All Episodes

June 26, 2025 34 mins

Send us a text

A year after baptism marked the most challenging yet transformative period in my life, proving that spiritual growth doesn't eliminate hardship but provides the foundation to withstand life's storms with newfound resilience and perspective. The journey revealed that peace doesn't come from perfect circumstances but from accepting what can't be changed and finding joy in small moments.

• Understanding the difference between self-awareness and self-criticism
• Baptism experience providing a sense of acceptance and a clean slate
• Facing relationship breakdown, my daughter's bipolar diagnosis, and job loss
• Learning that God never promised an easy life—only that it would be worth it
• Finding genuine self-love, forgiveness, patience, and gratitude through hardship
• Discovering true peace that isn't dependent on external circumstances
• Realizing that mistakes don't invalidate faith—we're all on different timelines
• Waking up with gratitude instead of dread for the first time since age 15

God loves you. You're enough, you're built for this, and until next time, have a good night.


Support the show

Thank you for listening 💞 You are loved You are enough You are NOT alone You were built for this.

Follow us on IG:https://www.instagram.com/checkyoselffoo
TIK TOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@checkyoselffoo

Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
You better check yourself before you break
yourself.
You better check yourselfbefore you break yourself.
I feel like my podcast has gonethrough an identity crisis, or
me I've gone through an identitycrisis of naming the podcast.
The check yourself part hasalways been very clear to me and

(00:23):
, honestly, the whole nameshould have been very clear to
me and, honestly, the whole nameshould have been pretty clear
to me because what came to mewas check yourself, fool or fool
, however you want to say it,but I didn't want to name it
that because I felt like puttingthe word fool in there was
going to be perceived as anegative thing and I didn't want

(00:44):
it to be negative because mypurpose is for anyone, not just
believers, not just followers,but anybody who feels like
they're going through somethingor feels like they are not good
enough or not worthy, just feelsvery negative about themselves

(01:10):
overall.
I didn't want to add to that bycalling them fool, but I'm not
calling you fool and really thename is more of a question to
yourself, a question to myself.
I am very honest with myself.
I would like to think that I'mpretty self-aware, but there's a
difference between awarenessand beating yourself up and I

(01:34):
did not know that difference.
Check yourself full isself-awareness.
Asking yourself, checkingyourself what is going on?
Am I contributing to thesituation?
Am I contributing to my owntroubles in life?
Beating yourself up is saying Iain't ish, I will never amount

(02:00):
to it and I will always be acrappy person.
It's telling yourself thatyou're all the words that people
have called you and justpointing out all the negatives.
But instead of changing them,just accepting them and selling
yourself short by basicallybelieving that this is who you

(02:20):
are and this is who you'llalways be.
But I wanted people to knowthat there is so much more to
you than where you're at.
No matter where you're at, youcan always go further.
You're actually built to be waymore than what you could even

(02:41):
imagine.
There's way more potential inyou than you know, but in order
to reach that potential, youhave to have self-awareness.
With no self-awareness, youdon't know in what areas you
need improvement and you cangrow.
With all that being said, Istarted thinking about the
podcast and I started thinkingabout my baptism, mostly because

(03:06):
I was baptized June 9th of lastyear and it was June 9th of
this year and I was excitedabout the fact that I had made
it a year.
I'm going to be extremelyhonest.
One of my fears about making apromise to God and being

(03:28):
baptized and accepting God in mylife was failure, and I believe
it's because I have a fear offailure overall, and that stands
from the fact that I feel likeI have failed at absolutely
everything in life.
I have failed at school, I hadfailed at being a mom.
I had failed relationships somany of them and that's how I

(03:52):
saw it.
I felt like I just could notwin at anything.

(04:16):
That's not even what wasimportant to me of my baptism to
where I am today as a person.
If I look at my relationshipwith God last year, to what it
is today and I mean relationship, I don't mean going to church,

(04:36):
I don't mean going to churchgroups or praying or any of that
.
I mean I have built arelationship, I have built my
trust and I have built my faithin a way that I never even

(04:58):
thought possible.
So, thinking about last yearwhen I was about to get baptized
, it was like the week beforeand I was getting a little
nervous because I had a lot ofquestions in my head.
One, because I was raised in away where God only loved you if
you were perfect, if you did allthe right things and followed

(05:24):
all the rules.
Perfect, if you did all theright things and followed all
the rules.
And I know that I wasn'tfollowing all the rules and I
knew realistically that evenafter being baptized I was going
to break some of those rules,because nobody changes overnight
and there are some things thatare harder to break than others

(05:45):
and some things that we do thataren't necessarily right, but
they don't feel wrong if thatmakes sense, one of them being
the fact that I was not legallymarried.
I was engaged, I lived with myfiance, we had a daughter, so I

(06:05):
wonder what that meant for me.
With getting baptized, myfiance wasn't getting baptized
and my fiance was living hislife.
So I didn't want to getbaptized if I was just going to
mess up, but I also reallywanted to make the next step in

(06:26):
building my relationship withGod.
Not only am I telling you thatI'm going to follow you, obey,
give you my life, my trust, butI also want to show you, I want
to follow in your footsteps ofwhat you did.
So I went ahead and gotbaptized.

(06:48):
It was definitely one of thebest days of my life.
I remember walking into the tuband sitting down, there was a
woman to my right, there was aman to my left.
The woman asked me do youaccept Jesus as your Lord and
Savior?
I looked at her and I had thisinstant overwhelming feeling

(07:11):
come over me, almost like arelief, and I felt love and
nothing but not me feeling thelove.
But I felt loved as if someonewas giving me a hug after years
of needing that hug.
It was like full acceptance.

(07:33):
That's the feeling I receivedat that moment and I said yes, I
went down into the water and itwas very quick, but it felt a
lot longer because, as I wasgoing into that water, almost
all of the horrible thingsflashed through and left my body

(07:54):
.
This is a very, very differentexperience and I'm sure everyone
goes through it differently.
Sure, everyone goes through itdifferently.
I think for me it was extremelymeaningful because it was my
choice and probably because ofmy age.
I was able to understand trulyeverything that was going on and

(08:23):
the promise that I was making.
I was fully aware of everything.
So I feel like I was able toreally understand and appreciate
that moment.
I came out of the water and Ifelt relief.
I felt clean, and when I sayclean, I mean like my soul felt

(08:45):
less heavy and I felt like I wasgetting a second chance, a redo
, a start over, which Idesperately needed in my life.
I would love to tell you thatafter that day I became perfect,
but I did not and honestly,life started to get a lot harder
for me after that.

(09:06):
A lot of people think that whenyou come to God, that he's some
sort of magician and all yourtroubles should be gone.
And if they don't, he must notbe that great.
What's funny to me about thatis in John 16, 33, jesus clearly

(09:26):
states I have told you thesethings so that in me you may
have peace In this world.
You will have trouble, but takeheart, I have overcome the
world.
We were never told that justbecause we believe in God,
believe that Jesus gave his lifefor our sin, that meant from

(09:50):
here on out it's a walk in thepark and I would honestly argue,
if anything, it gets harderbecause while you are trying to
do the best that you can and youare trying to grow and you're
trying to be a better personoverall, not just for yourself
but for the benefit of others.

(10:13):
Even though you're doing allthese things, the world is
business as usual andunfortunately, a lot of people
don't care.
A lot of people don't care howsaved you are or how much you
try or how nice you are or anyof those things, and a lot of
times there are people out therewho are going to keep the image

(10:39):
of the person that you used tobe, and you're going to struggle
if you keep trying to provethat you're not so with turning
life over to God.
You have to come to a point ofacceptance that, no matter what
you do, people are going to bepeople and they are going to be

(11:03):
who they are.
They will have their ownopinions of you and you cannot
base your behavior or youractions, reactions on what they
do or say, and you can't give upworking on who you are meant to
be just because other peoplewant to continue to see you as

(11:28):
what you were.
So that was a struggle, becauseI was feeling like I was really
trying.
I was feeling like I could seethat I was growing as a person,
I was growing in my faith and Icould see that my heart was
being softened, but other peoplecouldn't see that and at a

(11:50):
point it started to bediscouraging and I had to
understand that what I was doingit wasn't for people to
recognize that I was being sonice and great and all this
stuff.
I was doing it for me, I had todo it for me.
Life started throwing all kindsof curveballs.
So not too long after I wasbaptized, my relationship was

(12:14):
over.
Well, it was over before that,but it really hit the fan after
and that was extremely hard andextremely painful and I had to
keep just praying and asking Godand there was some really,
really dark times and I felt sodesperate and at that moment I

(12:38):
thought that God was supposed tofix that.
I just kept believing, I kepthaving faith and hope.
Things became really, reallyunbearable at that point and I
remember I was in the kitchenand I asked God if you could
just please get me out of thissituation.
I will hand my life and focusjust on you for a year.

(13:01):
And what I was referring to wasI wouldn't look for another man
for a year, because I had thistendency of you know that saying
you get over someone, get undersomeone else, something like
that.
So that was my, my go toresponse for a breakup or you

(13:23):
know whatever, and I didn't wantto do that again.
One because this time it hurtso much more differently than
previous times.
This last time was really just.
I have never experienced thattype of hurt and I don't know if

(13:44):
anyone would understand this,but this is the type of hurt
that it hurts so bad that youcan't you can't even express it
outerly, you just feel itinternally.
So I wasn't crying, screaming,crying it was.

(14:06):
I felt truly broken on theinside.
I realized that it felt so hardand it hurt so bad because my
whole happiness was wrappedaround this relationship and I

(14:26):
didn't want to do that again.
I truly wanted to.
Instead of handing my brokenheart to another person again
and them having control ofputting it back together or
breaking it or any of that,instead of handing the control

(14:47):
of my life and happiness toanother human, I wanted to hand
it to God.
I wanted him to fix my brokenheart, for him to be the one to
put it back together, because Iknew at that point that he was
never going to leave my side.
So there was no danger of myheart being broken again because

(15:09):
a person that held the key tomy heart was God, who is perfect
in his love for us, and nothingI do could ever take that away
from me Real, unconditional love, whereas, unfortunately, as
humans, no matter how much welove somebody, even if we don't

(15:33):
know it, there are conditions.
So once I made that promise inthe kitchen, I kept praying.
I wanted to make sure I madethe right decision.
I didn't want to make decisionsbased on anger, based on hurt,
based on fear.
So I waited for God to give mean answer, for him to tell me

(15:56):
what my next move was, and so hedid.
Months later, I got my stuffmoved out of my house, got my
own place, and I thought I'll bebetter, because in the past,
when I left a situation, I feltbetter.
But one of the reasons wasbecause I would have
distractions.
I never went through any typeof breakup and truly feel or

(16:25):
felt the pain.
I never went through thefeelings because I was already
mesmerized by something new or Iwas out distracting myself with
either partying with my friendsor spending money I didn't have
.
I would just have all kinds oflittle vices that would distract

(16:50):
me from what I was goingthrough this time because of who
I was serving, who I wasfollowing and who I made a
promise to.
I literally had to feel everysingle feeling that I was going
through.
I had to think about that I wasgoing through.

(17:13):
I had to think about everythingthat had just happened.
I had to think about the factthat I was starting over, and
when I say starting over, I meanlike all the way starting over.
My daughter then got sick.
We had been dealing with someissues with her since the
beginning of the year and theycame to a head.
We ended up having to take herto a hospital and my daughter

(17:33):
was diagnosed with bipolardisorder and that was really
hard for me because I knew howhard things were going to be for
my daughter going forward.
It is one thing for me to dealwith living with this.
It is a whole nother thing towatch my daughter trying to

(17:59):
navigate it as a child.
I didn't want her to have to gothrough the things that I have
gone through, so I wanted to bethere for her that I have gone
through.
So I wanted to be there for her.
I wanted her to have all thesupport that I never had and
because I've been going throughthis, I felt like I would be
able to share with her and helpher so that the ride would be

(18:25):
less bumpy.
It's not going to be easier,because we all have our own set
of challenges, but at least shewouldn't feel alone and she
wouldn't feel misunderstood.
So once that happened, I didn'trealize how much stress I had
been under for the past howevermany months year and I got sick.

(18:47):
I probably had the worstepisode of mania that I have
ever had in my entire life.
Quite literally felt like Ilost my mind and I didn't notice
.
But the people around me notice.
And it didn't really clickuntil one of my really good

(19:07):
friends, who also deals withmental health issues, said to me
you know, lina, maybe youshould talk to your doctor and
get this looked into, becauseyou don't seem right.
So to have her say that to mewhen we have had so many
discussions like I'm talkingabout me and this girl we are

(19:31):
just very transparent with oneanother.
I know the way she thinks andshe knows the way I think so for
her to tell me I needed to goto my doctor, I was like, okay,
there's something, maybe.
Maybe I do need to get thischecked out.

(19:53):
I kept feeling like there wassomething medically wrong with
me.
So I went to my you know, mywhat do you call that?
My actual doctor, my, whateverthe doctor that checks to see if
you're sick or not.
And she ran so many tests on meand everything kept coming back
normal.
That was also an indicationthat I literally was losing my

(20:17):
mind, and that's what mentalhealth does to you it makes you
think there's got to besomething more.
It can't possibly be all in myhead and it makes you feel like
you're crazy.
So now that I knew it wasnothing physical, I started to

(20:37):
realize that there was a lot ofmental work for me to do.
I realized how much of a tollall of this had taken on me, and
I didn't even know it.
So I took a leave from my job.
As I took a leave from my job,some more stuff came about with

(20:58):
my job, so I ended up being outof work and I couldn't
physically work.
So I was really, honestly, itfelt like rock bottom because I
felt like I have no job, I don'tlive necessarily what I would
like to live.
My health is not great and I'mhaving to deal with still the

(21:22):
heartbreak that I'm goingthrough, still wanting and
hoping that by some miracle, myfamily will be together again,
hoping and waiting for the otherside to basically make changes
and decisions in order for me tomove forward.

(21:46):
It was just a lot going on and Iremember a friend said to me I
was crying and I was upset andthey said to me you know,
there's some things that you'regoing to have to deal with on
your own.
And at first I'm not gonna lieI was mad because I'm like what

(22:09):
are you talking about?
I've been dealing with stuffalone like my whole life.
But I realized that I havenever dealt with anything on my
own and that doesn't necessarilymean I was dealing with it with
another person, but I wasdealing with it with habits,
with distractions and no funnybecause I feel like this has

(22:32):
been the worst, best year of mylife.
The worst because my familymeans absolutely everything to

(22:56):
me.
The worst because the person Ithought I would spend my life
with is no longer a part of mylife.
They are just a person in mylife.
Hard, because I feel like I amstarting over completely and I
am 35.

(23:16):
And I feel, by the standards ofthe world, I should not be
starting over.
If anything, I should be, youknow, like close to the finish
line or halfway there orsomething, but those are all
like honestly minor issues.

(23:37):
Things change in life.
Nothing is promised, and whathappens to us in our life is not
just based on our choices.
They're also based on thechoices of others, and that
taught me that, no matter whatis going on around me, no matter
what choices people around memake people in my life make I

(24:01):
have to have a foundation onwhich I can still stand on, and
I didn't have that.
And it has been the best yearbecause of everything I have
gained and, more importantly,everything that I have gained I
can't lose.
I have gained real love formyself.
I have learned to love thethings about me that I have

(24:26):
always hated.
I have learned to forgivemyself.
I've learned to forgive others.
I have learned my worth.
I've learned patience.
I have learned to truly begrateful, to truly be grateful
for the little things in life,to find joy in even the smallest

(24:49):
things and to choose joy.
I have learned to, instead ofcrying and whining about what's
wrong with my life, to insteadappreciate the things that
haven't gone as planned, andgrowing and learning from them

(25:11):
and sharing them with otherpeople who might be walking
through something similar or thesame.
I've learned that everything isnot about me, it's not about my
feelings, it's not about what Ihave, what I don't have.
I have learned to stop being avictim of my past.
One of the best things thatI've gained this year is I have

(25:34):
truly, truly come to learn who Iam.
I know my strengths, I know myweaknesses.
I know what I can and cannothandle.
I know situations that I canand cannot be in.
I have learned who I have tolove from a distance.
I have learned that noteverything needs a response.

(25:55):
It's amazing the peace that youget when you understand who you
are, and I believe when youunderstand who you are, you can
better understand those aroundyou and who they are.
I remember the first time Irealized I had peace.

(26:17):
I was sitting in my living room, I think I was watching TV, I
had just cleaned the house and Iguess my kids were either not
here or they were asleep.
But I was just by myself and Ilooked around my very small
apartment and I just thought man, thank you God, thank you for

(26:37):
everything that I have at thismoment, thank you for being able
to sit here and literally notbe worried about anything, and
not because nothing was going on, but because I knew, no matter
what it was, it was going to beokay and I had accepted that

(26:57):
there's things that I just can'tchange and I didn't want to
continue to allow things that Ican't change to affect me for
the rest of my life.
I learned to just be happy inthe moment and thankful for that
moment.
I would love to say that Idon't have hard days.

(27:20):
Everything is peaches and cream.
I wake up with a smile on myface every day, but that's not
realistic and that's not real.
But what I can tell you is thatevery day I wake up and I'm
thankful.
I am thankful that I get to seemy little baby girl's face, her

(27:42):
smile.
I'm thankful I have a roof.
I'm thankful I have a way toget around and I'm thankful that
I have peace.
No matter what life throws at me, it can't shake me because of
who is holding me up, because ofwho has the strength when I
don't, because of who loves me,because of who guides me,

(28:05):
listens to me, no matter what,doesn't judge me, just pushes me
to be better for me so that Ican walk through all this and
still be okay.
There's a lot of things I stillam learning, there's a lot of
things I'm still trying toimprove in, and even the things

(28:27):
that I have learned doesn't meanI have them down, it just means
I'm more aware of them.
I have learned the things thatI do that I didn't even realize
that I was doing, and just beingaware of that is the first step
in itself, because if I didn'tknow it, then I wouldn't be able
to fix it, nor, you know, wouldI even care to.

(28:49):
So what it's been like a yearsince my baptism.
It's been a lot of learning.
It's been a lot of letting go.
It's been a lot of acceptance,a lot of faith and a lot of
letting go.
It's been a lot of acceptance,a lot of faith and a lot of hope
.
It's been a lot of falling tomy knees and simply saying I

(29:13):
cannot do it anymore and himsaying, yes, you can, and me
getting back up.
But I've never given up and Ihave never left his side, not
once.
Even through my tears, eventhrough my anger, even through

(29:33):
the mistakes that I have made, Iwould still be there, talking
to him, asking for forgiveness,asking for him to help me do
better.
One of the reasons I wanted toshare this is because I feel
like a lot of us don't feel likewe can be honest and open once

(29:56):
we give our life over to God onour struggles, and we feel like
if we say that we're strugglingwith something or we have things
going on in our lives or wehave vices that we're struggling
with, that we will be looked atas if we're not being faithful,

(30:17):
we're not praying, we're not,you know, we're not close to God
, and that's simply not true.
We're all in different places.
Some of us have walked throughmore things in life than others
in a short amount of time.
Some of us are able to seethings quicker than others, and

(30:38):
some of us are ready and some ofus are not, and sometimes we're
ready to give some stuff up,but other stuff is harder.
No matter what yourcircumstances are, the only
advice I can give you is don'tlet other people make you feel
guilt or ashamed or ashamed.

(31:08):
We're up to a point where youwould walk away from God because
you think he feels the same way, because he doesn't.
Only you and God know what yourrelationship is Be honest with
yourself, have self-awareness.
One year down, a lifetime to go.
He never said it would be easy.
He only said it would be worthit.
I can tell you by personalexperience it's most definitely

(31:31):
worth it, because what I havetoday is something I thought I
would never have the fact that Iwake up each day and can say
thank you.
That in itself that's enoughfor me for the rest of my life,
because I was a person thatwould dread waking up.
I would open my eyes and Iwould just be like damn it,

(31:55):
because I was hoping the daybefore would be my last.
And that was my life since Iwas 15 years old.
Yeah, you just can't buy thattype of relief and peace.
So even if that's the onlything I gain in life from
walking with God, I don't wakeup with that empty feeling.

(32:17):
I don't have a void in my life.
I'm telling you I would do thisall over again.
I would do, I would do theheartbreak, I would do the loss,
I would do it all, because noteven when I thought my life was
quote unquote perfect did I everhave that type of peace.

(32:37):
Never, and I don't have toworry that someone else's
choices will take that away fromme.
I pray for anyone who is goingthrough anything right now.
I pray for anyone who ishurting, whose heart's been
broken by whatever circumstancenot just romantic, anything by

(33:02):
anyone who's been disappointed.
I pray for anyone who currentlyreally hates themselves, who
walks around heavy, who isfilled with anger, resentment.
I truly pray that you will findthe peace that you are looking
for, that you will find the lovefor yourself, that you can see

(33:25):
all of the good that is in youand embrace.
That you don't have to be theperson that your circumstances
made you become.
You don't have to live with theheaviness of hate inside of you
.
There is good and bad ineveryone.

(33:48):
It's your choice which side youlean on.
I pray that everything, oranything, even just one line of
everything that I have sharedtoday is something that someone
needed to hear.
I just want to remind you Godloves you.
You're enough, you're built forthis, and until next time, have

(34:10):
a good night.
You better check yourselfbefore you break yourself.
You better check yourselfbefore you break yourself.
Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

United States of Kennedy
Stuff You Should Know

Stuff You Should Know

If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.

Dateline NBC

Dateline NBC

Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.