# 207. What no one tells you about surrendering to God | TWS Part 3

An episode of [Secluded Thoughts](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1561515782), 13 Jul 2025, 58 min.

Audio: https://audio3.redcircle.com/episodes/61a15700-8029-48b7-a219-1311e2813012/stream.mp3

Giving up control over my life had to be the hardest thing I've ever done tbh. I always felt like control = safety... but what do I do when God wants me to give that up? The Wilderness Season is a month long series unpacking my unraveling and testimony in the wilderness season God let me into when I decided to start over at 28, leave my career and build the life I wanted. There are the lessons I learned and how the Holy Spirit read me for FILTH! The Wilderness Season Series: • 205. Everything you bury eventually catches up to you | TWS P1 • 206. Learning to trust God after He allowed bad things to happen to me | TWS P2 🗒️ Journal Prompts for self reflection, relationships & healing: https://secludedthoughts.com/journals LET'S STAY CONNECTED! TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@secludedthoughts Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/SecludedThoughtsPodcast Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/secluded.thoughts/ Sponsorship Inquiries: hello@secludedthoughts.com Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

## Transcript

[0:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I truly equated a lack of control as a threat.
[0:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I genuinely believe that it's something or someone threatened my sense of control.
[0:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Wanted me to give up control, it was a threat.
[0:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm asking God for results and he sent in my reassurance and I'm just like, I hear you.
[0:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel reassured.
[0:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need to be reassured by actions, though.
[0:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't need words of affirmation right now.
[0:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not be here if I did not believe you.
[0:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: My concern is the timing.
[0:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What are we waiting on?
[0:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could have done things my own way on my own time in my comfort zone in a way that made sense to me, but because I chose to trust God, I almost lost my mind.
[0:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because I'm not used to being still at the hands of others, I am used to getting up and going and doing whatever needs to be done, right?
[0:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And you're telling me to sit there and be still, and I'm just like, for how long, at least tell me that.
[0:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When, when the past has said that in the sermon I said, do you know what God?
[0:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel like you overstepping in this relationship because I'm the funny one, okay?
[1:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm the one with the sense of humor.
[1:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm the spicy one here.
[1:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't appreciate you talking back.
[1:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't expect you to be clocking me like this, okay?
[1:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't appreciate that.
[1:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I let it slide long enough until it got to a point where God was like you cannot go any further as this version of yourself.
[1:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I cannot use you as this guarded version of yourself because you don't even know what parts of your future that all of this is affecting.
[1:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So after feeling like I was, you know, playing it safe, playing it small for so long and settling in a career that I did not really enjoy, I decided to take the bowl leap of faith and leave my job and build a life that I actually wanted, but...
[1:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Things did not go as planned.
[1:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God actually pulled me aside and said, Ms.
[1:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Girl, we have some things we need to discuss, okay?
[1:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And after going through a wilderness season where God literally unraveled me and the Holy Spirit read me for filth and really revealed all the things that was in my heart, all the things that I needed to work on,
[2:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am finally able to share the lessons that I have learned.
[2:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Now that you know I'm basically coming out of it and I will be posting two times a week in July on Sundays and Wednesdays.
[2:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So if you find yourself in a season where you feel like you're not living the life that you actually want to live, you really feel like you need to start over and do the things that you really want to do.
[2:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you find yourself running away from the things God is calling you to do, if you find yourself playing it safe and your curious as to what the process is like when you decide to go after the things that you really want, then this series is for you.
[2:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And if you are new here, then hello and welcome to the show, I'm your host Sancy and on this podcast we talk about taking accountability for your life to become the best version of yourself.
[2:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So without further ado, let us get into today's episode.
[3:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So now let's talk about the battle for control, me versus God, and who is going to have control over my life.
[3:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I think that was, I think that was the hardest part of all of it.
[3:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I'm being honest, I think yeah.
[3:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, I think that was the hardest part of all of it because I told you all in my episode on, you know, how pride and self-reliance kept me from trusting God.
[3:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was the beginning of God revealing to me that I had control issues.
[3:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He like slowly led up to it.
[3:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He started off with telling me about the pride and rejection and later on I realized how that and some other situations in my life led to me being a control freak.
[3:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Now let me explain what I mean by a control freak.
[3:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel like I need it to be in control of everything in my life.
[3:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had a hard time trusting people to do anything really, like help me in any way shape of form.
[4:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I didn't ask for it, I didn't require it, I didn't really care because
[4:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I asked you to do it, I kind of control the pace and the time at which you do it.
[4:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I don't like that.
[4:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So rather than ask people for things and then stress them out because you're not doing it on my timeline, I just did everything myself, right?
[4:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And also because I felt like in some way, shape or form, almost everybody that I depended on had let me down in some way, some worse than others.
[4:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But to me, I was just like, okay, I'm just, you know, I'll just do everything myself.
[4:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But honestly, the reason why there's so many reasons there's so many layers.
[4:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's talk about why and how the control issues developed in my life in the first place before we unpack, why it was hard and the process of that.
[4:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had many instances in my life, in my childhood, especially, where things were less than ideal, in order to be very modest.
[5:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I was around a lot of things, I was exposed to a lot of things.
[5:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In my childhood, in that moment, to me, they were normal.
[5:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In the sense that it was so common, it was so frequent and I saw way too many people doing it, a way too many people living a certain lifestyle.
[5:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I felt like it was the norm, right?
[5:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But every time I would leave my environment and go to school, I went to a Catholic school.
[5:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was like a really prestigious school and a lot of people I went to school with
[5:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, they were well off living in nicer areas, nicer neighborhoods, you know, that type of thing.
[5:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So when I would go to school and I would be around them, my classmates, that's when it kind of started hitting home for me that my situation is a normal.
[6:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because from primary school, up until I entered secondary school, that was normal for me, that was like,
[6:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The majority of my childhood, that was what I was exposed to.
[6:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And then as soon as I went to that school and I went to people who lived in like nicer neighborhoods and lived like a common life, I was like, oh, this is not normal, right?
[6:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And there was a lot of things like DV and, you know, a lot of crime and violence and that type of thing that I was exposed to when I was younger, because I grew up in that type of neighborhood.
[6:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like to the point where there was a time in my life where I actually had a gun pointed to my face, I think I was probably thirteen or fourteen.
[6:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I never hadn't met at that.
[6:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't think I have a told anybody that, but that's, you know,
[6:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: an example of some things that I have seen and endured in my life.
[6:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And the crazy thing is sign note, I always tell my friends today, I'm like, yo, met me after like the most tumultuous part of my life was already done.
[7:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I feel like when people see me today because everything I eventually became was a product of me running away from where I came from and I did so well and I was very ambitious.
[7:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's like people never expect to
[7:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: hair certain things that I've experienced or I've witnessed or I've endured in my life because I hit it well and I apparently don't look like it but there were a lot of things in my life that happened that shaped who I am today and you know that's why I got had to unpack a lot of things but that's my business anyway.
[7:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So, in all of these things that I had to experience witness in your et cetera, in my childhood, in my upbringing, I remember feeling like there were many times where I just wish I could leave.
[8:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, I wish I could run away.
[8:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't want to be here.
[8:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't want to be in this situation.
[8:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But there's nothing I can do about it.
[8:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There's nothing I can do about the chaos that's happening around me.
[8:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm a child.
[8:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm not an adult.
[8:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't have money.
[8:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't have a job.
[8:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't have freedom.
[8:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just had to be there.
[8:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to be subjected to that.
[8:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And so it made me feel like I was very out of control.
[8:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I remember just always wanting to leave.
[8:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes there were points where I felt like I really don't want to be here.
[8:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like I really want to run away.
[8:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't want to stay here.
[8:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But most of the times when I felt that way I knew I couldn't do anything and a lot of the reasons why I couldn't do anything had to do with money, right?
[8:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It had to do with financial struggles.
[8:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It wasn't financially possible to get out of those situations.
[8:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I had no choice but to stay there.
[8:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And remember, if you haven't seen it, I did a whole episode on
[8:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: maladaptive daydreaming and how I overcame that and how that was really an issue for me and I think that's essentially how that developed in my life because I was found myself in situations that I did not want to be in, I wanted to physically leave and I couldn't leave so I left mentally instead.
[9:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And it became a coping mechanism that God had to break off of me because it was literally running my life.
[9:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But I made a whole episode on that so I wouldn't get too much in depth in this one.
[9:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But for me, these experiences in my life
[9:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: being around a lot of violence, being around a lot of DV, being around a lot of situations, and just facing certain hardships that had to do with financial issues, financial instability.
[9:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It made me feel like not being financially stable, meant lack of control, which equal being unprotected, or being unsafe.
[9:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I equated lack of control with unsafety.
[10:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I felt like not being in control meant that I wasn't safe, I wasn't protected, and I was in too much of a vulnerable position where it made me pray to people who want to take advantage, right, in many different ways.
[10:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And it's not just in my childhood, it was also in college.
[10:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's true like many different experiences in my life, right?
[10:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In college, I remember I've told you many times, if you're new, basically in college, I
[10:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: had to, you know, work to pay for school.
[10:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And it was very stressful.
[10:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was very tumultuous.
[10:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I almost lost my mind a couple of times.
[10:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was very hard.
[10:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had up to two jobs.
[10:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And there were many times where I just barely scripted by to make it.
[10:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I was a hundred percent like financially responsible for myself.
[10:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And that was a very heavy burden to bear from like eighteen until I graduated.
[10:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And that, again, financial instability just made me feel like I was not in control.
[10:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like I could not really live my life, I could not really enjoy my life.
[11:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to choose between which need I was going to feel today because I did not have the money to take care of all of my needs and I was like everything rested on me.
[11:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And so like through all of these things in my life, I felt like every time there was financial instability, it led to a lack of control and not lack of control, literally led to pain, trauma, stress, feeling stuck and a bunch of other emotions that I did not want.
[11:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And eventually after I graduated, I finally got a big girl job.
[11:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I finally got a good job working for a big for accounting firm.
[11:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And that was the first time in my life at twenty two or twenty three whenever I graduated.
[11:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That I finally was able to exhale because I wasn't financially struggling.
[11:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was the first time in my life where I could finally take care of myself.
[11:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I did not have to worry about money.
[12:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I did not have to pay any pinch.
[12:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I didn't have to count.
[12:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, every cent I didn't have to have such a strict budget and restrict myself all the time.
[12:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was the first taste of financial freedom that I had gotten in my life at twenty to twenty three.
[12:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: All of my life prior to that was marked by financial struggles, right?
[12:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And so when I finally started making money in my career, it gave me a sense of control that I did not have before.
[12:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It allowed me to do basically whatever I want, whenever I want.
[12:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, you know, like, yes, there were boundaries.
[12:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yes, there were certain restrictions.
[12:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, I still had a job.
[12:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I couldn't just do anything I wanted.
[12:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to be at the job that type of thing.
[12:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But the money it paid me allowed me to travel.
[12:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had flexibility.
[12:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had certain perks.
[12:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could.
[12:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I was also very good with saving money because I knew when it was like to go without.
[12:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I, when I started making money, I did not like go balling out of control.
[13:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I lived within my means and I saved most of my money, right?
[13:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And because for the first time in my life, I finally had a savings account.
[13:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I finally had, you know, like any emergency fund that, you know, I didn't need, because I was in a state of emergency all the time.
[13:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When I finally felt that sense of relief, it gave me options.
[13:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It gave me options.
[13:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It, it, it, it finally freed me from the sense of being pigeonholed that I would feel in certain situations.
[13:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I knew that if I was ever in a situation that I did not want to
[13:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: be in, I could leave.
[13:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When you know you have options, it's like anytime you experience an inconvenience.
[13:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's not that much of an inconvenience because you know you can do something about it if you choose to.
[13:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So if I wanted to switch apartments, I could pay to break the lease and move and do all of that and be okay.
[13:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I had maybe car troubles or something, it did not concern me because I had the money to be able to afford to pay for that.
[14:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could afford to have certain luxuries or conveniences.
[14:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could afford to live my life a certain way.
[14:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I had an unexpected expense, I did not spiral or break down.
[14:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I like my world was coming to an end.
[14:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: because I could afford to take care of these things for the first time in my life, right?
[14:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So making money, having money gave me a sense of control that I never had in my life.
[14:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And if I'm being honest, it made me very arrogant in my relationship with God.
[14:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I briefly touched on this in part two on learning to trust God.
[14:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But because I was, you know, making good money in my career, I was not struggling or whatever.
[14:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes when God would ask me to do certain things, I felt like I was still in control of my life.
[14:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So if I wanted to do it, I would do it.
[14:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I wanted to delay it, I would delay it.
[14:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like I approached him with a sense of arrogance because I felt safe and secure because of the money.
[15:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So for example, I have a podcast I've been podcasting for four years.
[15:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When I was, you know,
[15:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Living it up in my career, making a very decent salary.
[15:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I honestly didn't push too hard in my podcast because for one, I was always concerned that if my podcast went too viral, my coworkers might find it and that might hinder my job, my finances, my income, okay, the backbone of my piece and my sanity.
[15:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I also never like pushed for ad revenue and certain things like that because my job was sustaining me.
[15:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The money I made from my podcast was supplemental, right?
[15:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The money I made from my business from any of my other ventures was supplemental because I was doing very well in my career.
[15:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And so I did not have a sense of urgency on the things that God asked me to do.
[15:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I felt like the money brought me to a point where I felt like I was in control of my life.
[15:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It gave me a false sense of control.
[16:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Talk on that.
[16:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We'll talk about that later.
[16:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It gave me a false sense of control.
[16:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It propped me up to a place where I just I finally had options and I wasn't afraid to use it.
[16:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel like it just made me very arrogant in my relationship with God.
[16:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I really like the sense of control that I felt really carried over into everything and When God asked me to do things I would just be like
[16:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I will see, I will see about it, right?
[16:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel like at that point in my life, I pretty much rejected everything and everyone, everything in life that threatened
[16:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: my sense of control.
[16:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Anything that threatened me having control over my life, or threatened my finances, I rejected it because that, for the first time in my life, I finally had peace.
[16:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For the first time in my life, I could finally rest.
[16:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For the first time in my life, I wasn't struggling.
[17:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For the first time in my life, I didn't feel like my heart was damn near going to fail.
[17:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: from struggling and stressing about different things in life because I did not have the money to take care of myself all the time.
[17:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was a struggle to make the money.
[17:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was a struggle to bear the burden of being responsible for yourself.
[17:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: so young, right?
[17:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And before college too.
[17:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I truly equated a lack of control as a threat.
[17:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I genuinely believe that it's something or someone threatened my sense of control wanting me to give up control.
[17:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was a threat because of how much those experiences in my childhood where I felt like I wasn't in control of the situation.
[17:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was subjected to
[17:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: whatever the circumstances were I just I just couldn't give it up I just couldn't give it up and as far as it pertains to my relationship with God when I left my job when I left my job at first it was you know
[18:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I was in good spirits.
[18:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was, you know, I was optimistic.
[18:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was hopeful.
[18:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was, you know, all of these things.
[18:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And God, you know, pulled me to the side and said, actually, I'm going to take you through a wilderness season because we have some things we need to work on before I give you the things that I have planned for you.
[18:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know you think you're ready, but trust me, you don't know what's in your heart.
[18:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So let me pull you aside and let's sort that out first.
[18:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Now the issue with that is why he was, you know, sorting that out.
[18:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm living on my savings.
[18:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I felt like even though I built up a very good savings nest for myself, I felt like every month that went by when I had to pay bills and the income did not match the expenses.
[18:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It felt like something was just like chipping away at me.
[19:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was like chipping away at my sense of control and the precious that is sinking in and I'm like God.
[19:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What's happening?
[19:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What is going on right now?
[19:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is not going to work, right?
[19:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And then at one point I said, I was going to go back to, you know, work, I was going to get another job and God said, you know, I want you to trust me.
[19:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said, I've been trusting you.
[19:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: time is up, right?
[19:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And you know, he made it very clear in many ways that I tried to deny it.
[19:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I tried to overlook it.
[19:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He made it very clear.
[19:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He wants me to trust him.
[19:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I was like, okay, fine, I will trust you.
[19:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And in the process of unpacking all of the things in me that I will be, you know, talking through this entire series of the things I've been mentioning, including the sense of control.
[19:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In the process of doing that it took time and while it took time, rent was still due.
[19:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So that literally made me started spiraling because that started bringing up all of the times in my life where I felt like I did not have control and the feelings and the emotions of feeling like I was being threatened.
[20:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because of that lack of control, because I was remembering all the times that lack of control meant I was unprotected, meant that I was unsafe, meant that I was around things that I should not have been around, I enjoyed things that I should not have endured.
[20:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I, it's like the stress, it's almost as if the stress of the things that I experienced in my childhood, started coming back because the money was the one way I regained my sense of control and when God took it away and told me to trust him, child, I was like, Lord, I need to do something like two days, two days.
[20:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And he let me endure it.
[21:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He let me endure it.
[21:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He let me endure it.
[21:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm pretty.
[21:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I remember that was a time I was talking to God.
[21:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was like, um, Jesus, let me talk to you for a second.
[21:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God, the Father, step aside.
[21:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need to talk to Jesus.
[21:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was like, Jesus, you know what I think the issue is.
[21:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I think the issue is.
[21:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: when you came down and you were a human being that was like eons ago that was a long time ago so it's like you know what it's like to be in the flesh but I feel like maybe you forgot I feel like maybe you forgot because
[21:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, you know, you fed all that sorrow.
[21:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, when you felt like, you know, when you asked God to take this cup from you and he didn't, that's how I feel Lord.
[21:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Now, I know I'm not getting whipped.
[21:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know I'm not about to be crucified, but it feels like I'm being crucified.
[21:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know it's nothing compared to what you do, but I'm just saying.
[22:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You are the part of the Godhead that knows what I'm experiencing right now and I feel like maybe you forgot.
[22:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Maybe you forgot because when I pray, I don't see answers.
[22:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When I pray, I don't see results.
[22:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, I'm like, Lord, I know you are great.
[22:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know you are mighty.
[22:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know and I know you are the elephant, the omega.
[22:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know you are in every space in time right now because you do not exist in time.
[22:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You exist outside of time.
[22:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I know you're already in the moments where all these things work out.
[22:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know you're probably looking at me like since if you just relax, I have plans for you and everything is going to be fine.
[22:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I've been telling you that, okay?
[22:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But you keep looking at circumstances and you keep walking my sight and not my faith.
[22:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I've been telling you that, I know that's how you think.
[22:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know that's how you're thinking.
[22:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right now, Lord, I know you're thinking, it's okay.
[22:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: My plans for you are for good.
[22:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm going to work all up this time and you'll just laugh about this.
[22:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I know, I know, I know, I hear you.
[22:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But, but, could you speed it up?
[23:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's all that.
[23:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Could you speed it up?
[23:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Can we accelerate the time at which you work?
[23:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Can you, can you, can you for a second?
[23:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Just remember that I am here in the flesh.
[23:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, I am here in the flesh and my flesh does not like this.
[23:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, can you, I know you, I know you are, you know, the alpha and the omega, you are the great one, the divine one, all of that.
[23:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I worship you.
[23:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I love you.
[23:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I hear you.
[23:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But could you look past your divinity for a second and look at my mortality?
[23:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Look at my flesh.
[23:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, I am struggling.
[23:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am struggling.
[23:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Can you do something?
[23:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, do you not hear me praying?
[23:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Is something clogging up the lines of communication?
[23:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, what language do I need to speak?
[23:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, hello, Ola, Bozhu, Bonsoir.
[23:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Konichiwa.
[23:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't even know what that means.
[23:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Which language do you respond to?
[23:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am struggling.
[23:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need you to answer me.
[23:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need to see results.
[24:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am literally spiraling.
[24:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am like, I am losing my mind.
[24:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am sitting here calm, but at the same time, not right now.
[24:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm in the moment.
[24:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was sitting there calm, but at the same time, I feel like I'm losing my mind because I'm asking God for results.
[24:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And he's sending me reassurance.
[24:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I'm just like, I hear you.
[24:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel reassured.
[24:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need to be reassured by actions, though, not by words.
[24:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't need words of affirmation right now.
[24:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I hear you.
[24:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I believe your word.
[24:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm just my concern is the timing.
[24:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: My concern is the timing.
[24:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not be here if I did not believe you.
[24:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: My concern is the timing.
[24:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What are we waiting on?
[24:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What are we waiting on?
[24:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Lord.
[24:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I was literally like losing my mind.
[24:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said this in one of my last newsletters, I just sent where I could have done things my own way on my own time in my comfort zone in a way that made sense to me.
[24:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But because I chose to trust God, I almost lost my mind.
[24:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I almost lost my mind because I chose to trust God because the issue is the timing.
[25:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The issue is not his word.
[25:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's not his promises.
[25:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's the timing.
[25:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay?
[25:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's like, God, I trust you.
[25:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I believe in you.
[25:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I praise you.
[25:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I worship you all.
[25:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That good stuff.
[25:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's think on the timing though.
[25:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's talk about a cadence.
[25:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's talk about the rollout of certain things.
[25:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's talk about the let's do a progress check.
[25:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: A progress report.
[25:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Fill me up to speed you know what I'm saying like it's the uncertainty like I realized that there was a whole not a level to trusting God and it required me to give up control because in hindsight I realized that control is just an illusion anyway right we're really not in control of anything you can do your best to try to mitigate things to try to you know navigate life in certain ways but
[25:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There's always something that can completely knock you off your game.
[25:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You just have to be resilient.
[25:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You have to have a strong foundation, right?
[26:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I think that's one of the things that God wanted to teach me.
[26:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But in the process, I had to learn the hard way.
[26:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to learn that it was okay to trust him.
[26:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and to put him in control of my life, I had to unlearn that not having control over my life was safe, so long as God was the one in control.
[26:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because I truly believed in my heart of hearts that to not being in control was to be unprotected.
[26:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: To not being in control was to be vulnerable, was to be out there, to be taken advantage of, to be hurt, to be used.
[26:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right?
[26:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to have a sense of control because I equated control with the only way to protect myself.
[26:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In many ways, not just, I'm not necessarily speaking physically, but I'm speaking not protecting my mental health, protecting my sanity, protecting my emotions, protecting my finances, my assets, my life, everything.
[27:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to be in control because I did not know.
[27:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just felt like to trust that to another person meant to literally just throw my life away.
[27:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And people are going to let you down, right?
[27:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: People are going to let you down.
[27:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes, some ways worse than others.
[27:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But there will always be a situation where somebody does not live up to your expectations.
[27:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You cannot control that.
[27:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And the issue was, I applied that way of thinking to my relationship with God.
[27:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I also assumed that it was not safe to give him control.
[27:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Again, I didn't know him like that, okay?
[27:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wasn't brought up in the church, okay?
[27:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He came to me.
[27:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: All right?
[27:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He pursued me.
[27:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was over their mind in my own business in the world, and he came to me.
[27:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He had to teach me a few things, okay?
[27:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What I learned in the world was that it is not safe to give up control.
[27:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It is not safe to surrender to anybody or anything.
[27:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And he came to me and he had to teach me that it was safe to do that with him.
[28:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Oh, child, I almost lost my mind.
[28:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I almost lost my mind.
[28:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was like, Lord, this is too much.
[28:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is, perhaps you have overestimated me because I don't understand why you will let me suffer like this.
[28:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because the process of learning to surrender control to God meant that I could not predict my future.
[28:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could not fully plan my life in the ways that I was planning it before, right?
[28:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because, you know, we make plans and gods laugh.
[28:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Or there's a scripture I don't remember it would forward, but it talks about how many other plans or a desires in a man's heart, but ultimately, God's plan is what prevails, right?
[28:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's what happens when you surrender control to God.
[28:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You can have your cute little plans, but if it's not in his will for your life, it's not going to happen.
[28:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And you have to be okay with that happening.
[28:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So the process of me surrendering control meant that number one, he took away and required me to sit in that uncomfortable position of not having a healthy steady
[29:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: predictable income stream, like I did before, which is what gave me a sense of control, what gave me a sense of stability, what finally gave me peace in my life, and replace that with him.
[29:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Instead of relying on money to give me those things, I had to rely on him to give me those things, and that was very new.
[29:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, that was very new.
[29:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So it was a struggle, right?
[29:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So rendering control, like I said, also meant that I have to write my plans in pencil.
[29:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I have to first seek him to give me the desires of my heart and then sometimes when he would give me certain desires, if my heart, if I wasn't ready to receive it, he would not give it to me or he would give me certain breadcrumbs until I was ready for the full picture.
[29:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For example,
[29:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I remember telling you years ago on my podcast when I talked about the episode on why you don't know your purpose.
[30:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When I was begging God and asking God to tell me my purpose back when I was in college or even before that when I was like, I don't know what I want to do with my life.
[30:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When I was in that position, I desperately wanted to know if he had told me back then that part of my purpose part of the assignment on my life would be to pick up a mic to learn a camera and speak and put it out there on the internet.
[30:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would say absolutely not because I was not
[30:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The person that I needed to be in order to receive that and bring that to life, right?
[30:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So he had to get me to that point first before he asked me to do it.
[30:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So in the process of surrendering control, I realized that sometimes the reason why he didn't answer certain prayers, he didn't answer certain questions, sometimes I didn't have a vision from my life in certain areas, was because I wasn't the person that could give birth to those things.
[30:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wasn't the person that could plant those seeds.
[31:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If he had given me that seed to plant, I would have thrown it away because I would doubt myself.
[31:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not believe in myself.
[31:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not think that was possible.
[31:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not think that that's something I wanted to do.
[31:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would say, you know, that's not who I am.
[31:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Or I would put my opinion on it.
[31:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Or I would say what would other people think?
[31:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wasn't the person that he needed me to be.
[31:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I didn't have the character that he needed me to have in order to give me certain ideas in order to speak to me in order to answer certain prayers.
[31:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In order to give me a vision from my life in certain areas, I simply was not ready.
[31:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If he had told me, I would have spoken against it and death on life is in the power of the tongue.
[31:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So in his mercy, he was like, let me work on your heart first.
[31:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let me work on your character first before I start telling you certain things because I don't want you to speak against what I'm trying to do in your life.
[31:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So that's the third thing, surrendering control meant I would not have the answers to all of the questions and all of the prayers and there were a lot, okay?
[31:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There still is a lot.
[32:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I still don't have all of the answers, but in surrendering control I had to learn to be okay with that.
[32:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to learn to be okay with that because in looking back I see that every time God shut a door, every time he did not open a door,
[32:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was for my good because some of the things that I was praying for that I was begging for that I was pleading for, I thank God.
[32:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I thank God that He did not give me those things because who would I be?
[32:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Who would I be?
[32:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Where would I be?
[32:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I thank God that He did not give me certain things that I asked for that I prayed for, I thank God.
[32:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That certain things did not work out.
[32:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: that certain relationships did not work out.
[32:42] \[UNKNOWN\]: I thank God.
[32:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because you never know what he's protecting you from.
[32:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I have to learn to be okay with that.
[32:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And like I said, still to this day, I have to learn.
[32:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I have to be willing to be surrendered enough.
[32:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: at this point in my life today to say, I am willing to go in blind because I have certain ideas.
[33:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You've given me certain ideas.
[33:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You've given me certain assignments, school, but at the same time, there are certain parts of the puzzle that I don't have.
[33:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There are some pieces that are sublory.
[33:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There are some things that are still missing.
[33:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and I had to be okay with trusting that even if I don't know he's still operating in my best interest.
[33:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was very hard for me to do because in me doing that with people in my life it literally
[33:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: did not work out.
[33:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It didn't end too well, right?
[33:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It literally made me not trust people.
[33:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: People not coming through for me.
[33:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: People having control over certain areas of my life and then abusing it.
[33:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: People not doing what I needed them to do or what they should have done.
[33:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: made me feel like there is no way.
[33:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There is no way.
[33:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Listen, I remember thinking in some of those situations when I was young, I remember thinking that when I get older, as soon as I can help it, there is no way I would ever give somebody control over my life.
[34:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There is no way I would ever put myself in certain positions to experience these things again.
[34:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I equated all of that pain with control, with surrendering control, not having control over my life.
[34:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So it was very hard for me to surrender control to God, right?
[34:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And a lot of, there was a lot of crying.
[34:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There were a lot of tears.
[34:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There was a lot of back and forth.
[34:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, maybe just back, no forth because, you know, a lot of times when I was, you know, bringing all of my grievances to him, I didn't necessarily get a response.
[34:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay?
[34:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Or the response that I got was not what I wanted.
[34:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wanted answers.
[34:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wanted clarity.
[34:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wanted precision.
[34:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And what I got was B still.
[34:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I almost lost my mind.
[34:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay?
[34:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because I'm not used to being still at the hands of others.
[34:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am used to getting up and going and do whatever needs to be done.
[34:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right?
[34:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And you're telling me to sit there and be still.
[34:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I'm just like, for how long?
[35:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: At least tell me that.
[35:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: At least tell me that.
[35:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: At least give me give me give me a little bit more.
[35:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Give me a little bit more.
[35:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was losing my mind.
[35:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And that's why I said in my news that it was an emotional roller coaster because of the emotions that came up, the discomfort that came up from having to face all of those things.
[35:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because a lot of the reasons why we struggle with certain things and our adulthood has to do the things that we experience in our childhood.
[35:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It all started there.
[35:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And the reason why we struggle to move past certain things is because we never address
[35:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: the pain from our childhood and how it made us feel.
[35:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We never address or we quit that pain of the way things happen in our childhood with what will happen now if we try to do such and things in our adulthood.
[35:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And God was literally just taking me on a journey of unpacking all of that and
[36:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I have never cried so much in my life.
[36:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes it was because I was just fed up.
[36:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes I was grateful.
[36:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes I was at this point to take me home.
[36:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Take me home, not even in a morbid type of way, but in a
[36:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Why must I struggle?
[36:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Why must my life be marked by struggle?
[36:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What is going on?
[36:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What is going on?
[36:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When will this end?
[36:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Will I have people when I rest?
[36:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When will I rest?
[36:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, it was just overwhelming.
[36:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was emotionally overwhelming.
[36:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was like a roller coaster going up and down back and forth.
[36:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But the thing is, there was one time during the process where I watched a sermon that literally, I felt like I had to shut up for forty-eight hours after I heard that because when I tell you that clocked me,
[36:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I forgot what it was because it was a long time ago, but the sermon said, the person basically said that we get so fed up with God.
[37:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We are so impatient with God when we want something and we feel like he's taking a long time.
[37:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He's not answering our prayers.
[37:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He's not coming through.
[37:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He, you know, it seems wishy-washy like one minute we feel like we're having progress and then we've experienced a setback and we get so mad at God, but we always forget how patient he was with us.
[37:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We always forget how patient he was with us.
[37:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We always forget how we said we wasn't going to do something and we did it not even twenty four hours later and Salvation was still available to us.
[37:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We said, you know what got I'm never doing this again.
[37:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you get me out of this situation, I will never do it again and show it enough.
[37:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sure enough before the week was over we did it again right?
[37:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: How many times have you said you wouldn't do something to God and then you went right back You did exactly what you said you wasn't going to do how many times have you fell have you missed the mark and he was patient and he received you with open arms But the moment God doesn't do something when you want him to which is within twenty four hours you feel like you know what this is not worth it.
[38:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is too much
[38:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When the pastor said that in the sermon I said, do you know what God?
[38:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I feel like, I feel like you overstepping in this relationship because I'm the funny one, okay?
[38:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm the one with the sense of humor.
[38:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm the spicy one here.
[38:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't appreciate you talking back.
[38:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Don't ask you to talk.
[38:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I want answers to my prayers.
[38:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't expect you to be clocking me like this.
[38:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't appreciate that.
[38:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said it in my mind and then I was silent for like at least an hour because it made me remember how you know.
[38:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, if they remember the rough start, I had with the Lord, you know, if me being eighties and all of that, and I was like, you were a patient through all of that.
[39:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And when I pray and you don't answer me, I'm just like, Lord, I don't even know if this is worth it.
[39:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I was like, you know, let me shut up.
[39:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let me shut up.
[39:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You didn't have to do all of that.
[39:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But I heard you loud and clear, but I digress, I just wanted you all to know that God comes for me sometimes, okay?
[39:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't appreciate it, but he comes for me sometimes, okay?
[39:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But all in all, y'all, it was very hard to give up control because of the fact that I associated it with feeling safe and not having it, with feeling too vulnerable, too exposed.
[39:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and you know overall just unsafe and God really he was patient.
[39:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He was patient.
[39:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I cannot say that God is not patient because He has dealt with me.
[39:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God has been patient with me and honestly it was just it was hard for me because
[40:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Coming to that point of me surrendering and saying, I am choosing to not walk away from the faith and go back to the world, go back to being selfish, go back to being in the driver's seat and you in the passenger seat and bless me and keep me saved but don't tell me what to do.
[40:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: going back to that comfort zone, going back to what I left and doing things on my own terms in a way that would not require me to stretch because I chose to lay that down and say, okay, I am going to trust you and see what all of this is about and go through that process of healing and unpacking
[40:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and crying and trusting and giving up control slowly but surely it was tough but I feel like it required a literal death of the old me that
[41:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: felt so broken and felt like I had to protect myself.
[41:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to have those walls up.
[41:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could not let those walls down.
[41:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could not trust anybody.
[41:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I could not, you know.
[41:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God and I applied that to God and He wanted me to see that the expectations that I placed on other people to keep me safe, to do certain things, to always have my back to never let me down, to always look after my best interest to always protect me, to do all of these things.
[41:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That expectations, those expectations should have been placed on him.
[41:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He is the only one that you can have those expectations for and actually have them met.
[42:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: People, people will disappoint you.
[42:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God is the only person that if you place those expectations on, he will actually operate in your best interest.
[42:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And no, it does not look like he always is.
[42:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's certainly in the moment, especially when you're going through a wilderness season, when things, when the circumstances are circumstance in, when life be life in, it certainly looks like perhaps God has handed you over to the devil.
[42:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Something must have happened.
[42:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Something must have happened because this is not me getting any sense, right?
[42:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When life is life in,
[42:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It definitely looks like God is not operating in your best interests, but I've said this a million times and I need to continue saying it for myself especially, but we never understand what God is doing in the moments when things are hard, but we always understand in hindsight.
[42:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While I was going to the moment spiraling, dealing with all of these things,
[43:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I, for one, I did not touch on it because again, I wanted to, you know, deal with that, understand it, wrap my head around it before I said anything on the podcast.
[43:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But I also, you know, I just, I, I was fed up.
[43:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, I was fed up.
[43:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was fed up at a lot of grievances towards God and you know, because we have a very good relationship.
[43:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I brought all of them to him and he addressed them.
[43:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, he gave me strength and all of that.
[43:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But we never understand what is happening while we are going through it.
[43:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's only in hindsight.
[43:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Do you actually understand why you have to go through certain things?
[43:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because now in hindsight, I can tell you
[43:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: that throughout all of the crying and the spiraling and the emotional roller coaster and the feeling like I need to just scream.
[44:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: God was truly making me a better person.
[44:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He was producing fruit in me, the fruits of the spirit.
[44:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He was changing my character.
[44:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He was making me less of a selfish person.
[44:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He was getting me to a place where my foundation would be in him and not in worldly things that could perish, that could pass away, that was not stable.
[44:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He led me to a lot of healing and forgiveness.
[44:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He brought out a lot of things that were creating bitterness and resentment in my heart that I had no idea of.
[44:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He truly made me a better person and just like completely changed my outlook on life and none of that would have happened if I had not gone to that wilderness season.
[44:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you had to ask me, back then, would you give up your job?
[44:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Would you give up your job and just trust God?
[45:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Even when it got to a point where the threshold that you said you had to go be low weight if you had asked me before I was absolutely not.
[45:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would say absolutely not, right?
[45:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But if I had not gone through that, the things that were unpacked in that season when I chose to go past
[45:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What my threshold was?
[45:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What my safety net was?
[45:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I don't think they would have happened in any other way because these were things that I had no idea were an issue for me.
[45:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: These were things that I had no idea were still living on the inside of me and were affecting me that much and I had no idea, right?
[45:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I truly, I was a very selfish person.
[45:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was a very selfish person.
[45:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would have probably run myself to the ground because I just felt like I had to be in control of everything.
[45:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There was nobody I could trust or hand over anything to regarding my life.
[45:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I wanted it done and had to be done myself,
[45:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I think a lot of times when we feel that way, we feel like it's justified because of how many times people have let us down.
[46:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But we don't always see how that mentality is literally running us to the ground mentally, emotionally, eventually physically.
[46:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like, it's a defense mechanism.
[46:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We do it to protect ourselves.
[46:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, we feel like the alternative is the worst case scenario, but the worst case scenario is living with that and never giving that to God and allowing it to just deteriorate your mental health, your relationships, your mindset, your
[46:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: physical health, etc.
[46:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There was a lot of resentment, there was a lot of trauma, there was a lot of defense mechanisms in me, there was a lot of my personality that actually defense mechanisms, but I didn't know because I thought that's just who I was, but that's why it became to protect myself.
[46:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And if I did not allow God, if I didn't give him the permission to do what he wants in this season,
[46:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I would not have discovered those things because I didn't think anything was wrong.
[47:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I didn't think anything was wrong.
[47:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I think when we look at our life a lot of times we mark our success or our well-being by external markers and we completely negate what's going on on the inside.
[47:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So for example with me, I was doing very well in my career.
[47:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was alright financially and I just felt like everything was fine, right?
[47:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: the external stuff that is.
[47:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I knew internally that I wanted to pivot.
[47:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I knew that I wanted to do work that I was called to do and I knew I was not in that position yet.
[47:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But I, the external markers were unfortunately loud enough to where I did not know what the internal markers were trying to tell me that there was something wrong, that there was a lot wrong actually.
[47:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But because I was doing very well because it looked good externally other people assumed I was doing well and I I let it slide long enough until it got to a point where God was like You cannot go any further as this version of yourself I cannot use you as this guarded version of yourself because you don't even know what parts of your future that all of this is affecting right?
[48:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I think a lot of times when people have these external markets of success, especially in your career and your finances, people tend to think that everything is okay.
[48:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But there are issues, there are certain parts of your life that is being negatively affected because of all of these things that the external markets of success are masking.
[48:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You cannot just look at, you know, how much money somebody has or what career they have and think that everything is good.
[48:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You don't know what's going on on the inside, right?
[48:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I thought,
[48:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I thought that you know because I was somebody because I am somebody who has always been committed to self-improvement and personal growth and being introspective and always thinking about life and the things I've been through and trying to dissect the lessons from that and that's how this whole podcast was birthed, that's what carries it, that's what I do.
[49:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I always thought that because I was so forward thinking and introspective in that way that I didn't think I was perfect but I thought that if there was something wrong I would have things that were wrong I thought I was aware of it but I just I just did not know
[49:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I couldn't see the selfishness.
[49:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I knew I had a system level of selfishness, but I thought that it was a healthy level of selfishness to preserve and protect myself, but I did not realize how it was not.
[49:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I did not realize how certain things were affecting what I said or my viewpoints on such things because it was all rooted in self-defense.
[49:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was all rooted in protecting myself.
[49:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was all rooted in pain and trauma.
[49:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was rooted in pride.
[49:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was rooted in rejection, right?
[50:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If I had not surrendered control, God would not be able to unpack all of these things because it was wrapped or hidden under a very pretty successful, externally successful career.
[50:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Very good external appearance, but there was a lot that needed to be unpacked on the inside.
[50:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And that process of trusting God and giving up control literally required a death to the version of myself that wanted to always be in hyper independence mode for the sake of protecting myself, for the sake of not being disappointed by people, for the sake of feeling like I had a sense of control so that I wouldn't be safe.
[50:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just wanted to be safe.
[50:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just wanted to have the option to
[50:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Leave a situation if I needed to leave it.
[50:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Whatever the situation was, any situation where I felt unsafe or whatever it was, knowing that you have the financial ability to leave any situation that makes you feel uncomfortable or safe.
[51:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: is truly a privilege that I wish everybody could experience and there's nothing wrong with having that but there was just way too much beneath the surface of how much I depended on that that was hindering how God wanted to use me so he had to unpack that right it's not necessarily the money that was an issue is not the finances that was an issue it was the fact that I put the finances in places that God had to be
[51:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I rely on the money, not God.
[51:40] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It wasn't God that I was trusting to get me out of situations or prevent me from going in situations.
[51:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was the money.
[51:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was the issue.
[51:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I used the money to gain a sense of control that I never had but always wanted because not having it made me feel unsafe.
[51:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That was the issue and God had to take me through that process because He wanted me to learn to surrender control to Him.
[52:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He wanted me to replace what I depended on money for with Him, right?
[52:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to look to Him for those things.
[52:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to look to Him for protection, for provision, to keep me safe, to make sure I'm not in situations I don't need to be in, to make sure I can get out of situations that I unfortunately ended up in.
[52:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right?
[52:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I didn't see him as, you know, all of that.
[52:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just, I just knew I wasn't going to hell.
[52:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I received salvation, but I did not receive the Savior, but I did not receive a Lord.
[52:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay?
[52:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because the Savior gave you salvation.
[52:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The Lord is who's leading your life.
[52:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I wanted to be in control of my life, okay?
[52:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Save me, don't make me crisp and burn and hell, but don't tell me what to do.
[52:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, and he was like, yeah, we have come as far as we can go with that mindset.
[52:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You either want to surrender control or stay where you are.
[53:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I don't want to stay where I was.
[53:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was like, right, fine, I will do it.
[53:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It almost made me lose my mind.
[53:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: but I survived.
[53:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I survived, I'm so surviving because again, I have given up control of certain things over to him.
[53:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I really fought hard to try to be in control of my finances.
[53:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I fought hard to try to be in control of certain opportunities, the plans for my life.
[53:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I fought, I put up a fight.
[53:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I put up a fight, but I lost.
[53:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay.
[53:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I surrendered, I surrendered because I knew it was a losing battle so I surrendered and it is what it is he's been coming through but still it's like an ongoing thing so I think
[53:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I think it's just something that you have to learn to get comfortable with because I'm still learning, but at least I am here, at least I am here.
[53:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I had to be in situations where I did not have a plan.
[53:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I did not all the possible outcomes of the possible paths.
[54:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: that an options that could be taken to solve this problem do not look very promising right now and I had to be in no situations and I had to say I trust you and he has been coming through y'all like the thing is you will never know God as your protector if you don't let him protect you you will never know him as your provider if you don't allow him to provide for you
[54:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And in order for him to do these things, the need has to be there and you have to wait on him to fill it.
[54:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's I talked about that in part two on trusting him.
[54:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The need has to be there and you have to wait for him to fill it.
[54:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You cannot run to fill it yourself.
[54:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In order to know that he's a God who heals, you have to be in a position where you need healing and then wait on him to heal you.
[54:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In order for him to be a God who protects you and defends you and vindicate you.
[54:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like he says he will.
[54:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You have to bring a position where your enemies, you know, the weapons that are forming against you look like they're prospering and you have to trust that they will not prosper.
[54:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You have to trust that he will protect you.
[55:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The need has to be there.
[55:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The gap has to be there in order for him to fill it.
[55:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And in the process of having that gap and looking at that gap.
[55:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and watching time go by while that gap still exists.
[55:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's where it's hard to surrender control.
[55:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's where you have to sit there and be like, alright, I trust you, I trust you.
[55:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Okay, twenty-four hours past, I still trust you.
[55:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said, okay, one week, one week, okay, did my prayers get stuck?
[55:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In a line or something, am I in the queue?
[55:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like how many people are before me?
[55:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Like what's going on?
[55:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You know, I realized that I cannot control anything anyway.
[55:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I might just work on surrender to the one who controls everything.
[55:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because in hindsight, I realized that when I wasn't in control of my life, when I was the one with the pen, making all of the plans,
[55:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I was thinking so small in comparison to the things that God had in store for me.
[55:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There's not one moment in my life that I can look back on the plans that I've had for my life prior to now and not think that that is so small compared to what God has shown me.
[56:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But that is so small compared to what I've actually accomplished through trusting God.
[56:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I'm just like, you know what, if I was thinking small anyway, even though to me those were big, if I was thinking small anyway, then you know what, just have your way.
[56:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's easier said than done.
[56:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's easier said than done.
[56:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm not going to hold you.
[56:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's easier said than done.
[56:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But it's worth it because even when it looks like God is not coming through in the ways that I want him to, I just remember the times that I begged him to
[56:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I just remember the times that I begged him to work certain things out and it didn't work out and I am so grateful.
[56:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I am so grateful.
[56:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I can think of like two things in my life that I am so grateful did not work out, right?
[56:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I'm just like, okay, when things don't look like they're working out, I have to go back to those moments and remember that
[57:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes I think I'm asking for, could lead to my own sabotage.
[57:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So I just need to be quiet and trust you.
[57:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Even when I don't understand, even when it looks like the walls are caving in, I just need to trust you because I may not know now, but eventually I will make sense.
[57:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It has always worked out that way.
[57:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And so, you know, again, just constant reminder, I have to keep telling myself, alright, life looks like it's life in, but it will make sense in the end.
[57:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And a lot of things have already started making sense as what I'm doing in the series.
[57:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I hope that it has been helpful.
[57:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you have not already, make sure you go watch part one on how he laid the foundation in my life and part two on the process of learning to trust him.
[57:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And stay tuned because part
[57:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: four will be posted on either Wednesday or Thursday.
[57:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So that is all I have to say today and I will talk to you next week.

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