December 15, 2024 • 37 mins
We're ending S1 with a bang and keeping it so forreal about how self-improvement and self-help start out as innocent tools to help us get out of low places, but how slowly over time these things can actually end up hurting us more than they help us.
We cover:
- What self-help is
- When it starts to get dangerous
- How these tools can hurt us more than they help
- How we can bridge the gap between self-help and looking to the Lord for help
- Some amazing book recommendations to help you get started!!
Books mentioned in this episode:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
We are all wrestling with something.
Whether you're wrestling with your selfimage, your faith in God, or your entire
life's purpose, I'm here to tell you thatnumber one, you are not alone, and number
two, to encourage you to find both beautyand purpose in the midst of your struggle.
My name is Emled, and this isthe Wrestling With Life podcast.
(00:24):
What's up, you guys?
Welcome back to theWrestling With Life podcast.
I am your host, Emled.
Thank you so much for tuning in tothe fifth and final episode of our
series on how our self obsession isactually making us all so miserable.
Today we're focusing on the self helpworld, on self improvement, and how
(00:46):
Our journey with self help and selfimprovement actually starts out very
innocently and from a wholesome place,but how over time it actually leads
to us exalting ourselves, glorifyingourselves, and being so obsessed with
ourselves to the point where it'sactually hurting us and hurting our
relationships and our peace and ourpurpose more than it's helping us.
(01:10):
A lot of times if we take it toofar and we treat self improvement
as our God or as the fix all,that's where the suffering comes.
That's where we kind of get on this neverending hamster wheel where we're always
chasing these self help tools and theseself improvement tools to fix us, right?
So if you guys remember from the lastcouple episodes, we've been talking
(01:33):
a lot about pride and humility.
And just a quick recap ofwhat we've been talking about.
Especially this age demographic thatthis podcast is focused around, about
22 years old to 35 years old, in yourcareer full time and no children yet.
This is especially the time in ourlives where we are more likely to be
(01:54):
selfish and to be obsessed with ourcareers, making money, et cetera, and we
are told, we are targeted specificallywith this message from the world.
If you scroll on Instagram or Twitteror I guess it's X now, wherever
you like to scroll online, thesekind of messages are everywhere.
(02:16):
Focus on yourself, worryabout your money, grind.
These are all messages that weare getting constantly and so it's
become so normalized and so accepted.
An American culture in general isjust so incredibly individualistic
and encourages you to worry about youand only you as a way to find success,
(02:38):
peace, happiness, et cetera, right?
I've believed those messages for severalyears of my life and firsthand experience.
Not true.
It does not end how everyonesays it's going to end.
You End up kind of running yourselframpant, always chasing, always grinding,
always trying to fill this God sizedhole in yourself that you can never fill.
(03:03):
Okay?
And if you guys remember, I said I hadput some polls out on my Instagram to try
to understand what this age demographicis really, really struggling with and
focusing their energy on and feeling.
And a stat that just continues to.
blow my mind, but also not blowmy mind at the same time, is that
(03:23):
98 percent of us are focused onourselves instead of other people.
I'm especially excited to speak on thisself help topic because this is what I
had be my god for the last couple years.
Like, As I was wrestling with my faithand really didn't know where I stood with
the Lord, self help was like the nextbest thing because it took all of the
(03:48):
principles of Christianity, well manyof the principles of Christianity and
wholesome living and living a life thatyou're proud of, it took like the core
of that, of like being a good person,but then left God out of the equation.
And so how self help works and selfimprovement, if you're not familiar
(04:08):
with the industry, or maybe you justknow it, uh, with a different term or
a different name, it's basically usingresources or your own efforts to achieve
things and not rely on anybody else.
And this is usually pertainingto fixing personal struggles.
Like, you're leveraging these resourcesand your own efforts to try to overcome
(04:30):
some sort of problem in your life,like your mental health, or struggles
with organization or managing yourstress, managing your money, your
finances, things like that, right?
And the thing about self help, it's,it's literally in the name self help.
It is this hyper focus on you.
(04:52):
And there's this underlying messagein all of the self help mediums out
there, the books, the masterclasses, thewebinars, the podcast, the events, the
catalogs, the programs, the affirmations,whatever medium this message is being
communicated to us in, the underlyingtone of that is you make the rules, you
(05:15):
decide what goes, you set the pace, right?
This is all about youand what works for you.
And so without saying it, this is neverexplicitly said, but without saying it,
this, there's this underlying suggestionthat you are the God of your own life.
You create your own reality.
(05:37):
And I used to eat this for breakfast.
I used to love this idea, this ideaof being in charge and calling the
shots and being in control, makingthe rules up, living on my own terms.
That appealed to me so, so, so muchover the last few years because I was
coming away from a lot of church hurt.
(06:00):
A lot of experiences that left areally bad taste in my mouth of
what the Christian life was andwhat following Jesus looked like.
Christianity and Jesus as I know itnow had never been modeled to me in a
way that really emphasizes humility.
laying down your life andletting God change you.
(06:23):
How I understood Christianity up untilthis point was being a good person in your
own willpower to make God happy with you.
That's how I understood it, right?
And it was always so confusing to mebecause there were these two seemingly
conflicted conflicting messages inChristianity where it's like you can't
(06:44):
do anything in your own power to saveyourself and you need God but then it's
at the same time it was this message oflike but you're a Christian and so this is
how you should live and how you should beand black and white all or nothing if you
don't live this way you're going to hell.
And I could never make sense of how thosetwo things could be true at the same time.
(07:07):
Like, how could I need a Godto save me, but it's also on
me to make the right decision?
That was always so confusing to me.
All this to say, the self helpworld really appealed to me because
at the end of the day, really whatself help teaches you is like, you
have to pour into yourself beforeyou can pour into other people.
(07:29):
So the narrative that I was tellingmyself as I was consuming all this content
about, you know, putting your mentalhealth first and creating boundaries and
not being a people pleaser and livinglife on your terms and doing what's best
for you and creating a life that youlove, like all this content that I was
consuming about me, I genuinely believed,okay, I am making myself the best
(07:55):
version that I can be so that I can then.
Be a good person for other people.
That's where it started out.
Because if you know me personallynow and the philosophy that I've
kind of always lived by is that I amhere to be a light to other people.
I am here to encourage otherpeople and lift other people up.
(08:16):
Like that is the life philosophythat I've always operated on.
And so much of my Christian rootsand my Christian upbringing is the
reason why I live my life that way.
But I, I really believed the self helppiece where it's like, okay, but I got to
focus on me because for many years of mylife, I just, I gave and I gave and I gave
(08:38):
and I loved, I lived from a place of loveand I didn't realize that I was actually
operating from a place of wanting approvaland doing things because I thought I
was supposed to do them to earn love.
Okay, so the self help world helped meget rid of that philosophy that I needed
(08:59):
to do things to earn love, but then whatI didn't realize as I really started,
like, reading all the books and reallygetting immersed in the podcast and
the culture and building myself up isthis undercurrent of self glorification
and of you mattering and your needsmattering more than those around you.
(09:23):
Okay, and I'm not saying this to say thatboundaries don't matter, because they do.
They very much matter.
And there is an element of truth inneeding to fill your own cup so that you
can overflow energy into other people's.
I'm not saying that your needs don'tmatter, and I'm not saying that you should
completely disregard yourself, right?
(09:44):
But when we think that our life isours, And everything that we do should
be on our terms and that we should livelife the way that we want to live it.
And we throw rules and guidanceand direction out of the
picture and we forget our place.
That's when we experience not only dangerand run the risk of running completely
(10:09):
rampant and really messing up a lot ofour life and justifying a lot of sometimes
really harmful behavior in the name ofliving the way that we want to live it.
Not only that happens, but we also sufferlike our mental world really suffers.
And that's what I experienced.
(10:30):
Okay.
So my podcast.
Up until I reinvented it a few, maybe acouple months ago now, a month ago or so.
Up until that point, my podcastwas literally self help.
Like, I was regurgitating the things thatI was learning from the self help world.
just regurgitating them.
(10:51):
And don't get me wrong, a lot of theseself help tactics work in the moment.
Like, I used to just coast off theselittle highs that a banger therapy session
and a killer workout and journaling andhaving a good morning routine, like,
those things are great tools to help yoube the person that you want to be, right?
(11:13):
And I would coast off those littlehighs that those things would give me.
Again, they're wholesome things.
But they weren't the answer.
They weren't the fix all.
They weren't the end all, beall, because they weren't God.
At the time, when I was so immersed inthe self help world, like I genuinely
(11:34):
thought I am running this amazingpodcast where I'm helping other people.
I was getting messages all the time ofpeople who were saying to me, Emily,
your content is really, really helpingme overcome a struggle that I'm having.
Thank you for being vulnerable.
Thank you for doing what you're doing.
Keep going.
And I was getting messages likethis almost every single day.
(11:57):
And the podcast was successful.
It was doing well for literallybuilding it out of nothing.
And so I thought, wow,I'm really helping people.
I'm doing a good thing.
This is good, right?
But then there was an element where Ialmost always felt like a fraud putting
this out there because when my worlddid start to feel dark and those highs I
(12:21):
was on lapsed and I had a tough time orI reverted back to old patterns that I
thought I had broken and I thought I hadovercome, I thought, wow, I'm a fraud.
I'm sitting here getting on a micpreaching to people how they can overcome
their struggle and I can't even do it.
perfectly because I couldn't and I stillcan't to this day and I never will.
(12:46):
You see so much online, especially ofinfluencers showing you a way to live
life and we see that person showing uswhat, again, they want us to see, which we
talked about in the last episode, right?
Of social media is what otherpeople want us to see of them.
We see these influencers, these publicfigures, these life coaches, these, these
(13:10):
gurus who seem to have it all figuredout, showing you a way of life, but what
they don't tell you is that even theycan't perfectly practice what they preach.
And it's because none ofus are perfect, y'all.
So all of this to say, the self help worldis not going to fix your problems, because
(13:30):
you're going to always need more of it.
If you get a perfect routine down,you get a perfect, uh, a workout in, a
perfect therapy session, you're creatingall these boundaries, you're doing all
these things, that's only going to lastand give you the high that you crave
and the peace that you crave as longas you can keep up with it, right?
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But what about whensomething major hits the fan?
Like, when something really hits the fan,something really goes wrong, you lose
someone in your life, you go through adevastating breakup, you lose your job,
you don't have enough money to pay rent,and you're in the pit, and you're not
okay, and you don't have time, or energy,or the mental capacity to do any of those
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things that I just mentioned, what then?
That is when you need a perfect, alwayspresent, never failing, higher power
outside of yourself to call upon.
You see so many people when theyare brought to their knees and
something bad is going down,that's when they turn to God.
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And we always wait until our mostdesperate moment to turn to the Lord
because we realize how incapablewe are in our own flesh to make
things happen by ourselves, right?
When you're brought to a point ofdesperation, you're confronted with
the limitations of your humanity.
And that's the place that Ireached with the self help world.
(14:59):
I realized I was never, ever, evergoing to be able to master my mind.
That's what the self helpworld promises, right?
It's like, you can master your mind.
No, you can't.
Because you're a human being.
You were a creature that wascreated by an all knowing creator.
And the more that we try to fightthat truth, and at least in my own
(15:22):
experience, the more I suffered.
I was trying to fill the role of Godin my life, and I was continually
confronted with the truth thatI could not fill that role.
That hole I felt was this,this deep dependency within
me that needed and craved God.
(15:42):
I kept denying myself to be filledby God because I didn't trust him.
I didn't trust him.
And, and that's a huge piece of,I think, why a lot of us turn to
things outside of God is becausewe don't fully understand God.
We can't fully wrap our head around God.
And so we say, okay, maybeI'll decide to believe in God
(16:06):
when I have all the answers.
And, and that was my heartposture for the last couple years.
I couldn't make sense of God and I hadso much church hurt and I had so many
questions about faith that I reallycouldn't be bothered to figure that out.
It felt so overwhelming totry to make sense of God.
(16:26):
And I was like, no, I just, I justdon't want to deal with that right now.
I'm just gonna figure it out in my ownpower, y'all, that, that really blew up in
my face, . It really blew up in my face.
Like the anxiety, the impostersyndrome, the exhaustion of just
always trying to compete with everyoneelse because that's the other piece
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of self-help is when it's you andyou're responsible to fix yourself.
Nobody else is on your team.
It's, it's you versus the world.
And so, you're trying to convinceyourself that you're not competing
with other people, but you really are.
Because you're always looking atwhat else out there can I attain?
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What else out there canI do to improve myself?
You become fixated on perfectionand this hyper independence
that keeps you isolated.
Right?
So you never, you never reallytruly can clap for other people.
Like you, you think that you can,and you're not necessarily wishing
for other people's downfall.
(17:30):
But if you're really being honest, youwant to be on top, you want to win.
And so if there's someone outthere doing it better than you are,
You're like, Oh, the bar is raised.
Uh, the bar is raised again, but Ijust got to this place, but I just got
to, to this level of mastering myself.
And now you're tellingme there's another level.
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So it's just unfulfilling.
And you're always, always chasing.
And what I keep bringing us back to inthis series has just been how much this
self obsession, that self help, and socialmedia, and the narratives of our world
foster in us, is it cuts us off from love.
It fosters pride in us.
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And we don't have peace.
We're so sad and anxious andalone, and we wonder why.
To me, I feel like God hasreally lifted a veil from over
my eyes the last few months.
Like, I feel like he's He's openedme up to so much truth and so much
understanding that in the moment, likewhen you're in the thick of it, when
you're so immersed in this world of, ofgrind and, and prove yourself and achieve
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and, and push yourself to the limit andpump out as much productivity as you can
when you're so fully immersed in thatyou can't see that you're suffering.
So when I turned to God a few months agoand said, God, what am I doing wrong?
Like, the veil that he's taken offmy eyes over the last few months is
that I was doing everything wrong.
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I was doing way too much.
And he just keeps saying tome, Emily, chill out, dude.
Chill out.
You were doing the most.
To try to perfect yourself and proveyourself and improve yourself, that
you're forgetting that you, you'vehad that spark in you all along.
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You've had Jesus in you all along.
Rest, babe.
That's what God's beentelling me is a rest.
You're doing too much.
Rest and I think twothings are possible, right?
Like I function from a deep beliefof Every single day is a gift and not
to waste it, but also Rest but alsorecognize our limitations as human beings.
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That's what God is showing me can existat the same time I can make the most
of my life and I can have an impactbut I can also find time to rest and
just sit with him and just Bide withhim and just experience his goodness.
That's what's been missing fora really, really long time.
It's just that, that peace and quiet ofjust abiding with God, just sitting in
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his presence, just being still before him.
I actually, I recentlyjust got two new tattoos.
One says, be still.
And one says, abide.
And I got them as reminders.
That's so much.
Of what God calls us to be andto do is just sit with him,
to just be in his presence.
(20:30):
So much of my life up until thispoint has been spent chasing and
running a hundred miles an hour andseeing how much I can cram into a day.
How successful can I be?
What can I get done?
How high can I climb?
How many people can I meet?
How much can I do?
How much fun can I have?
(20:50):
It's all been about quantityover quality of life for so long.
For so long I've been hustling.
For so long I've been grinding.
And it's exhausting, y'all.
It's exhausting.
And what I love so much aboutJesus is he's like, Dude, you
don't have to do all that.
You just need to chill out, mama.
(21:12):
Just sit with me.
Just let me love you.
Let me humble you.
Just come before me with all youranxiety, with all your stress,
with all your uncertainty, and allyour questions, and all your doubt,
because he wants our doubt, too.
The difference between me versusthree or four or five months ago now?
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is that I literally just decided, okay,I don't have to have all the answers.
I don't have to haveJesus and God figured out.
I don't have to be able to explain it.
All I have to do is have an openheart posture towards him to come
into his presence and to humble myselfbefore him to accept my place as
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creature and his place as creator.
Know that I don't have to have all thisstuff figured out, that I don't have
to perfect myself, that I don't haveto plan my future year by year, day by
day, that I don't have to grind, thatI don't have to prove, that I don't
have to achieve, that I don't have tobe doing all this freaking stuff that
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I've been doing for years of my life.
And all I have to do isjust come to him as I am.
Humble myself and just letthis man take care of the rest.
Y'all, you know the amount of pressurethat has come off of me since I did that?
You know how much lighter I feel?
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I'm like almost in tears sayingthis because it's just a relief.
I used to feel this weight of theworld on my shoulders because before
God was in the picture it felt likemy responsibility to fix the world.
That sounds so ridiculous to say out loud.
I'm fully aware of that.
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But at the time, that was reallythe weight that I felt on me.
I was so aware of the pain in the worldand the suffering of my own suffering, of
my friends and my family, my co workers.
Like, especially in running the podcast,you know, so many people would reach
out and share their pain with me andshare what they're going through.
And I'm like, dang, how am Igoing to fix this for everyone?
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If y'all can't tell.
I just have such a fixerpersonality, right?
And I just want to bring allthe love and goodness and
peace that I can to the world.
But I, I keep forgetting and I forgotfor many years that that's not my job.
It's not my job to fix it.
It's not my job toeliminate pain and struggle.
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And I absolutely cannoteven do that if I tried.
I've had to accept my place.
I've had to humble myself.
I've had to give myself a big, fatdose of humility and really come to
terms with the fact that I'm not God.
I'm never gonna be God.
And so I need to stop trying to be.
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If you are in a similar position, ifyou're like, dang, Emled, I really
relate to everything you're saying, girl.
I'm there with you.
First of all, you're not alone.
I've been there, and there's absolutelyno judgment, and this is a lifelong
struggle that I think I'm going to have.
Like, I think I'm going to wrestle withpride and trying to be God forever.
(24:24):
And I think if we're allbeing really honest, that's a
wrestling match we're all in.
When we're wrestling with life, a lot oftimes it's because we're trying to be God.
Like, if we gotta sum up thispodcast and what it's gonna be
about, it's stop trying to be God.
That's why you're wrestling with life.
Stop trying to be God.
But, but if you're in that position,let me tell you something, okay?
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First of all, if you're somewhere inbetween the self help world and wanting
to pick up a Bible, I want to put you onthree different pieces of literature that
honestly were so transformative for me inhumbling myself and deciding to turn my
eyes to Jesus again, because Y'all knowI've been very turned off to religion for
(25:05):
a long time, but what really got my footback in the door with Jesus was first
this one book called Practicing the Way.
And this is by a mannamed John Mark Comer.
And when I tell you that reading thisbook just had my jaw on the floor so
many times of how actually simple itis to walk with the Lord and realizing
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how much we overcomplicate it.
All of us get so caught upin the sin conversation.
What's a sin?
What's not a sin?
What's the right way to live?
What's the wrong way to live?
This book takes you to the basics ofwhat it means to live the way Jesus did.
And I'm not talking about sin.
I'm talking about a way of life,a way of abiding with Jesus, a
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way of sharing meals and breakingbread and building up community and
relationship and love with other people.
This book is not about sin.
It's about emulating andliving life the way Jesus did.
And it was the most beautiful readand it was so comforting and soothing
(26:14):
because it wasn't a long list ofhere are all these things that you
need to do to be more like Jesus.
It was, here's a long list ofthings that you can just stop doing.
Here's things that you can cut outof your life to be more like Jesus.
And to me, that was just sowonderful because that's not
how the self help books work.
The self help books are like, hereare 50 more things that you need to
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do to be the best version of yourself.
And who has fricking time for that?
And who wants to do that?
Okay.
So I really recommend I'll link thisbook in the show notes, but if you're
even open to, Jesus to God, but you'renot ready to dig into the Bible.
This book is a really goodintermediate step in between.
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Okay.
Another one is Humble Roots, and thisis by a woman named Hannah Anderson.
And I need to shout out my friendBrie, who recommended this book to me.
This book really made me realize Howdeeply pride was running my life.
Okay.
This book is just a perfect summationof how we as humans really get
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it in our mind that we are somuch better than we actually are.
We think we are so much morelike God than we actually are.
And so to sum up the book.
It is really just learning tohave a heart posture of humility,
and I cannot recommend it enough.
It's a really cute littleread and, and very wholesome.
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So check that out.
And the last one that I will say,this book is not for the weak.
And I don't even know if I could call ita book because it's only like 50 pages,
but this is like an old timey book, okay?
It's called Humility.
It's by Andrew Murray, and it waswritten literally in the 1800s.
So I'm talking like, thoust and thyand thee, like, old words, okay?
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So this book is notfor the faint of heart.
It is old.
But man, did it just smack me in the face.
Again, just understanding that humility,not only is it the way that we have
deeper relationship with God, but it trulyleads to our peace when we can humble
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ourselves to really recognize that weare the creature and he is the creator.
And what a joy and delight it isto have anything because all that
we have It doesn't belong to us.
It's not ours.
What a delight it is to evenexist here and even be able to
take part in God's creation.
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It really just shows you how having thatheart posture changes everything, dawg.
changes everything.
So again, not ready to dive intothe Bible, dive into those books.
Those three have just, again, hitme in the face time and time again,
just realizing how deeply I strugglewith pride, how unlike Jesus I really
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am, and how at my core, what I longfor is peace and love and community
with other people and with God.
That is the longing of my heartabove success, above money, fame,
or riches, or followers, or any sortof thing that I used to care about
(29:35):
in the past or wanted for myself.
What I truly, deeply have come tobelieve after these last few months
of really wrestling with God andwrestling with faith and wrestling with
life, everything is fleeting, exceptfor the people that you love in those
relationships and the relationships thatyou have with God, with your creator,
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with the one who gave you life, dude.
And when you strip everything else away,and you focus on those things, it's crazy
how much perspective that gives you.
Perfecting yourself and overcomingall of these little things that
you don't like about yourselfor that you wish were different.
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When community and God and love is thefocus of your heart, the importance of
those things really, really slip away.
A lot of times when we'rewrestling with life, it's because
we need a perspective shift.
Because we're so caught up in the rat raceof competition with other people, we're
so convinced that if we have more of thisor that, or we achieve something, or we
(30:44):
get to a certain status or level with ourjob, or if we marry this person or that
person, or we get into this relationship,or we just get this thing, We think more
of all these worldly material thingsis what's going to fill that God sized
hole in us, y'all, and it just doesn't.
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Humility is the answer to sum it all up.
Recognizing your place in this world.
as one tiny small molecule in abig fat galaxy that is so much
bigger than we can even comprehend.
And realizing what a gift it is thatyou exist right now, right here, on this
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planet, at this time, you get to go frolicin fields and swim in oceans and walk in
the sand and feel the sun on your face.
And dance in the rain and break breadwith other people and sleep in a comfy
warm bed and drink water and eat deliciousfood and experience life when you
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fully can wrap your head around what anincredible gift that is, that you have
air in your lungs and you woke up thismorning and you have a God who loves you.
Oh my God, I'm about to cry.
Dang, thank you.
That is the perspective shift thatwe need to make when we are down bad
in the trenches because we create allthis pressure for literally no reason.
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Like, it is all in our heads.
We get so caught up in this humanmade rat race of competition and
superiority that is literally made up.
It's literally made up.
And so the point of our timehere is to worship the Lord.
We were created to worship.
We were created to admire our Creator.
(32:41):
We were created for Him.
And when we remember that everythingthat we have is not ours, and that it's
all a gift, that is a crazy wake upcall and heart posture change that I
don't know about you, but I needed that.
I needed a big fat dose of humilityto deflate my ego, to remind me
(33:02):
that I didn't deserve any of thisand that all of this is a gift.
And man, has my peace changed andman, has my burden felt lighter.
And man, have I been more inclined towake up every single day and grab life
by the freaking balls and appreciate lifefor what it is and what God has given me.
And y'all, if you, if you listento this series all the way through,
(33:26):
my hope and my prayer is that Icommunicated well to you exactly that.
Talk to God.
If you're really struggling withhumility, if you're struggling
with pride, talk to God about it.
Literally what I say to God all the time,like the prayer that I have for him.
Every time we talk now is, Hi,Jesus, I'm coming to you and I am
(33:47):
just laying my pride at your feet.
I'm laying my need for importance andsignificance and success at your feet.
Thank you for this gift of life.
Thank you for letting me be here.
I put all of my stress and myanxiety and my worry at your feet.
I ask you just to take it from me,Jesus, take it from me and order my
(34:09):
steps and show me where you want me.
And man, when I do that, you don'tknow the weight that comes off me.
You don't know the peace that I feel.
And that's just thepower of the Lord, man.
I can't explain it.
It doesn't make sense.
And how I'm going forwardwith my faith, there are so
many ways that I need to grow.
(34:30):
I really want to growin my Bible knowledge.
I'm finding it easier and easierto pick up the Bible now than ever
before, but I got a long way to go.
And I really just want to grow inunderstanding the Holy Spirit and
understanding how I can even humblemyself further, how I can abide in
his presence, how I can work on beingobedient and truly living my life for him.
(34:52):
Because although he's done alot of work on me in the last
four months, I am nowhere near.
yet being done and he has so much work tostill do in my heart and I have so many
more lessons to learn and I'm just excitedto do it because I, for the first time in
a long time, truly recognize my place asa creature and his place as the creator.
(35:14):
Y'all, I hope you have a fantastic week.
I hope you talk to God.
I'm not really sure when wewill be chatting again next.
I'm really working on notdoing so much and resting and
letting the Lord guide my steps.
And so whenever he places somethingon my heart to share again in this
podcast, you already know I will,I will show up with that message.
(35:35):
But until then, y'all.
I, I wish you all the best.
I'm, I'm praying for y'all.
If you have prayer requests,reach out, hit me up on Instagram
at em underscore led 11.
I just want to remind youall that you are not alone.
And that struggle is very real.
But a lot of that struggle can beovercome when we just put our eyes on him.
(35:57):
And we remember the truth.
Alright, y'all.
I'm signing off now.
I'm gonna shut up now.
Bye, guys.
Thank you for listening to theWrestling With Life podcast.
If this episode sparked something inyour brain or made you think of someone
specific, please share it with them.
Let someone else know that they arenot alone in their struggles today.
(36:17):
And please rate the podcast onwhatever platform you're listening on.
If you're a Spotify listener, you canleave a comment on this episode with
your thoughts on what we covered,and I want to hear about what God
is doing in your life, so tell me.
And if you're hungry for even moreinspirational content just like
this, you can give me a follow onInstagram at EM underscore LED11.
(36:38):
I am always posting polls toget a gauge on what everyone
is struggling with out there.
There sharing everyday little lifemoments and encouraging all of us
to find both beauty and purpose inthe midst of our daily struggles.
So come join in on the good vibesand real quick before you go, this
is just a little quick reminderon what this podcast is not.
(36:59):
Okay?
A Wrestling With Life podcast andany content posted on my channels is
presented solely for informationaland educational purposes.
The use of this information is at yourown risk and should not be substituted
for the advice of a therapist,pastor, or any qualified professional.
If you're struggling with yourmental health, please consider
(37:21):
seeking professional help.
or contacting the 988Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
Please don't try to getthrough this by yourself, okay?
You are not alone.
We are all wrestling with something.
Whether you're wrestling with your selfimage, your faith in God, or your entire
life's purpose, I'm here to tell you thatnumber one, you are not alone, and number
two, to encourage you to find both beautyand purpose in the midst of your struggle.
My name is Emled, and this isthe Wrestling With Life podcast.
(00:24):
What's up, you guys?
Welcome back to theWrestling With Life podcast.
I am your host, Emled.
Thank you so much for tuning in tothe fifth and final episode of our
series on how our self obsession isactually making us all so miserable.
Today we're focusing on the self helpworld, on self improvement, and how
(00:46):
Our journey with self help and selfimprovement actually starts out very
innocently and from a wholesome place,but how over time it actually leads
to us exalting ourselves, glorifyingourselves, and being so obsessed with
ourselves to the point where it'sactually hurting us and hurting our
relationships and our peace and ourpurpose more than it's helping us.
(01:10):
A lot of times if we take it toofar and we treat self improvement
as our God or as the fix all,that's where the suffering comes.
That's where we kind of get on this neverending hamster wheel where we're always
chasing these self help tools and theseself improvement tools to fix us, right?
So if you guys remember from the lastcouple episodes, we've been talking
(01:33):
a lot about pride and humility.
And just a quick recap ofwhat we've been talking about.
Especially this age demographic thatthis podcast is focused around, about
22 years old to 35 years old, in yourcareer full time and no children yet.
This is especially the time in ourlives where we are more likely to be
(01:54):
selfish and to be obsessed with ourcareers, making money, et cetera, and we
are told, we are targeted specificallywith this message from the world.
If you scroll on Instagram or Twitteror I guess it's X now, wherever
you like to scroll online, thesekind of messages are everywhere.
(02:16):
Focus on yourself, worryabout your money, grind.
These are all messages that weare getting constantly and so it's
become so normalized and so accepted.
An American culture in general isjust so incredibly individualistic
and encourages you to worry about youand only you as a way to find success,
(02:38):
peace, happiness, et cetera, right?
I've believed those messages for severalyears of my life and firsthand experience.
Not true.
It does not end how everyonesays it's going to end.
You End up kind of running yourselframpant, always chasing, always grinding,
always trying to fill this God sizedhole in yourself that you can never fill.
(03:03):
Okay?
And if you guys remember, I said I hadput some polls out on my Instagram to try
to understand what this age demographicis really, really struggling with and
focusing their energy on and feeling.
And a stat that just continues to.
blow my mind, but also not blowmy mind at the same time, is that
(03:23):
98 percent of us are focused onourselves instead of other people.
I'm especially excited to speak on thisself help topic because this is what I
had be my god for the last couple years.
Like, As I was wrestling with my faithand really didn't know where I stood with
the Lord, self help was like the nextbest thing because it took all of the
(03:48):
principles of Christianity, well manyof the principles of Christianity and
wholesome living and living a life thatyou're proud of, it took like the core
of that, of like being a good person,but then left God out of the equation.
And so how self help works and selfimprovement, if you're not familiar
(04:08):
with the industry, or maybe you justknow it, uh, with a different term or
a different name, it's basically usingresources or your own efforts to achieve
things and not rely on anybody else.
And this is usually pertainingto fixing personal struggles.
Like, you're leveraging these resourcesand your own efforts to try to overcome
(04:30):
some sort of problem in your life,like your mental health, or struggles
with organization or managing yourstress, managing your money, your
finances, things like that, right?
And the thing about self help, it's,it's literally in the name self help.
It is this hyper focus on you.
(04:52):
And there's this underlying messagein all of the self help mediums out
there, the books, the masterclasses, thewebinars, the podcast, the events, the
catalogs, the programs, the affirmations,whatever medium this message is being
communicated to us in, the underlyingtone of that is you make the rules, you
(05:15):
decide what goes, you set the pace, right?
This is all about youand what works for you.
And so without saying it, this is neverexplicitly said, but without saying it,
this, there's this underlying suggestionthat you are the God of your own life.
You create your own reality.
(05:37):
And I used to eat this for breakfast.
I used to love this idea, this ideaof being in charge and calling the
shots and being in control, makingthe rules up, living on my own terms.
That appealed to me so, so, so muchover the last few years because I was
coming away from a lot of church hurt.
(06:00):
A lot of experiences that left areally bad taste in my mouth of
what the Christian life was andwhat following Jesus looked like.
Christianity and Jesus as I know itnow had never been modeled to me in a
way that really emphasizes humility.
laying down your life andletting God change you.
(06:23):
How I understood Christianity up untilthis point was being a good person in your
own willpower to make God happy with you.
That's how I understood it, right?
And it was always so confusing to mebecause there were these two seemingly
conflicted conflicting messages inChristianity where it's like you can't
(06:44):
do anything in your own power to saveyourself and you need God but then it's
at the same time it was this message oflike but you're a Christian and so this is
how you should live and how you should beand black and white all or nothing if you
don't live this way you're going to hell.
And I could never make sense of how thosetwo things could be true at the same time.
(07:07):
Like, how could I need a Godto save me, but it's also on
me to make the right decision?
That was always so confusing to me.
All this to say, the self helpworld really appealed to me because
at the end of the day, really whatself help teaches you is like, you
have to pour into yourself beforeyou can pour into other people.
(07:29):
So the narrative that I was tellingmyself as I was consuming all this content
about, you know, putting your mentalhealth first and creating boundaries and
not being a people pleaser and livinglife on your terms and doing what's best
for you and creating a life that youlove, like all this content that I was
consuming about me, I genuinely believed,okay, I am making myself the best
(07:55):
version that I can be so that I can then.
Be a good person for other people.
That's where it started out.
Because if you know me personallynow and the philosophy that I've
kind of always lived by is that I amhere to be a light to other people.
I am here to encourage otherpeople and lift other people up.
(08:16):
Like that is the life philosophythat I've always operated on.
And so much of my Christian rootsand my Christian upbringing is the
reason why I live my life that way.
But I, I really believed the self helppiece where it's like, okay, but I got to
focus on me because for many years of mylife, I just, I gave and I gave and I gave
(08:38):
and I loved, I lived from a place of loveand I didn't realize that I was actually
operating from a place of wanting approvaland doing things because I thought I
was supposed to do them to earn love.
Okay, so the self help world helped meget rid of that philosophy that I needed
(08:59):
to do things to earn love, but then whatI didn't realize as I really started,
like, reading all the books and reallygetting immersed in the podcast and
the culture and building myself up isthis undercurrent of self glorification
and of you mattering and your needsmattering more than those around you.
(09:23):
Okay, and I'm not saying this to say thatboundaries don't matter, because they do.
They very much matter.
And there is an element of truth inneeding to fill your own cup so that you
can overflow energy into other people's.
I'm not saying that your needs don'tmatter, and I'm not saying that you should
completely disregard yourself, right?
(09:44):
But when we think that our life isours, And everything that we do should
be on our terms and that we should livelife the way that we want to live it.
And we throw rules and guidanceand direction out of the
picture and we forget our place.
That's when we experience not only dangerand run the risk of running completely
(10:09):
rampant and really messing up a lot ofour life and justifying a lot of sometimes
really harmful behavior in the name ofliving the way that we want to live it.
Not only that happens, but we also sufferlike our mental world really suffers.
And that's what I experienced.
(10:30):
Okay.
So my podcast.
Up until I reinvented it a few, maybe acouple months ago now, a month ago or so.
Up until that point, my podcastwas literally self help.
Like, I was regurgitating the things thatI was learning from the self help world.
just regurgitating them.
(10:51):
And don't get me wrong, a lot of theseself help tactics work in the moment.
Like, I used to just coast off theselittle highs that a banger therapy session
and a killer workout and journaling andhaving a good morning routine, like,
those things are great tools to help yoube the person that you want to be, right?
(11:13):
And I would coast off those littlehighs that those things would give me.
Again, they're wholesome things.
But they weren't the answer.
They weren't the fix all.
They weren't the end all, beall, because they weren't God.
At the time, when I was so immersed inthe self help world, like I genuinely
(11:34):
thought I am running this amazingpodcast where I'm helping other people.
I was getting messages all the time ofpeople who were saying to me, Emily,
your content is really, really helpingme overcome a struggle that I'm having.
Thank you for being vulnerable.
Thank you for doing what you're doing.
Keep going.
And I was getting messages likethis almost every single day.
(11:57):
And the podcast was successful.
It was doing well for literallybuilding it out of nothing.
And so I thought, wow,I'm really helping people.
I'm doing a good thing.
This is good, right?
But then there was an element where Ialmost always felt like a fraud putting
this out there because when my worlddid start to feel dark and those highs I
(12:21):
was on lapsed and I had a tough time orI reverted back to old patterns that I
thought I had broken and I thought I hadovercome, I thought, wow, I'm a fraud.
I'm sitting here getting on a micpreaching to people how they can overcome
their struggle and I can't even do it.
perfectly because I couldn't and I stillcan't to this day and I never will.
(12:46):
You see so much online, especially ofinfluencers showing you a way to live
life and we see that person showing uswhat, again, they want us to see, which we
talked about in the last episode, right?
Of social media is what otherpeople want us to see of them.
We see these influencers, these publicfigures, these life coaches, these, these
(13:10):
gurus who seem to have it all figuredout, showing you a way of life, but what
they don't tell you is that even theycan't perfectly practice what they preach.
And it's because none ofus are perfect, y'all.
So all of this to say, the self help worldis not going to fix your problems, because
(13:30):
you're going to always need more of it.
If you get a perfect routine down,you get a perfect, uh, a workout in, a
perfect therapy session, you're creatingall these boundaries, you're doing all
these things, that's only going to lastand give you the high that you crave
and the peace that you crave as longas you can keep up with it, right?
(13:51):
But what about whensomething major hits the fan?
Like, when something really hits the fan,something really goes wrong, you lose
someone in your life, you go through adevastating breakup, you lose your job,
you don't have enough money to pay rent,and you're in the pit, and you're not
okay, and you don't have time, or energy,or the mental capacity to do any of those
(14:14):
things that I just mentioned, what then?
That is when you need a perfect, alwayspresent, never failing, higher power
outside of yourself to call upon.
You see so many people when theyare brought to their knees and
something bad is going down,that's when they turn to God.
(14:37):
And we always wait until our mostdesperate moment to turn to the Lord
because we realize how incapablewe are in our own flesh to make
things happen by ourselves, right?
When you're brought to a point ofdesperation, you're confronted with
the limitations of your humanity.
And that's the place that Ireached with the self help world.
(14:59):
I realized I was never, ever, evergoing to be able to master my mind.
That's what the self helpworld promises, right?
It's like, you can master your mind.
No, you can't.
Because you're a human being.
You were a creature that wascreated by an all knowing creator.
And the more that we try to fightthat truth, and at least in my own
(15:22):
experience, the more I suffered.
I was trying to fill the role of Godin my life, and I was continually
confronted with the truth thatI could not fill that role.
That hole I felt was this,this deep dependency within
me that needed and craved God.
(15:42):
I kept denying myself to be filledby God because I didn't trust him.
I didn't trust him.
And, and that's a huge piece of,I think, why a lot of us turn to
things outside of God is becausewe don't fully understand God.
We can't fully wrap our head around God.
And so we say, okay, maybeI'll decide to believe in God
(16:06):
when I have all the answers.
And, and that was my heartposture for the last couple years.
I couldn't make sense of God and I hadso much church hurt and I had so many
questions about faith that I reallycouldn't be bothered to figure that out.
It felt so overwhelming totry to make sense of God.
(16:26):
And I was like, no, I just, I justdon't want to deal with that right now.
I'm just gonna figure it out in my ownpower, y'all, that, that really blew up in
my face, . It really blew up in my face.
Like the anxiety, the impostersyndrome, the exhaustion of just
always trying to compete with everyoneelse because that's the other piece
(16:47):
of self-help is when it's you andyou're responsible to fix yourself.
Nobody else is on your team.
It's, it's you versus the world.
And so, you're trying to convinceyourself that you're not competing
with other people, but you really are.
Because you're always looking atwhat else out there can I attain?
(17:09):
What else out there canI do to improve myself?
You become fixated on perfectionand this hyper independence
that keeps you isolated.
Right?
So you never, you never reallytruly can clap for other people.
Like you, you think that you can,and you're not necessarily wishing
for other people's downfall.
(17:30):
But if you're really being honest, youwant to be on top, you want to win.
And so if there's someone outthere doing it better than you are,
You're like, Oh, the bar is raised.
Uh, the bar is raised again, but Ijust got to this place, but I just got
to, to this level of mastering myself.
And now you're tellingme there's another level.
(17:50):
So it's just unfulfilling.
And you're always, always chasing.
And what I keep bringing us back to inthis series has just been how much this
self obsession, that self help, and socialmedia, and the narratives of our world
foster in us, is it cuts us off from love.
It fosters pride in us.
(18:12):
And we don't have peace.
We're so sad and anxious andalone, and we wonder why.
To me, I feel like God hasreally lifted a veil from over
my eyes the last few months.
Like, I feel like he's He's openedme up to so much truth and so much
understanding that in the moment, likewhen you're in the thick of it, when
you're so immersed in this world of, ofgrind and, and prove yourself and achieve
(18:37):
and, and push yourself to the limit andpump out as much productivity as you can
when you're so fully immersed in thatyou can't see that you're suffering.
So when I turned to God a few months agoand said, God, what am I doing wrong?
Like, the veil that he's taken offmy eyes over the last few months is
that I was doing everything wrong.
(18:58):
I was doing way too much.
And he just keeps saying tome, Emily, chill out, dude.
Chill out.
You were doing the most.
To try to perfect yourself and proveyourself and improve yourself, that
you're forgetting that you, you'vehad that spark in you all along.
(19:18):
You've had Jesus in you all along.
Rest, babe.
That's what God's beentelling me is a rest.
You're doing too much.
Rest and I think twothings are possible, right?
Like I function from a deep beliefof Every single day is a gift and not
to waste it, but also Rest but alsorecognize our limitations as human beings.
(19:44):
That's what God is showing me can existat the same time I can make the most
of my life and I can have an impactbut I can also find time to rest and
just sit with him and just Bide withhim and just experience his goodness.
That's what's been missing fora really, really long time.
It's just that, that peace and quiet ofjust abiding with God, just sitting in
(20:08):
his presence, just being still before him.
I actually, I recentlyjust got two new tattoos.
One says, be still.
And one says, abide.
And I got them as reminders.
That's so much.
Of what God calls us to be andto do is just sit with him,
to just be in his presence.
(20:30):
So much of my life up until thispoint has been spent chasing and
running a hundred miles an hour andseeing how much I can cram into a day.
How successful can I be?
What can I get done?
How high can I climb?
How many people can I meet?
How much can I do?
How much fun can I have?
(20:50):
It's all been about quantityover quality of life for so long.
For so long I've been hustling.
For so long I've been grinding.
And it's exhausting, y'all.
It's exhausting.
And what I love so much aboutJesus is he's like, Dude, you
don't have to do all that.
You just need to chill out, mama.
(21:12):
Just sit with me.
Just let me love you.
Let me humble you.
Just come before me with all youranxiety, with all your stress,
with all your uncertainty, and allyour questions, and all your doubt,
because he wants our doubt, too.
The difference between me versusthree or four or five months ago now?
(21:33):
is that I literally just decided, okay,I don't have to have all the answers.
I don't have to haveJesus and God figured out.
I don't have to be able to explain it.
All I have to do is have an openheart posture towards him to come
into his presence and to humble myselfbefore him to accept my place as
(21:54):
creature and his place as creator.
Know that I don't have to have all thisstuff figured out, that I don't have
to perfect myself, that I don't haveto plan my future year by year, day by
day, that I don't have to grind, thatI don't have to prove, that I don't
have to achieve, that I don't have tobe doing all this freaking stuff that
(22:17):
I've been doing for years of my life.
And all I have to do isjust come to him as I am.
Humble myself and just letthis man take care of the rest.
Y'all, you know the amount of pressurethat has come off of me since I did that?
You know how much lighter I feel?
(22:38):
I'm like almost in tears sayingthis because it's just a relief.
I used to feel this weight of theworld on my shoulders because before
God was in the picture it felt likemy responsibility to fix the world.
That sounds so ridiculous to say out loud.
I'm fully aware of that.
(22:58):
But at the time, that was reallythe weight that I felt on me.
I was so aware of the pain in the worldand the suffering of my own suffering, of
my friends and my family, my co workers.
Like, especially in running the podcast,you know, so many people would reach
out and share their pain with me andshare what they're going through.
And I'm like, dang, how am Igoing to fix this for everyone?
(23:20):
If y'all can't tell.
I just have such a fixerpersonality, right?
And I just want to bring allthe love and goodness and
peace that I can to the world.
But I, I keep forgetting and I forgotfor many years that that's not my job.
It's not my job to fix it.
It's not my job toeliminate pain and struggle.
(23:40):
And I absolutely cannoteven do that if I tried.
I've had to accept my place.
I've had to humble myself.
I've had to give myself a big, fatdose of humility and really come to
terms with the fact that I'm not God.
I'm never gonna be God.
And so I need to stop trying to be.
(24:01):
If you are in a similar position, ifyou're like, dang, Emled, I really
relate to everything you're saying, girl.
I'm there with you.
First of all, you're not alone.
I've been there, and there's absolutelyno judgment, and this is a lifelong
struggle that I think I'm going to have.
Like, I think I'm going to wrestle withpride and trying to be God forever.
(24:24):
And I think if we're allbeing really honest, that's a
wrestling match we're all in.
When we're wrestling with life, a lot oftimes it's because we're trying to be God.
Like, if we gotta sum up thispodcast and what it's gonna be
about, it's stop trying to be God.
That's why you're wrestling with life.
Stop trying to be God.
But, but if you're in that position,let me tell you something, okay?
(24:44):
First of all, if you're somewhere inbetween the self help world and wanting
to pick up a Bible, I want to put you onthree different pieces of literature that
honestly were so transformative for me inhumbling myself and deciding to turn my
eyes to Jesus again, because Y'all knowI've been very turned off to religion for
(25:05):
a long time, but what really got my footback in the door with Jesus was first
this one book called Practicing the Way.
And this is by a mannamed John Mark Comer.
And when I tell you that reading thisbook just had my jaw on the floor so
many times of how actually simple itis to walk with the Lord and realizing
(25:28):
how much we overcomplicate it.
All of us get so caught upin the sin conversation.
What's a sin?
What's not a sin?
What's the right way to live?
What's the wrong way to live?
This book takes you to the basics ofwhat it means to live the way Jesus did.
And I'm not talking about sin.
I'm talking about a way of life,a way of abiding with Jesus, a
(25:52):
way of sharing meals and breakingbread and building up community and
relationship and love with other people.
This book is not about sin.
It's about emulating andliving life the way Jesus did.
And it was the most beautiful readand it was so comforting and soothing
(26:14):
because it wasn't a long list ofhere are all these things that you
need to do to be more like Jesus.
It was, here's a long list ofthings that you can just stop doing.
Here's things that you can cut outof your life to be more like Jesus.
And to me, that was just sowonderful because that's not
how the self help books work.
The self help books are like, hereare 50 more things that you need to
(26:37):
do to be the best version of yourself.
And who has fricking time for that?
And who wants to do that?
Okay.
So I really recommend I'll link thisbook in the show notes, but if you're
even open to, Jesus to God, but you'renot ready to dig into the Bible.
This book is a really goodintermediate step in between.
(26:59):
Okay.
Another one is Humble Roots, and thisis by a woman named Hannah Anderson.
And I need to shout out my friendBrie, who recommended this book to me.
This book really made me realize Howdeeply pride was running my life.
Okay.
This book is just a perfect summationof how we as humans really get
(27:24):
it in our mind that we are somuch better than we actually are.
We think we are so much morelike God than we actually are.
And so to sum up the book.
It is really just learning tohave a heart posture of humility,
and I cannot recommend it enough.
It's a really cute littleread and, and very wholesome.
(27:44):
So check that out.
And the last one that I will say,this book is not for the weak.
And I don't even know if I could call ita book because it's only like 50 pages,
but this is like an old timey book, okay?
It's called Humility.
It's by Andrew Murray, and it waswritten literally in the 1800s.
So I'm talking like, thoust and thyand thee, like, old words, okay?
(28:09):
So this book is notfor the faint of heart.
It is old.
But man, did it just smack me in the face.
Again, just understanding that humility,not only is it the way that we have
deeper relationship with God, but it trulyleads to our peace when we can humble
(28:30):
ourselves to really recognize that weare the creature and he is the creator.
And what a joy and delight it isto have anything because all that
we have It doesn't belong to us.
It's not ours.
What a delight it is to evenexist here and even be able to
take part in God's creation.
(28:52):
It really just shows you how having thatheart posture changes everything, dawg.
changes everything.
So again, not ready to dive intothe Bible, dive into those books.
Those three have just, again, hitme in the face time and time again,
just realizing how deeply I strugglewith pride, how unlike Jesus I really
(29:14):
am, and how at my core, what I longfor is peace and love and community
with other people and with God.
That is the longing of my heartabove success, above money, fame,
or riches, or followers, or any sortof thing that I used to care about
(29:35):
in the past or wanted for myself.
What I truly, deeply have come tobelieve after these last few months
of really wrestling with God andwrestling with faith and wrestling with
life, everything is fleeting, exceptfor the people that you love in those
relationships and the relationships thatyou have with God, with your creator,
(29:58):
with the one who gave you life, dude.
And when you strip everything else away,and you focus on those things, it's crazy
how much perspective that gives you.
Perfecting yourself and overcomingall of these little things that
you don't like about yourselfor that you wish were different.
(30:21):
When community and God and love is thefocus of your heart, the importance of
those things really, really slip away.
A lot of times when we'rewrestling with life, it's because
we need a perspective shift.
Because we're so caught up in the rat raceof competition with other people, we're
so convinced that if we have more of thisor that, or we achieve something, or we
(30:44):
get to a certain status or level with ourjob, or if we marry this person or that
person, or we get into this relationship,or we just get this thing, We think more
of all these worldly material thingsis what's going to fill that God sized
hole in us, y'all, and it just doesn't.
(31:05):
Humility is the answer to sum it all up.
Recognizing your place in this world.
as one tiny small molecule in abig fat galaxy that is so much
bigger than we can even comprehend.
And realizing what a gift it is thatyou exist right now, right here, on this
(31:28):
planet, at this time, you get to go frolicin fields and swim in oceans and walk in
the sand and feel the sun on your face.
And dance in the rain and break breadwith other people and sleep in a comfy
warm bed and drink water and eat deliciousfood and experience life when you
(31:51):
fully can wrap your head around what anincredible gift that is, that you have
air in your lungs and you woke up thismorning and you have a God who loves you.
Oh my God, I'm about to cry.
Dang, thank you.
That is the perspective shift thatwe need to make when we are down bad
in the trenches because we create allthis pressure for literally no reason.
(32:18):
Like, it is all in our heads.
We get so caught up in this humanmade rat race of competition and
superiority that is literally made up.
It's literally made up.
And so the point of our timehere is to worship the Lord.
We were created to worship.
We were created to admire our Creator.
(32:41):
We were created for Him.
And when we remember that everythingthat we have is not ours, and that it's
all a gift, that is a crazy wake upcall and heart posture change that I
don't know about you, but I needed that.
I needed a big fat dose of humilityto deflate my ego, to remind me
(33:02):
that I didn't deserve any of thisand that all of this is a gift.
And man, has my peace changed andman, has my burden felt lighter.
And man, have I been more inclined towake up every single day and grab life
by the freaking balls and appreciate lifefor what it is and what God has given me.
And y'all, if you, if you listento this series all the way through,
(33:26):
my hope and my prayer is that Icommunicated well to you exactly that.
Talk to God.
If you're really struggling withhumility, if you're struggling
with pride, talk to God about it.
Literally what I say to God all the time,like the prayer that I have for him.
Every time we talk now is, Hi,Jesus, I'm coming to you and I am
(33:47):
just laying my pride at your feet.
I'm laying my need for importance andsignificance and success at your feet.
Thank you for this gift of life.
Thank you for letting me be here.
I put all of my stress and myanxiety and my worry at your feet.
I ask you just to take it from me,Jesus, take it from me and order my
(34:09):
steps and show me where you want me.
And man, when I do that, you don'tknow the weight that comes off me.
You don't know the peace that I feel.
And that's just thepower of the Lord, man.
I can't explain it.
It doesn't make sense.
And how I'm going forwardwith my faith, there are so
many ways that I need to grow.
(34:30):
I really want to growin my Bible knowledge.
I'm finding it easier and easierto pick up the Bible now than ever
before, but I got a long way to go.
And I really just want to grow inunderstanding the Holy Spirit and
understanding how I can even humblemyself further, how I can abide in
his presence, how I can work on beingobedient and truly living my life for him.
(34:52):
Because although he's done alot of work on me in the last
four months, I am nowhere near.
yet being done and he has so much work tostill do in my heart and I have so many
more lessons to learn and I'm just excitedto do it because I, for the first time in
a long time, truly recognize my place asa creature and his place as the creator.
(35:14):
Y'all, I hope you have a fantastic week.
I hope you talk to God.
I'm not really sure when wewill be chatting again next.
I'm really working on notdoing so much and resting and
letting the Lord guide my steps.
And so whenever he places somethingon my heart to share again in this
podcast, you already know I will,I will show up with that message.
(35:35):
But until then, y'all.
I, I wish you all the best.
I'm, I'm praying for y'all.
If you have prayer requests,reach out, hit me up on Instagram
at em underscore led 11.
I just want to remind youall that you are not alone.
And that struggle is very real.
But a lot of that struggle can beovercome when we just put our eyes on him.
(35:57):
And we remember the truth.
Alright, y'all.
I'm signing off now.
I'm gonna shut up now.
Bye, guys.
Thank you for listening to theWrestling With Life podcast.
If this episode sparked something inyour brain or made you think of someone
specific, please share it with them.
Let someone else know that they arenot alone in their struggles today.
(36:17):
And please rate the podcast onwhatever platform you're listening on.
If you're a Spotify listener, you canleave a comment on this episode with
your thoughts on what we covered,and I want to hear about what God
is doing in your life, so tell me.
And if you're hungry for even moreinspirational content just like
this, you can give me a follow onInstagram at EM underscore LED11.
(36:38):
I am always posting polls toget a gauge on what everyone
is struggling with out there.
There sharing everyday little lifemoments and encouraging all of us
to find both beauty and purpose inthe midst of our daily struggles.
So come join in on the good vibesand real quick before you go, this
is just a little quick reminderon what this podcast is not.
(36:59):
Okay?
A Wrestling With Life podcast andany content posted on my channels is
presented solely for informationaland educational purposes.
The use of this information is at yourown risk and should not be substituted
for the advice of a therapist,pastor, or any qualified professional.
If you're struggling with yourmental health, please consider
(37:21):
seeking professional help.
or contacting the 988Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
Please don't try to getthrough this by yourself, okay?
You are not alone.
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