to talk about God's timing, how he can interrupt, and in his humor, he can take what we're doing and redirect it for something better. And I'm going to ask Lee to share that part where he just flips upside down what we think we're doing and he turns it into something great. Lee, welcome today. I'm so glad you're back again. Lee Smith. Welcome.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Thank you so much, Trash. So happy to be here. I have so much to share.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Oh my goodness, I know we could probably do 10 podcasts and not get everything that you have. But our hearts are so similar too. So I think that's one reason why we we kind of connect. But Lee, the one thing I would like you to lead with today is listening to God. Now you have known God since you were a little girl. You've had a relationship with Him. Um, but there came a time in your life when you thought you were going one way and God said, I've got a better plan. Can you tell us about that, please?

SPEAKER_00 2:18

Yes, yes. And this and this goes to whether you want to call it an adage, a cliche, what have you. It's tell God your plans and you get to hear Him laugh, right? It's so true. It's so true. Yes. It's it's it's amazing to think uh just all the different things. And yes, I I've been blessed uh you know since since birth uh that you know God's been a part of my life. I I can still remember um uh I was raised Catholic and and going to mass uh you know isn't isn't the most favorite time for kids, you know, trying to be still and quiet in the pews and whatnot. But for me, even you know, at five ages five and six, um, I I can still see it like for me, the way that I was able to be still is that my imagination, whether you put it to my imagination, or this is the way God showed himself to me, is that Jesus was my playmate during that time. So during the mass times, like Jesus was right there in the form of you know a fellow child. It wasn't Jesus the man, as a fellow child, and he was my playmate, and he would just whisper things to me and I would just nod and and laugh and and and and listen, and that was wonderful. And then through through my my my youth and into into my teenage years, in my teenage years, I well, let me go back to eight years old because I was gifted with being able to read aloud very, very well and articulate my words, enunciate properly. And of course, I didn't see it that way. I just uh I enjoy reading and I like reading aloud. And so because my catechist um teacher noticed that about me, she said, Lee, would you would you read the scriptures at a mass sometime? And I said, sure. And I had no thought of, oh, I'm going to get up in front of people, and uh because maybe stage fright would have hit me if I really consciously thought about that. But my focus was on I get to read out loud. So it, you know, that day came and I got up in front of the congregation, it may have been somewhere around three to five hundred people there, and all I saw was the sea of faces of smiles and and bright eyes looking back at me. And so that was wonderful reading the scriptures that morning. And then when I walked away from the sanctuary, there was this like quiver or shiver that rippled through my body. And for me, it was what is that feeling? And how do I get more of that? And I'll come back to that a little bit later in the story because then I went on to my teenage years where I was very active in my youth ministry, and and I did speaking all the time, where at the beginning of the school year I'd speak to about 500 peers, fellow teenagers. And then at the end in the spring before summer break, I was in front of 2,500 peers and delivering this message of you know, where's my faith journey? How's that impacted? And at that time, as a teenager, I didn't think of it as a career path. I just thought, oh, this is just what I love doing. So I go into college as a physics major, and it was I I only made it into one university, and and and I thought, okay, well, I'm going to follow in the footsteps of my family where I'm I'm going to enter the military. And so I did Air Force ROTC for two years. So I had the blue, blue uniform, and I'm I'm going through my my calculus classes. And in the second year, I'm taking calculus three, and I had always excelled at math. I understood it at an early age, always accelerated through it, and yet in that year, I could not, I could not get past calculus three. And I said, Well, that's not going to work then. I can't become an engineer and I can't go on to be a test pilot if I can't get calculus under my belt. So I grasped at straws, I got a tutor, I talked with the professor, and I tried to drill it into my head. And my brain said, Nope, this is where this path stops. We're not getting past these concepts. I thought, what do I do now? So I sat down at my dorm, gave myself this opportunity to just grab a piece of paper or a bunch of paper and a pencil, and I wrote down, well, what do I like doing? And what do I like in life? And I just said, put down anything and everything, no judgment, you know, no conscious thought about it. Just go, go, go till you can't go anymore. So I sat down, I did list after list after list, some doodles here and there, even. And I would cover the floor with all these things. And I was like, okay, I think that's everything. And then I took a break and I came back and I looked at it and I'm like, oh, well, what is it that I really love? What out of this jumps at me? And it was public speaking. Oh, right. That's that's what I love doing. So I learned this pathway of, oh, I can be a corporate motivational speaker because then I get to make a difference in the world. I can go speak to these corporations and talk about productivity and improving morale and leading into excellence. And so really creating that impact. Well, I know that makes good money, and and that that uh it's involved with travel. I can go and travel and I can do that. And then you know what? Oh, I won't need all the money that I make, so I'll take what I need to live on, and I'm going to put the rest aside so that later in life, when I get married and I get to become a mom, I can be a stay-at-home mom without being a financial burden to the family. Because at 14, I watched my grandmother come over from Vietnam, not speak any English, and she helped the other Vietnamese families. She was a nanny for their kids, and the kids would come over to our house, and I, as a young teenager, I saw those kids first crawls, their first steps. I heard their first words, and it broke my heart as cute and wonderful as it was. It broke my heart because I'm not the parent. And I thought, where are the parents? They're the ones who should be seeing these things. And I said, Oh, I'm not missing out on my kids when that happens. I am going to be a stay-at-home mom, whatever it takes, whatever it takes. So I had my life plan, right? There's the plan. I'm going to graduate, I'm going to go serve two years in the Peace Corps. I'm going to come back and do my graduate studies, get my PhD in psychology. I'm going to be a corporate speaker, travel around the nation, make good money. I'm going to find me a good man, be a, you know, get that husband. And then I'm going to get pregnant at some point, be a stay-at-home mom. I had my plan. And God went, ah, that's what you think. And the first wake-up call, Trish, was a car accident. It was a major car accident. And I I won't go into the full details, I'll just get right up to the end of it, where I literally fell asleep at the wheel. And uh I I had done, I had pulled an all-nighter adventure. And so I was coming home early hours of the morning, and I thought I was awake. I really did. I caught I remember consciously thinking I was awake. And then the next thing I know, I'm going off the road because I felt the rumble. I'm going off the road. And this was where God sent one of his guardian angels, and it was right here on my left shoulder, because I remember the whisper in or in my ear, because I did open my eyes, and before I had any conscious awareness of what was really happening, I heard this gentle male voice say to me, No, not yet, to go back to sleep. And I just said, Okay. And I went back to sleep. And I mean, this had to happen within seconds. And so I went back to sleep, and then there was a moment of impact. And so when that happened, because my body was so relaxed and I didn't freeze and freak out, that probably would have killed me instantly. But because I went with that, then yes, I had some injuries, but no life-threatening injuries. I was able to be removed from the car. I spent uh 11 days in the hospital and about three months re-recovering. And that was a reset where God's like, What are you doing? What are you doing? Well, then after that, I I went into a burnout because I had to withdraw from college that semester. And then to make up for that, I was working three jobs. I was going to school full-time from semester to spring uh summer school into fall. When the summer came around again, I just said, Dad, I'm in burnout. I I need to get out of here. And that moved me from North Carolina to Nevada. Initially, I came out for just a couple of months, and it was just to change environment and get myself out just a little break, right? And I go back home and after those two months, and and I'm ready to start again. And and I thought, okay, I'm going back into my studies, I'm I'm I'm getting my life path. And as as I'm going through, God starts speaking to me again. And he says, You need to go west. And I said, What? He said, Yeah, you you need to go west. And that that was not part of my life plan. That was a break. That that was kind of a holiday. God, that was no. I'm like, what do you mean? I need to go west. And I kept I kept feeling it. I kept feeling the nudge. I kept hearing it. And there was a quote that consciously I was thinking, how much do I question this? Because I've seen in the Bible what happens when you question God. And I just thought, oh, especially women, right? And I thought, oh my goodness, oh my goodness. So I said, okay. I said, okay, but God, I I've grown up 20 years of my life here. My family is here. My whole foundation of friends is here. My my faith ministry, it's all here. I have only the few friends that I made in when I was out there, but they're not core friends. I was just getting to know them. And repeatedly it was, you need to go. You need to go. And after two months, two months of me questioning and this back and forth, I heard this go and don't ask me again. Okay. Okay. Well, I'm not going to push back against that. So I literally packed up my things. I moved out west, and that meant I dropped out of college, and it was kind of a now what? I was homesick. I was missing everybody. And um, because not even my dad was out here. He had connections in here in the Reno area, but he wasn't here, he was in Southern California. So I'm I'm trying to figure out what why did I need to come out here? And I I went through a three-year relationship that I thought was the one, and that was a massive heartbreak. But then a couple of years later, I met my husband, an amazing man. And a year and a half later, I I got to be pregnant. It took quite some effort. I when I got pregnant, I I was out partying with friends because I was still young and having fun and living it up. And because I went through so much struggle to get pregnant, I I thought maybe that's not my calling. And I was out partying with friends. And while it I'm into the wee hours of the morning, and admittedly, I I had a number of drinks in me, and I was going to the restroom, and the voice pops in again, says, You might want to stop drinking. And I thought, okay, why? And it said, because you might be pregnant. And I thought, ah, that's ridiculous. How many times have I thought I was pregnant? The test comes out negative, and I fall into a little depression. And I'm like, no, no. But of course, as women, when that pops in your head, you start to think about your cycle, right? I thought, oh, well, I am a couple of days late, but no, it's probably not that. It's probably just a couple of days outlier. But and I I just I make the decision, I made it upon myself. I I'm gonna stop drinking, I'm just gonna drink raw water the rest of the night because I mean that, not because the voice told me so, right? I make that decision, I drink the water, I wake up the next morning and I'm going to the restroom, and the voice pops in ahead again, and it says, You probably should take a pregnancy test. And I'm like, What? What? No, how many times, month after month, have I gone through this? I don't like that cycle. No, voices, it's it's it's it's stubborn. You should take a pregnancy test. No, you know, those things I was like, I am not made of money, they cost money, and I don't want to take it just to be again a negative turnout. And and the voice said to me again, but you have one in the counter, you know, and I'm like, no, I don't want to do this, and it I'm not giving in, and it's not giving in, right? And then finally I say, okay, if it will make you be quiet, I will take the test. So so I pull out the test, and I'm literally the moment that I'm peeing on the stick, it changes instantly. You know, normally you have to wait for those results, but it changed so quick. And I thought, what is happening right now? And sure enough, uh, yes, I I was pregnant. So here the nudge is, you know, it's telling me I need to move. Why? Because in its time, in God's timing, I meet my husband. I'm trying to get pregnant on my time, and no, it happens on God's time. And and I'm gonna try to share this real quick too, because I I think this is one of the funniest stories is that nine I found out two weeks into the pregnancy that I was pregnant, and it was the longest nine months of my life. And while I did not have any health issues, I was miserably sick the whole nine months, and then I'm working full time and and I'm wanting to just be home desperately. And my husband says, No, we need every penny that you can contribute before we go down to the one-income family, and it's now December, and I'm working in a large doctor's office, and what doctors' offices do during December Christmas time is they they trade chocolates with each other. So the lunch room is always filled with chocolates, and it's one week before the due date. And I I grab a piece of chocolate and I bite into the chocolate. Well, if you remember the car accident, one of the things that happened there was I I lost my teeth. I broke the bone and I lost my teeth. So ever since then, I wear a partial. And I took a bite into the chocolate that day. My partial breaks. And so I take the partial out and I'm like, oh, okay, you are having another laugh at me, God. And I call a girlfriend, coworker, over, and I said, I said, hey, take a look. And she's like, oh, she's like, are you okay? And I said, yeah, I'm okay. I said, but you know what this means. What? What do you what do you mean? She asked me inquisitively, and I said, This means the baby is coming tomorrow. She said, What? How do you know that? And I said, Trust me, this is God's way of having a laugh with me. The baby is coming tomorrow. She said, You don't know that. You're a first-time mom. We don't know when the baby is coming. And she said, Your due date is next week. You know, you'll have it next week. And I said, No, no, no. This this is a sign. She's like, Why do you say that? And Trish, you have you have the pleasure of seeing me. Listeners, I'm sorry I can't give you this visual. But if you can imagine, I am going to have a three-tooth gap if I do a full smile. So as a brand new mom, my first pictures with my baby are going to have to be a grimace because I'm not gonna show a broken smile like that. And I was like, oh, I just have to laugh. And my girlfriend said, she's like, no, I'll see you at work tomorrow. And and this was Thursday afternoon. I said, no, you won't. And sure enough, Trish, at the stroke of midnight that night, my water breaks, and I go into 13 hours of labor, an hour and a half of pushing. So after 13 hours, an hour and a half of pushing on Friday the 13th, my baby girl comes into the world, and my first pictures are of me just having a grimace on my face because I couldn't do the full smile. And then as I shared, as I shared on the last, on our last session together, you know, my moment on the beach, and when I was going through my depression and I found that joy again, that's where God came through in that joy. And he came from my heart center and he moved to my ear, and he said, Now that I'm here, what are you going to do with me? And it was in that truth of remembering who I am and hearing the skipping of my eight-year-old inner self and that little laughter. And she says to me, Lee, remember that feeling. You have everything you need now. You have all these years of personal development and and NLP and positive psychology. So you have the academic knowledge, you have all these life stories that you've lived through, and the lessons that you've gained, and the wisdom that you share. You now have your Assignment, go and transform those reactors in the world into those beautiful creators. Remind them, like I'm reminding you right now, of who you really are. Remind them that they are a miracle. Remind them that God exists in them. Remind them that they are worthy, they are deserving. And even if they don't feel ready, they need to step into their truth and into their dream and to shine into who they're meant to be. Go now and go and bless others. And here we are, Trish.

SPEAKER_01 22:39

Right now. Oh, that's amazing. I love it. I I when we talk, I hear a little bit more of the story, and I love the story. How you, you know, you were all settled in North Carolina with your plan. And God says, go west, young woman. That's right. Because he had a better plan. Oh, and I want, I I would like for you to, I know there's women out there saying, What you could laugh when you're partial broke. How can you do that? Can you help a woman who can't see the joy in life, the funny things in life? Could you help someone real brief with that?

unknown 23:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

It's hard, hard to do it a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 23:30

Yeah. First of all, you have to say it's okay. Life does happen. And we we are not we are not worthy and deserving of pain. We're not. But pain does happen. Heartache happens, grief happens, we have things that come into our lives, and we have things that are taken out of our lives. And it's hard. And when we can just say this is what's happening right now, and we just acknowledge it. This is what's happening right now. And whatever feelings come with it, allow it. Because what we resist will persist, because our attention is going into trying so hard. Whether we're brushing it under the carpet or we're I'm fine. Oh women are experts at say I'm fine when the truth is it's not. And if you don't want to share that with anybody, that's okay too. Um, as an extrovert, I process things verbally. So I go and I'll talk to 20 people and I'll do it that way. But I also, since COVID, have like turned internally, and now I kind of bounce back and forth between introvert and extrovert. So I understand the introvert process too of like, get me away from everybody. I just want to deal with this myself, and that's okay too. And coping with it is acknowledging it. Don't put yourself in a state of denial because that's creating sabotage. So acknowledging it without shame, without guilt, without any harsh judgment, can we just say this is what it is? And then observe what are my feelings around it, and it's okay. I'm still safe, I'm still supported. And you're like, Well, how am I supported? Well, first and foremost, you're not alone because God is with you in this journey, and you know, feel feel God encompassing you. Well, I'm so mad at life right now. I had this happen with a friend recently. I am so mad at the way life is is unfolding right now, and and you know, God is doing this. No, no, he really isn't. He really isn't. It's just we're the way life is happening right now, and it feels so hard. You want to get mad at God, and it's okay to get mad at God. Believe me, I have had I've had my yelling literal on top of the hill yelling situations with God. Guess what? That's okay too. So wherever you can create that space to acknowledge it is what it is, look at your feelings, and most of the time, our feelings will have a tidal wave where it will rise up, it will feel very intense, and it will it will subside, and that can be a 90-second period, unless we are the ones anchoring that feeling, and that's where we we get ourselves stuck, and that may be a part of life too, and again, no shame, no guilt around that. And because again, I've been there where I've anchored some of those feelings that weren't so great. So, where can we acknowledge the feelings and just try to process through it? What can I learn from this? Or what is this saying about myself? Because often it's an indication of what really matters to you, and when we can look at what matters, what is important to us, okay, then what am I meant to be from this experience? What am I meant to do with this? And sometimes it's just a life lesson for you. Other times it may be, oh, here's a lesson. Yeah, it was for me, but now that I've come through it, I need to share this, whether it's in conversation with somebody or it's in a speaker environment like I'm doing right here and right now, so that your story becomes a lifeline for someone else. Because we we we are bloomers of hope. And where we can plant hope in others, that's part of our calling because so many people, unfortunately, in the world are living in hopelessness, and they want to quit, they want to give up on themselves, on life, and that desperation. We need to be we need to be able to give breakthroughs for that, and so can we do that as a friend? Can we do that in our ministry? Can we do that as a speaker? Can we do that as a leader in some way? So we need to do it for ourselves first to again, it is what it is. Observe the feelings, feel free to name it. Can you let the tidal wave roll over and pass through? Because good things, numbness, bad things, this too shall pass. And maybe it doesn't happen in our timing. You've heard many of my stories today. It's all about God's timing, and God's time is is perfect. And then look at what can I learn? Who do I get to be and become? What do I get to do with this? And let that become part of your wisdom because that's what we women get to do. We are carriers of wisdom and get be able to pass that on. So I hope that helps.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

Oh, that is yes, and I was just thinking as you were talking, um, you you do have your coaching, and I thought, wow, she is just giving us one of her coaching sessions right now. I thank you so much because I know there are women out there who are in that place, and I I come in agreement and pray that their hearts are open and they will receive what you have said, and they will acknowledge this is what it is, and that they will look, look at their feelings. Okay, I'm feeling this, and I do teach the same thing as I heard you say, 90 seconds. Our um emotions really only last 90 seconds, and the rest of it we carry on. So if we can grasp that and you know, and just and if we can grasp that, and then I love how you said ask, ask God and see who you are becoming, and because that's what he does. He he he takes us, it says that we are changed from glory to glory, and he just takes us and changes us into the image that he's created us to be. He's such a loving, good God. Would you pray for the women out there today for them to just see who they are in God? Yes, my pleasure.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

My pleasure. Yes, Heavenly Father, I I thank you so much, first and foremost, for Trish that she is shining in her light to create this platform, to create this under heaven podcast so that she can share her genius and her gifts and her greatness with the world and welcome other voices like my own with my story and my message so that in this collaboration we can we can be opportunity opportunities for planting seeds of your hope and your goodness and your glory into all the women who are listening, Lord. And I just I just say Lord, open their ears, open their minds, and most importantly, open their hearts that they may hear the drop of wisdom that is meant specifically for them, a little piece of you coming through us into them in such a way that they can see it themselves. Help them, Lord, that when they take a look at themselves in the mirror, that they don't see just a woman standing there, an image of hair and face and body, but they see the image of you. You made us a reflection of you, Lord, in our own unique and special way. And so I ask you, Lord, for your guidance, for your spirit to cover these women with a piece of your glory and let them see that beautiful light that comes through so that we can continue to be a light and a salt of the earth for others. It is done in your name, in Jesus' name. Amen.

SPEAKER_01 32:59

Amen. Oh, oh yes. Will you please let the women know how they can contact you?

SPEAKER_00 33:07

Absolutely, my pleasure, Trish. Thank you again for this opportunity. Ladies, I am so passionate about rewriting your self-talk that I bought the domain. So you can connect with me by going to rewriteyourself talk.com. I ask simply for your first name and your email, and that allows me to give you my free gift. It's a five-minute reset, positive self-talk guide so that you can rewrite your self-talk. And if you heard in the other episode a little bit of my candy method, um it takes you through those steps. And I and then uh I'd love to have a conversation with you so that we can stay connected. So, once again, you simply go to rewriteyourself talk.com. Thank you, Trish.

SPEAKER_01 33:55

Well, thank you. And I want to thank our lift listeners as well. As you listen to to Lee today, she reminded us that God doesn't just reroute us, but he upgrades us. He does even better than what we have planned. And if something today that that Lee has said has connected with you, don't ignore that. She was telling you about recognize your feelings. If something was in there that stirred you, connect with Lee. And she can help you develop into what God's created you to be. She can lead you in that direction. It's God that does the work. It's you and God together. And did you know that you and God together are minor are a majority? And it also says in the word, when when Lee was praying, I I remember the joy of the Lord is our strength. So I do pray along with her that that joy of God will continue in each and every one of you. And I encourage you to speak life, choose hope, and live knowing that you are loved. Thank you, Lee, and thank you, everyone. Have a great day. Bye-bye. Thank you for being with us today on Under Heaven. I trust this conversation encouraged your heart and reminded you of God's faithfulness. If today's episode blessed you, please click like, subscribe, and share the hope with others. Until next time, blessings.