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We share stories of how the blood of Jesus has transformed ours and others' lives.
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Red Ledger. I'm really excited to have Pastor Mark Collins joining today. He is a husband, a dad, an author. He wrote the book, Life Mastery. I want to make sure I get this right. Life Mastery, living life by design, not by default. And I've invited him today to discuss the big, powerful topic of Of fear, so I'm really intrigued by the word fear.
I used to be in marketing and it is a powerful tool to get people to move in. We use a fear of loss and it was kind of gross, right? It's kind of gross using fear to motivate people. I don't do that anymore. But I am still intrigued by the power of fear because it is, it's a negative power that changes.
the trajectory of humans, of what we could be, of who we could become. It's a life stealer, I think. It, I've seen it within myself where I've been paralyzed by fear before. I've seen it in family members or people who, you know, it's a weird thing. There's a duality sometimes where there's a fear of success or a fear of failure in the same person.
What if our biggest obstacle in becoming who God wanted us to be, Is fear and not our circumstances? I think that's a possibility for many people I I can see that in acquaintances, family members, and even in society, we've seen where fear has paralyzed people from the abundance that Jesus died for. And that's why I am so excited that you're here is because I do believe that Jesus died so that we could have an abundant life.
And I do believe that fear is one of the number one killers of that abundance and that it was given to us. We just have to understand. How to tap into it. And so I'm excited that you can maybe help us out of that trap and into the victory and the freedom that he promised us. So thank you for coming.
Thank you for having me, Denali. I appreciate it. I love this conversation and I can't wait to be a part of it with you. Awesome. So I think we need to start at the beginning. Like, what is fear? Where does it come from? That is a really good question. And so, wow, where does fear come from? Um, it kind of depends, right?
So you could talk about it in two ways. You could talk about the, the appropriate, a fear of, you know, an outcome, a dangerous situation, a challenge that you're walking into. I'm not talking a job interview necessarily, but you know, if you think about it yourself, if you're walking out in the middle of a street when there's heavy traffic, or you're standing at the edge of a high rise building, right, the fear is a natural and appropriate emotional response to your circumstances.
The challenge is, most of our life doesn't measure up to that level of stress. Yet, there's those times where we feel like we're fearful, right? For me, the work that I did, that book that you talked about, Life Mastery, Living Life by Design by Default, came from a course, Life Mastery, and the course, Life Mastery, came from my own life, of trying to figure those things out, walking through things academically, athletically, you know, as an entrepreneur, starting my own business, and in those places, Finding that there was this fear of failure that was coming along for the ride and trying to figure out and navigate how to, how to overcome it.
What I found in my own life, and we can start to unpack some of that if you want to take that conversation in that direction, but really what it is is an identity statement. It's really not the outcome itself because so in business, you know, my wife and I had a successful business that we sold for a very, you know, significant profit, but it was the fifth business that we started, not the first.
And so, failure or fear of failure isn't really an outcome that has detrimental effects unless you allow it to, but here's the issue, it's not the experience you walk through, I tell people, but it's the meaning that you give it, and it's not necessarily the meaning of the circumstance, because challenge happens, bad things happens, you know, worry happens, stress happens, things happen in every person's life, it doesn't mean your experience isn't bad, isn't challenging, isn't, you know, Something that is, you know, a negative impact, but the challenge is the meaning that you give it and the meaning that you tie to your identity.
So for many of us, it really isn't fear of success. It's the identity that's tied to it. What if I don't succeed? What does that say about me? What if I fail? What does that say about me? What if I don't do this thing or that thing? What does that say about me? It's a it's an identity statement that you take from it That robs you from the life that you're created for.
Hey, everybody. Sorry to interrupt you I just wanted to quickly tell you about a new store that we're opening. It's called red ledger gifts. com. It's a christian gift store Um, some of our items aren't christian. They're just candles, right? But we wanted to create a store that had meaningful thoughtful gifts that you could give people because gifts are important people Like to receive them and it makes us feel good to give them and It's good to get something that's meaningful or that actually can impact their life in some way.
Our store has a lot of different cool gifts. Um, we have candles cool mugs. You still don't know god And uh, we also have really cool bibles. This is like a small one, you know, um, it's very like it's kind of manlier It's got like a nice black leather to it. Um, and it's it's nice and compact too. So I fit my man purse Anyway, these are just kind of a small sampling of some of the things we're going to offer.
Please check us out I can see that, you know, we lost everything in 2009. My husband was a builder and since then we haven't fully stepped out. Sometimes we, we really hold ourselves back a little bit financially or with risks that we didn't use to. And I think it became kind of an identity and I hadn't looked at it in ways of like, Oh, this is an identity that we're maybe holding on to.
I appreciate you saying that. And, and the challenge is, that's a common circumstance and I'm not trying to minimize what you guys walk through. You know, my wife and I will walk through bankruptcy as well. When you are investing everything you have into what you're doing, you know, there's no backstop of, of financial safety if it doesn't work out.
But the interesting thing is, so what is it? Is it something that is an identifier that tells you the limitations on your life? Or is it an instruction and an educational point of being able to walk through it? I tell people that you're either living from who you're created to be or what your life has told you.
And like you just illustrated, Denali, and I've certainly had in my own life, we could unpack all of that. And certainly, your listeners, your viewers, the people that are, you know, listening to this right now could do the same. Everybody has a life, and everybody's life is telling them something. And I tell people it either is aligning with who God says you are, or it's lying to you.
There's no in between. So if it's telling you that you're a failure or I can't do this because what if you know those things that you try and do to manage your life well maybe those things that you're hearing in your head maybe those thoughts that you're having are really just a response to the life that you're living they're not who you're created to be lived out.
The interesting thing you know, Denali, because I'm sure you and your husband are successful now in the things that you're doing, because most people typically are. Entrepreneurs never stop at one time. That's right. It's like, it's like a Lay's potato chips. You can't have just one. But in that place, you learn from it and you grow for it.
So it's not an identity statement unless you allow it to be. That is good. I think, you know, I look at my husband. And. He was a really an amazing builder and he's just now stepping into that again after that many years which is I'm so excited because he has such a gift of Creating homes that have an amazing flow and feel good when you walk into them.
So I'm super excited that he's Stepping out in that. Yeah arena again, even if it doesn't work out No, I agree. And at the end of the day, the thing is that, is he, you know, I'm sure we'll use you guys as an example. Is he walking into the things that he's created for? You see the outcome of what he's doing and the things that he does that really blesses others.
So, obviously that's the case and that's the thing that, That's the thing that I work with people and try and help them to evaluate is, am I, is the things I'm doing to control, to manage, to make decisions in my life, are they aligned with who God says I am, or are they something that's telling me that I'm not going to be able to?
I was going to say, how does someone know? Wow, that's a great question. So for us, the work that I do with Life Mastery and what I've detailed in my book, Life Mastery Living Life by Design, really starts from, starts from identity. What I do is I separate people from their outcomes and I tell them this, who are you created to be and it is who you are apart from the things you do.
Apart from your title, your role, your position, your income, right? Your vocation, apart from those things, who's the person that's, that's sitting there in front of me, or we're walking through a counseling or coaching session, or, or you're listening to the instruction. The challenge is many times we believe that we are our outcomes.
Yes. So I have value because, uh, you know, I'm a husband, I have value because I'm an entrepreneur. I have value because I have this job or this income or this, this car or truck in my driveway or whatever the things are that we're using, right? But even as Christians. We can feel like, because I don't have this, I'm not as good as, because I don't have that.
Even titles, I mean, we get into this with, you know, wanting to become a pastor, and I am a pastor. But what I find is that a lot of times people exchange their calling for a title. Because they think that I'm a person of worth and value because of this thing in my life. And so what I do to separate us, where we start to really unpack it, is an understanding that Who you are and the person you have and that you're looking at in the mirror, the value you have is separate from the things that you do.
Your, your outcomes are an extension of your identity. They're a horrible replacement for it. I like that. Do you think that men have a harder time accepting that identity because they tend to be providers? And that creates An identity in itself. It seems like I can separate what I do a little bit easier than my husband I don't know if that's anecdotal Or if it's you know a male female thing or if it is just our family No, I think it's a great question I think there's just there's definitely a mandate or an expectation that that men have on their lives But the honest truth is generally there's there's an expectation that women have as well Right, you know the fastest way for me to know who you believe you are is to give you a mirror and ask you what you see And, and in most people's case, what they'll see is something they're lacking.
They're seeing something they're missing. They're seeing something that's not as good as, right? And we do the same thing in our lives. We look at our life in comparison to somebody else and say, well, I'm, you know, I've only got or I'm only doing, or I only have, and I don't think it's men and women in general, but I think it, um, affects them in different ways.
And there's different things that they have in their life. There's different, uh, things that they use it as an identifier. I'm valuable because of, because I'm valuable because of a relationship. I have a relationship, therefore I'm somebody of worth and value. I have a high level income, therefore I'm somebody of worth and value.
So it's different for both of them, but the attack is still the same. If I could unpack it really quickly, there's identity in the way the work we use all comes from Scripture. And so with us, identity starts with what the Word of God says. And what I use as an example of that is Jesus. And so when Jesus was baptized, Matthew 3 going into Matthew 4, in Matthew 3 Jesus is baptized.
He comes up out of the water. It says that the Holy Spirit descends and abides with him. It says it descends like a dove and it abides, which means it remains with him. And there's this voice that comes from heaven and says, This is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. It's God speaking about Jesus to the people around him.
It's an identity statement. It's before he started ministry. It's before he had temptation in the desert. It's before he did all of the things that he came to earth to do for us. He had an identity of somebody who was loved. He was loved before he accomplished a thing. So, he goes in the desert for 40 days.
Satan comes and tempts him. And Satan's temptation is this. If you are the Son of God, doubt on his identity, then turn these stones to bread. That same temptation is a lot of what a lot of us are using in our lives today. If you really believe you're somebody of value, then you need to prove it. Identity and accomplishment versus identity creating accomplishment.
And so in that place, he does it. So, I mean, if I can complete the story, Jesus response to him in using scripture was this, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. It may have not been the last word that was spoken from God to Jesus before that temptation, but the last recorded word that Jesus heard from his Father was, You're my son and I love you.
Extending that thought process before you've done anything. Many times, even in Christianity, we try to measure up to a feeling of worth by the things that we do, whether we're men or we're women. And many times, one of the easiest and quickest temptations is for Satan to say, if you really are somebody who's worth loving, if you really are somebody who's valuable, if you really are somebody who's smart, then you have to do these things to prove it.
I love that. And I don't want to skip past this because it was pretty profound what you said at the beginning. So I want to reiterate it. He said, with whom I am well pleased before he did anything. He hadn't done anything yet. He hadn't performed any miracles. He hadn't done anything. Right. He loved him and was well pleased before there was any performance, which is huge, right?
If we could all believe that about ourselves before any of our performances, we just come loved. Yeah, absolutely. And for the people in your life, and I know you have them, the high achievers, one, the people that are really doing things are really going for it. I love those kind of people. I'm, I believe I'm one of them, and I'm sure you and your husband are as well.
It doesn't mean you don't accomplish things. Right. What it does mean is, the things that I accomplish are because of who I am, they're not as a substitute for it, as I said before, which means that I have value and worth whether my business succeeds or fails, whether my marriage is amazing and all roses and butterflies, or there's challenges going on, whether I have a health scare or an issue in my life, whether I've reached that level of income or not.
It doesn't mean you won't have all those things in your life, but what I try and do is separate identity from accomplishment, because when I have that. That I can start to really understand, as you said, for yourself, like with your husband or like with me in my own life, you start to unpack what, what's the reason behind the things I'm doing?
Am I living from who I'm created to be so I can have this amazing life that I'm created for right? Life mastery as we call, we describe it is you living from who you're created to be, um, at the highest level that you're created for in every area of life. That's the, that's the vision, that's the goal that we walk people towards.
Well, all of that, you know, can be in relationship, it can be spiritually, it can be financially, it can be with your job or your business. But it really says this. What's the, what's the most amazing life that God has for me? The one that He created me for. Like with everybody in the Word of God. And so when I can align with who I'm created to be, I'm not using things as a substitute and, you know, therefore get on that hamster wheel of success where you have to continually re succeed.
You have to continue to remind yourself, you have to continue to get positions, have positions, have titles, have roles to prove who you are, but instead you're, you're what I call unleashed as the hero in hiding, the person that you're created to be in every area of your life. My passion, Denali, is this. I believe every person has an impact in the world that has their name on it.
Sometimes we substitute accomplishment for fulfillment because we think that by gaining things, I'll prove worth and value, I'll have satisfaction. I've, I work with successful people and people who are on their way, and I've never found anybody yet who, when they got that title or role, apart from who they are, when they're using something as their income to prove that there's somebody worth and value, actually is satisfied when they're done.
But when I find that I work with people and they're unleashed, they start to understand identity, they start to work with some of these tools and strategies. Now all of a sudden, they have this amazing life, this life of passion where I'm sure you're there and you're probably there right now where You, the thing you're doing, you lose track of time.
The thing you're doing, you're so passionate about it that you have to be pulled away to do other things because you're so, you know, this is exactly who I was created to be. That's the life that God has for us. That's the life that Jesus portrayed. And I could talk about it throughout all of scripture.
And so that's, that's from a place of identity, understanding who you are and being able to live that out. So this podcast, for instance, isn't something that I really think about. Thought I should be doing. I am not a great speaker. I really felt called by God to do it when our blog system changed of how we were doing and how AI changed things and my son and I were praying and this is what we decided.
We wanted to connect with people, which is what we were trying to do through the blog, but things really changed drastically on Google. And so we felt called to do this podcast. It is interesting because I do feel called to do it, not because it was like my lifelong dream, but because I felt like God wanted me to do this, that I can do it, that it is sustainable for me to do, even though we're not making gads of money with it, right?
Because, you know, it does take a considerable amount of time to edit videos, create reels, and all the things that happen with it. I think the beautiful part of it is I do feel called by God to do it. So it does relieve me of the fear of failure. Like, yeah, I don't know that. Well, I don't know where it's going and I don't know why, but I know this is where God has me.
So I don't have that outcome. I mean, of course I want it to be successful, but I mean, maybe God has me here for a season to help somebody. I mean, I don't know what the reason is, but it doesn't matter because I'm learning and growing and loving it. And I think that's the difference between this and anything else I've ever done.
And I don't, and it has, I mean, I'm not saying fear doesn't sneak in. It does. It's like, what am I doing? You know, the trolls are so mean. Here's the interesting thing to think about. There's a chapter in my book, and it's actually a part of our course as well. There's a lesson that I teach there, and the title gives away the whole, the whole lesson.
The lesson starts with the title, Your Characters, Your Calling. It's something that we impact, again, as I'm walking people towards life mastery, living from who you're created to be understanding your identity and being able to live that out. Living out that at the highest level that you're created for.
Not the level that you can manage, not the level that you can control. Oh. So in that place, your character's calling is a lesson that helps people to understand that God doesn't bring people into the things that they're doing because there's a skill set that's needed, but because there's a person that he's decided that is the answer.
I tell them this and, you know, I'd love for your listeners to write it down because it's the truth for their lives as well. I tell them you're the answer to the circumstance you're walking into. You're not the question to be figured out. Oh, wow. When we don't understand who we're created to be, we think we're the question to be figured out.
Can I do it? Can I succeed? What skill sets do I need? Oh, I don't know enough. I'm not smart enough. I don't have the technique, right? The things that go around in our head, the thought process that stops us from doing it or slows us down in doing it is the things that's stopping us. That's the question to be figured out.
But what I tell them is you're the answer. to the circumstance you're walking into. One of my favorite Bible stories is a guy named Gideon. He reminds me a lot of myself. So, the Israelites were being oppressed by a group called the Midianites. They were stealing their stuff. Every time they had new flocks, new harvest, new everything, they would come in, sweep in, the Midianites would sweep in and take all of their things.
And so, you know, of course it was the Israelites fault because they weren't doing what God told them to do, weren't living as He told them to live. But in either case, this guy Gideon was doing his family chores, which was, of course, he was. threshing wheat. He was creating, you know, preparing wheat for the things that they were going to do, products they were going to make, and things that they were going to, you know, create from it.
But because of those Midianites, he was doing it in hiding. He was hiding in a wine press to make sure that the things weren't stolen from the Midianites when he was trying to do it. An angel comes, sat on a rock, and says this, Greetings, mighty man of valor, to a young man who is in hiding. Mm hmm. There's a whole conversation that goes on where Gideon lets him know that he's not qualified, that there's no way he can do it, why hasn't God done this for us, and all of the excuses he made for why he couldn't do what he was doing.
But the angel had told him he was a mighty man of valor and then told him he was going to save all of Israel. Wow. So fast forward from that conversation, he goes and does the things that he's told he needs to do. He confirms that God was actually talking to him. And the very next thing that happens is the Midianites and another tribe come to attack Israel.
So he goes and he creates, you know, does the things he needs to do to walk them into war so that they can be victorious. Here's the interesting thing from the time he was told he was a mighty man of valor. the time he went into battle to win the war, did the things God told him to do, and was victorious.
You know what didn't happen in that time in between? He wasn't trained. He didn't go to military school. He didn't learn tactics. He didn't find a mentor. He didn't grab a hold of some books. He didn't go through some training to getting the skill set for the leadership he was walking into. The reason he didn't was because he didn't have to.
The thing that God knew that he didn't was he was already qualified for the work and the walk that he was walking into. The only person who needed to be convinced was Gideon. And that's the same in our lives more and more times than I can imagine. You are actually equipped and ready. By character for the things that you're walking into it doesn't mean like with your business with your husband You don't learn, you know account management or hiring and firing or hr tasks or?
Planning and all the things that you're trying to do or taxes or you know, all those Attributes of any kind of business But what it means is you're the secret sauce to the life you're walking into. God already knows what he's created you for. He's walked you into it, and in that place, the only thing holding you back is what your past has told you, what your belief about your identity has told you, maybe what Satan has told you.
Certainly the lies of the hurts and the struggles and the challenges of your experience have told you. But if you unpack all of those, if you pause those for a minute, and you stand there and say, Okay, well, who did God make me to be? And you start to unpack it. We have tools and strategies that we use to help people do that in a definitive way, so they can actionably do it.
But at the end of the day, when I start to understand who I am, I start to see why I'm here. Because when I know my character, when I know who I am, now I know, Oh, It's because of my, these gifts, these talents, this passion, this fortitude, this integrity, this thing that I'm doing. These are the things that God's inviting me to invest into whatever I'm doing.
And so it's the same with you, Denali, with that, there's a reason why you're here. And it's not because of an outcome, although outcomes will happen. It's because of a character. It's because of the person that you're created to be that he needs others to learn from, grow from, be nurtured from, be encouraged from.
And in that place, the outcomes are beyond what you could even imagine, but they're not because you've gained a skill set. It's because of who you're created to be lived out. Life mastery is the easiest life possible. Because it's literally me just living from who I'm created to be. I don't have to measure up, I don't have to figure it out, I don't have to build myself up, I don't have to gain a bunch of education so I can finally be who I am.
I can just be. And in that place, the person I was created to be is not just enough, it's the perfect answer to the circumstance. Life management, which most people live, is much harder because then I do have to measure up. And then I do have to fit in, and actually I do have to gain a skill set to have value.
And then I do have to have an income level to feel like I'm somebody of worth. I have to have a relationship to feel like I'm somebody worth loving. Life management is much harder. Life mastery is amazing, but it all comes down to identity, which comes down to character. Who Denali is, is the answer to the things God's investing in.
And whoever is listening right now, put your name in that place, because God's no respecter of persons. He loves all His children the same. And in that place, it's the same thing He uses for all of His family. Who you are is not just enough. It's the perfect answer and solution to the things you're walking into.
It doesn't mean challenge isn't going to happen. It just means you're already the answer before they do. Okay, so there's a pattern here, and that I'm hearing when you said that. I feel like where I'm feeling the fear is where I start striving. And you said it was easy. We walk in the character, so there's not really a lot of striving there, right?
Yeah. It seems to be a pattern with God that He doesn't really want us striving. Right, and it doesn't mean you don't work hard. You already do. It doesn't mean you don't put excellence in the things that you're doing. It doesn't mean you're cavalier about the outcomes from the things you're trying to invest in.
Really, it's actually the opposite. The more I understand who I am, the more specifically I can invest the things that I'm created with, that are actually the things that are needed in whatever those situations are, but it isn't striving. Striving is really an identity substitute. Striving is me, again, like Satan said, if you really are that, then you need to prove it.
It's the same tactic that happens most people I know about. And in that place of fear, the fear is always an identity statement that says, Maybe I'm not good enough, but if I wasn't good enough, God wouldn't have planted me there. He wouldn't have put me there. He wouldn't have invited me there into that place.
Again, it doesn't mean challenge doesn't happen, but sometimes we think challenge is a proof that I'm not good enough. What challenge is, is an equipping so that you can carry the weight of the thing that's to come. You're being prepared now through the challenges you walk through to that next level of the life that you're called to live.
It's not a proof that you're not capable, it's a proof that there's more and you're being prepared for it. So as I'm thinking of my story, as you say this, every part where I would have doubt feels where that's where the fear sneaks in. Like, Oh, am I, is, am I really supposed to be doing this? Is this really for me?
Did I get it wrong? Did I miss it? Yeah. Yeah. And it's all of those doubts where the fear starts to sneak in. Is that common? Oh, yeah. Or is that just me? No, it's not just you. And I appreciate you being honest about it because it's me as well. You know, I dealt with fear of failure. I created a course called Life Mastery and wrote a book, Life Mastery, Living Life by Design, not by default.
Out of my own experience and walking through that journey I walked through a bunch of different courses probably like you did maybe a bunch of books that I read Maybe like you did as well a bunch of speakers that I listened to as well And that gave me great ideas and opportunities for change and here's the challenge Most times most of the things we use We try to create change and change is really just me managing a habit to whatever.
Overcome a fear momentarily, get me to move forward towards action, right? Whatever the things you're doing. The challenge is the habit you use to get there, you have to use to stay there. And so those mantras that we use, those scriptures that we try and use to bludgeon our thoughts into submission so that they align with who we are, right?
And scripture isn't bad. The problem is if you don't believe it, it's just a substitute for faith. Oh, wow. But here's the truth of the matter. If God says that he's not giving us a spirit of fear, you can take that one, right? And I can say it over and over again, my fear, but when my thoughts are telling me, no, but I did that, I failed in that last business, or I did flunk out of that school, or that last relationship didn't work out, or, you know, the thing I tried to do, I just lost money in that.
Right? When your mind reminds you of your experience, and why it reminds you of your experience is because we're either living through who we're created to be, or we're living from what our life has told us. When you allow your experience to just be an experience to walk through, not an identity statement to live, now all of a sudden you can do that.
And if, I'd love to share how you actually can get to the place of doing it. I would love for you to share that. Um, let me give you three steps, and I'll do them quickly. We, we do them extensively in my course, but the first thing is creating an I am statement. Okay. The statement is answering this question.
Who are you apart from your things? Your title, your role, your income, your possessions, your position, whatever the things that make you you. The outcomes of your life and your college degree or your trophies on the wall, whatever. Take all those, set them aside. Who's the person that's left? That's the person that you're created to be.
So what's your character? Right? What's your values? What's your passion? Right? What's your personality? What are the things that make you you? It's an I am statement for people who are people of faith, which I'm assuming most people are who are listening here. My encouragement for the people I work with is it starts with a conversation with God with a simple question.
God, who did you make me to be? And then start writing down because I'm sure he's starting to talk. And it's not my resume. It's not the things that I'm doing. So who are you? I'm a person of passion and character. I'm a person of empathy and love. I'm a person who loves small animals and people in need.
I'm a person who is all in and, and I'm black and white. And when I'm in, I'm into the end. You can count on me to the very last. I'm a person who loves silly humor and amazing times with my family. And I love resting at a place. And silence and peace apart from other people. These are the things that make me me.
They're part of my I am statement. So what's yours? Not just you, Denali, but who's listening to this? The second is this, a celebration list. So you have an I am statement and the second one's a celebration list. The celebration list answers this question. What do you love about you? Here's the interesting thing about it.
The more I see the things about me that I love, the more I see God in me. Yes. Yes. I'm a pastor, so I get to tell you this. There's this false idea of humility that we have that says that in order for me to elevate God, I need to denigrate myself. I need to put myself down, which is interesting. You never elevate an artist by putting down his creation.
Right. But only in Christianity do we think that the more I can tell everybody that I'm just a sinner, I'm just this, I'm just that, well, I'm just. The only thing in all creation that was made in the image and likeness of God. I'm just his son. I'm just so belovedly loved that God in flesh, Jesus Christ, came to the earth to die for me.
Those are all truths in my life. I'm never just a sinner. He didn't create me to just be a sinner. So anyways, the more I celebrate me, the more I see God in me, and the more I see the things. So what I love about me are those Things I'm passionate about, the character that I have, and all of that. The interesting thing, Denali, for you and for me, and everybody listening is, before they were part of me, they were a thought of God.
He thought about all of these things uniquely, specifically, intricately, intimately before he created anybody. So again, that identity statement, how do I know what I'm supposed to do? How do I know what my future is? It starts with knowing who you are. And part of that is the I am statement. A second part of that is a celebration list that says, I'm a person of worth and value just like God and Jesus.
You're my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. When I create a celebration list, I create an understanding in myself that I'm somebody worth loving. I'm somebody of value and worth. I'm somebody worth celebrating because I'm his, because he made me that way. The more I see those things, the more I see the fingerprints of God on my life and in my body and in my thoughts and in who I am.
The third thing, last thing that we use to really round out identity is an accomplishment list. I tell the people I work with, I invite them to do 20, I've done over I think 138 by now. And here's the truth, Dennelly. When you get past 10, when you get past 20, when you certainly get past 60, now you're writing things down like, I show up to work on time, I pay all my bills, I get up on time without hitting the snooze button, or whatever the things are, I brush my teeth on time.
My list at 138 includes things like, I graduated from junior high. You know, when you get to 138, it's not just college, it's not just high school, it's the minor successes in your life. It's college. And here's the truth that most people don't know about, but people who are hugely successful, especially in the athletic fields now.
If you don't celebrate small wins, you'll never get big wins. If I don't celebrate the ordinary successes in my life, I'll never see the extraordinary ones. And if I do, those extraordinary successes, as some of my clients have found out, when they've gotten really successful at things and the satisfaction and the joy lasted about ten minutes.
For two reasons. One, it was an identity statement. I need to be successful to be of value. And when you always use your accomplishments as a substitute for identity, you always have to recreate the accomplishments to continue to reprove it to you. And the second is this, if I don't celebrate myself along the way, I really lose the joy of getting there in the end.
And so I tell them to create an accomplishment list because what I want people to see is that you're a person who has a track record of success on a daily basis. So that fear of failure that you're talking about are those past things that you didn't succeed at. Well, you've succeeded at things just by being on this podcast.
Just by looking at me, eye to eye, I know there's a multitude of things you've done today that you succeeded at. The challenge is most of the times we discount them as if everybody's done them. Well, not everybody's on a podcast. Not everybody is looking into a camera and that doesn't mean we're better than other people.
What it does mean is you had an intention and you had an accomplishment. That's called success. And so, I am statement. Celebration list and accomplishment list. If you wrap these three up, these are three tools we use to really kind of give a rounded figure of understanding who you are. You're not a failure waiting to happen.
You're not the sum total of the things you didn't do and the things you didn't accomplish. You're a person of success who's walking in it. You're a person of value and worth. You're a person created by God. The more I start to see those things in me, the less fear has hold of me, and we can go through some other tools around thoughts, words, and actions, but it starts with the foundation of who are you.
You're the secret sauce to the life you're living. I love that. I really love that. You know, when I, we were talking about doing this, I was kind of thinking, Oh, I bet he has some great tools and these will be the scriptures and he's going to have me meditate on them. But it is, it is easier to, um, not feel that fear of failure if you're set up for success, for the wins.
There's, Oh gosh, I can't remember the name of that book. And I thought it was so important. And I, oh. It, it's an old book from the sixties. I, I, if I remembered it, you would, you'd probably know what it is. Cause it's really famous, but it was about kind of improving yourself image and how I, how you see yourself is really important.
And I love that. You talked about us being God's creation and that we see ourselves through his eyes and As his creation, because there is that false humility that people have. And it's hard to look in the mirror and say, Hey, I love you. It's hard to do that sometimes when you don't feel good about the mistakes or the failures or the other things.
But if we start thinking about those wins a little bit. Because they are. There are so many victories in life. It helps us to have the next success. It helps us to go, okay, I did that. I can do that again. I turned the camera on. I can do that again. It's, it's true. And it allows you to say and counteract, first off fear, second off the words that are telling you you're not good enough.
Because you have done it. Not only am I not, not only am I good enough, but I've accomplished these things in my life. And here's the interesting thing, a couple of things, if I could, the first one is this, I love scripture. Every, every lesson I have, every chapter in my book, every lesson that I have in my course called life mastery is based on a scripture.
The challenge is that a lot of times myself in my own life, I'll just use me. We've used, the Bible as philosophy, not instruction. And there's no harm or foul. There's a reason why the title of my book is Life, Mastery, Living Life by Design, Not by Default. The default in my life that I see in a lot of people's life is that I memorize scripture in replacement for identity and in placement for instruction.
So just by memorizing a scripture, now magically I'm going to be changed. And the truth of the matter is, I believe God wants us to take ownership of the things that are invested in in our life. And what that means, what the Bible is, there's instructions in the Word of God. We just unpacked one about identity.
We unpacked an illustration about what identity looks like lived out with Gideon. Yes. And how he lived that out. I can unpack it, there, our transformational strategy. So you have the identity piece and you have the transformational strategy piece is mastering your thoughts, words, and actions. One of the scriptures under Mastering Your Thoughts is this, is Proverbs 23, 7, As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
It's a story that the author is giving the reader about a wealthy man who's acting one way, being generous, inviting you to dinner and feeding you. But on the inside, he's somebody different. He's being deceptive. But in that word, as a man thinks in his heart, so is he, is an instruction. And the instruction is this, If I am where I'm at as a sum total of the thoughts that I've had, because the truth is, I'll never be greater than who I believe I can be, and who I remind myself that I am.
So, if I am where I'm at right now because of the sum total of the thoughts and the beliefs I've had about myself, how do I become the person I'm created to be? As I talk with people for me, my journey and transformation was believing on the inside that there was a life I could live in a person I could be, but I wasn't seeing that man on the outside.
My whole journey of transformation was unleashing what I, the thing I do with the people I work with. I tell them my whole job is to unlock and unleash your hero in hiding and your business, your job, your relationships in your life. And so, for me, that was my journey of figuring out, how do I, how can I come up, can I kind of be that person of assurance, of confidence, that person who's not trying to prove myself through things, not having doubt when I'm trying to accomplish big dreams and big goals, but really unleashed in the person I am, showing up, right, believing in me, showing up as me, right, living the big life I've had, not shrinking back from it.
Yes. So in that place, it was my own thoughts that needed to change. So the scripture, as a man thinks in his heart, so is he. So, if I am where I am at right now because of my thoughts, right? Meditations, right? The meditations of our minds, right? God let the meditations of my heart and the words of my mouth be pleasing in your sight.
The meditations of my heart is another word for your thoughts. So, if I am where I am at right now because of my thoughts, how do I become the person that God created me to be? Right? Fully, completely who He made me to be. First and foremost, it needs to start with my thoughts. And please write this down if you are, you have a pen and you're listening, re, re listen to it again.
It's this, I tell people that your thoughts are either aligned with who God says you are, or they're lying to you. Mm hmm. Your thoughts are either aligned with who God says you are, or they're lying to you. How to become the person that I was created to be? Aligning my thoughts first and foremost. It comes from a scripture, as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord my God. I love it. We could talk about mastering your words. Right? Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Amen. And we can talk about actions, right? Yes. It talks about in scripture about a good, a good tree bears good fruit or a bad tree bears bad fruit.
What are the actions that you take? That hero that I talked about, the person God created you to be? What does that person look like lived out? So certainly we're going to use scripture and certainly we're going to use affirmations in meditation, but they're going to be from the instructions of God. So I love that you brought that up because there's a way to do it so you actually can see transformation.
And revelation. And I think, of course, God brings revelation in all areas, but I do love, and I wanted to make sure because we have people from all areas of, because I get emails, I get texts from people. who are brand new believers, or they've been believers forever. And sometimes we skip the new believers.
You're not. I did when I said about the scripture memorization thing, and I think you covered it, but I wanted to also express that these are These are, you're taking not just scriptures, you're taking whole ideas from God that are spread over many scriptures and changing the way people think is what I think is happening in this course.
Like, learning your identity isn't just found in one scripture. It is many that you've probably created this course from, and I think you've said that, but I just wanted to reiterate that, because I think it's important, and I don't want to confuse anybody by what I said a few minutes ago. No, and I'm sure you didn't, but I appreciate that.
You're right. I mean, one of my favorite scriptures is, do not be conformed to the pattern of this world. But be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will. In my early Christian life, I memorized that. Not because I wanted transformation, not because I didn't want to be conformed to the world, but because I wanted to know what God's will was for my life.
And I thought if I could just memorize the scripture, I'd know it just by magically memorizing it. And memorization is great. Memorization is the first doorway to relationship with God. But the second doorway is instruction and understanding how do I live it out? Yes. Here's, here's, if I can unpack this super quick, I'm sorry, this is one of my favorites.
That word transformation, if you look at it in the original language, is the word metamorpho. From metamorpho, we get the English word metamorphosis. I was such a nerd in my passion for God and going after it that I looked up metamorphosis. I kind of knew what the illustration would be, but I thought I would look it up anyway.
The word that they, or the picture they use for metamorphosis is a caterpillar into a butterfly. Okay, so we're talking about transformation, we're talking about in the Word of God, and it's talking about the original word being metamorpho, which we get metamorphosis from caterpillar to a butterfly. My wife and I had an element, not elementary, a preschool, and we'd have our little kind of science projects, but you know, they're two, three, four and five year olds, so they're, they're super simplistic things where we're just trying to illustrate what kind of, you know, concepts are in nature.
And so for that science piece, we, we used to, um, you actually can grab mail order butterfly habitats. And what it is, is a bunch of caterpillars. In a case with some vegetation that they're going to eat you put them in a case Whatever the case is that you're using right? It's a could be a glass case a fishbowl or what have you And over time they'll create the chrysalis, which is the shell that goes around them and they'll create a butterfly So I knew what that was like from a process standpoint because I got to see it with our little kids Well, I also I looked it up and and I found this thing fact about it, which was super fascinating.
I read, as I was studying it, and it said this, it said if you take a strand of DNA from the caterpillar, and you take a strand of DNA from the butterfly, They're exactly the same. That transformation journey that God's talking about for us isn't me being transformed into somebody else. Mm hmm. Because, hear me, if there's a perfect God, He has perfect creation.
If God had to recreate me, if He had to make me somebody different, it would mean that He didn't make me in His image and likeness to begin with. So, In that place of transformation, here's the truth, and here's the instruction you need to understand. God didn't tell you to transform so that you could become somebody else.
That sanctification process, we talk about it, is becoming more and more like Jesus. But what he did is he's inviting you to be transformed so you become who you were created to be from the beginning. The person you were created to be, not what your life has told you, not what sin and lies and past and hurt has created in you, but who you were created to be.
It's that transformation that God's asking for. It's that life mastery journey that I'm inviting people into. That's awesome. I, I think I wish I had, um, I could be taking notes myself. I can't wait to watch this because they're, I think you just drop things. And I don't, I don't know if you just know how profound they are, but they're so many, like it's line after line.
So I, I, I'm so. I'm excited to watch this myself. I appreciate it. At the end of the day, here's the thing I need you to know. Not you, Denali, although I'm super glad that if you do this, but whoever's listening, you're right. That God has created you for something. I think for the people I work with, the one thing that they have in common is they believe that there's more than the life that they're living.
It's the same thing that drove me to try and figure out how do I apply Scripture to my life? How do I walk in this relationship? How do I become that guy so that I can actually show up? It wasn't, you know, early on in my teenage years, in my early 20s, it was because of a dollar amount. It was because of a car I wanted.
And it wasn't because of those things because I thought I deserved them. It's because I thought I would be somebody of worth and value if I had them. But as you start to walk in this journey, as you find the instruction in the Word of God, as you start to see that I'm really being driven by my hurts and my fears, Versus the truth of who I am.
And you start to unpack that you start to really start to see those places and ways you can do it. I created a transformational program called Life Mastery because I couldn't find one. I found courses for change that brought habit. I never found one that brought transformation that unleashed me. So in that place, the one thing I got right was I refused to give up on me.
I refused to say that I wasn't going to find that path forward to the promises of God. There's a scripture behind me, you probably can't read it, it says, He who the Son sets free is free indeed. Hmm. Apart from that freedom, we're living in the struggle of trying to overcome our fears, overcome our sins, our addictions, our issues, our struggles, and try and prove who we are.
That freedom is definitely a salvation message. It absolutely, if you can talk about it biblically, about it, it's the freedom comes from Christ dying on the cross. And in that place, we're no longer slaves to sin, we're free from the bondage of sin and death. Absolutely. I'm a pastor. I understand that too.
Here's the thing most of us don't understand. Freedom looks like something lived out. It's, again, there's a chapter in my book. There's a lesson in my course that the title gives it away. Is it freedom from, or is it freedom to become? Many times we think the freedom is just, it's freedom from sin. And now I'm just going to wrestle with my doubts and my issues and my challenges, try and live up to the best of my abilities.
And eventually I'll see God. That's what typically we find, which is life by default, not by design. But freedom to become is the freedom so that I'm not, not just dealing with sins and stress and issues in my life, but I'm not allowing lies to tell me who I am anymore. What I tell people is, our desire is for not, for you to believe, you know, ignore your experiences, act like they didn't matter, get over it, move on, be quiet about it, stop talking about it.
It's not any of that where you're denying your past to try and create a better future. It's saying this, it's not that your experiences don't happen. Horrible things have happened to people, bad things, challenging, hurtful things, all of that. I'm not discounting people's experiences or their life at all.
But here's the goal, is to not allow your life and your past. To tell you who you are anymore, that's the freedom so that my last struggle, my issues, the things that I'm living on aren't what my identity is and I refuse to believe that they are. If you can stand there and hang on to your hope and believe there's more long enough, maybe there's a course like Life Mastery that can change you, but certainly there's a God who can.
And we will put those links in the description if anybody's interested, please, please find them there. I do. I don't know how you are on time, but I have a question. Yeah, absolutely. So, you said something earlier about saying a scripture that you don't quite believe yet about yourself. And I don't know if you're familiar with Caroline Leaf.
She's a neuroscientist who is also a Christian, who I really love. Yes, I've learned a lot from her work. A lot of what I use and try and pepper into my stuff is from her. Oh, awesome. And so I have a hard time sometimes with, well, I need to be careful here. Even sometimes where I go to church, like I love my church, but you know, we say this, we walk in this and we walk in faith in this, but if I don't really have faith or believe this particular scripture for my life yet, it kind of feels like a lie to me.
which causes a little anxiety and a brain issue for me. And I think it does others too. So I'm working with another person right now who is having a hard time. believing some of God's words for herself. And I can't really say, well, just believe it. But how do you get to that space? How do you, how do you get to that place where you can believe that word for you?
Um, yeah, like let's just use fear as an example, you know, perfect love cast off all fear, right? Well, what's wrong with me? Just, I do not have enough love, enough faith in me. Why can't, why am I living in this fear? I tell people the joke. I say that I don't have a tattoo, but if I did, my tattoo would say identity is everything because it is.
The identity of who you were created to be, I mean, throughout all of Scripture, I could just name you person after person that was the answer to the circumstance that God had planted them into. It wasn't because they were these little robots that God needed. It wasn't because they were servants or slaves that God demanded to do stuff.
It was because they were sons and daughters that He invited into the family business, which was a salvation and the, you know, the things that were done within Scripture and within the world. So here's the thing. The thing I would ask about, so it's an identity statement, everything in life is an identity statement.
If I'm still struggling with fear, even though there's a scripture that says perfect love casts out fear, well there's a couple of questions I would have. The first one is, do you believe that you deserve it? Do you believe that you're worthy? Sometimes in our lives, I have a father who loves me, but when I don't feel that I'm a person who deserves love, when I can't love myself, right, that celebration list we talked about, I have value.
When we feel like we don't, when we feel like we can't be loved, when we have an experience in the past with families, with parents, with fathers who have disappointed us, who have maybe not been the best that they could have been, that gives us a understanding of relationship with God that says that it's the same way.
We don't understand it to be that way, but we act like it is. So for me, my father was a disciplinarian. He was somebody, you know, it was that old school when I was acting up as a young person at home, my mom would say this, wait till your dad gets home. Because he was the punisher. He was the one to fear.
He was the one to worry about. I thought that's who God was. So in our, about 20 years ago, Nah, actually more like 28 years ago. I have a daughter who's 26. Two years before she was born, we were expecting twin daughters. And we lost them at five and a half months of pregnancy. Crushing, devastating time of our life.
At that time, I felt that God was punishing me, right? Disciplinary and as a dad means God is the same. And I felt like it was a punishment for sins and issues I had in my own life. It was a journey I had to walk through, and I had to unpack and unravel some things, and help to walk in this journey of understanding that God is a perfect father.
And I say that in general, and people think it's a wonderful cliché that they don't actually believe. It's only when you're trying to walk through pain and reconcile God versus your dad and things you've lost versus the promises he has for you that you start to kind of unravel some of the things that you've believed.
And so, you know, I don't want to go too deeply into, you know, the spiritual journey and figuring out that God is, you know, a person who's created us for gifts and great things and wonderful blessings in our life. But there are this physical world, this fallen life that has caused things to happen like sin and death.
But there was this understanding that God isn't like my father. My father was a disciplinarian, so I always expected God to find something I did wrong and punish me for it. Certainly not to be there to love, and care, and to nurture, and to be with, and to invite me into these wonderful, amazing journeys that we've had.
So a lot of times it's that. A lot of times it's this place of, I don't really deserve it. I don't really believe it. Every time it's something in our life telling That, that the fear is real and the fear is appropriate. So for us, we start with identity and we start unpacking, okay, well, where has that happened in your life?
I talked to you about an experience in my life. I could talk to you about an experience with my mom when she was hospitalized because of a nervous breakdown. I could talk to you about school and academics where I wasn't doing great in school and I had a teacher tell my parents they needed to hold me back.
And that identity statement that said, you're not as smart as everybody else. It wasn't something she said out loud. It's something I felt inside. So those things that we're believing right now, those things that aren't working right now, those things that are continually repeating in our mind, those thoughts that we have, they come from a place, and they come from an identity statement.
That identity statement comes from a life we've lived. That life we've lived has a hurt associated or attached to it. That's created an identity statement that says that I'm not worthy of being loved. You're not as smart as everybody else. You don't get to succeed like they do. The struggle that you're going through right now, that's all you get.
Every, you know, you're not, you're not the favorite people, the favorite person, the favorite son, the favorite daughter, or you're not worth loving when my mom was hospitalized at a young age and finding out that somebody you loved was gone, that abandonment challenge and, and those things that are happening.
So that for this lady that you're walking with, the first is first question I have is, do you believe it? And the second is. If you don't believe it, then where did that come from? We unpack some of that with some of the lessons and teachings that we have, but it really comes down to a thought. And by the way, just a general thought about imposter syndrome, fear of failure, and all those things.
Here's the fastest way you know this through Caroline Leaf. Neuroplasticity is, is the, the, I call it the shortcut to decision making in the brain. There's structures in the brain that give you the ability to make decisions because we have thousands upon thousands that we have to do on a daily basis.
And God created us in an amazing way so that there's automation with many of them. So I didn't have to remember how to brush my teeth again, I don't have to remember how to tie my shoes every time I put a pair of shoes on, and all of those things, it's because through repetition in your life, you're able to use those things in, in an automated session so that your, your brain doesn't have to continue to, you know, consciously think about everything you're doing, breathing, eating, walking, talking, while in that place.
The best way to change that is to, well, there's only one way to change those structures from disempowering, which means that I always expect to fail, which means that I always hold back, which means I always have relationships that I get into that are bad for me, right? There's disempowering structures in your brain.
There's disempowering ideas that you have, and there's empowering ones. You can change the disempowering ones, the negative beliefs, the fears, the words, the issues to positive ones, assurance and confidence and an action taking. You do it through. Mastering your thoughts, words, and actions. You know that if you've studied Caroline Leaf at all, and I'm sure you have.
But most people don't realize, how do I stop fear from happening? Well, you start Preparing for war before it happens. So what we do is we invite our people to create affirmations and those affirmations aligned with who you are. The problem with affirmations, the ones that I did when I was learning from different programs, personal development courses, and all that is, they're just generic affirmations.
I am strong. I am strong. I am strong. I'm a person of character. I'm a person of value. I'm a person of worth, whatever these things are. Well, you won't believe them. If your life has told you, you're not right. When I create an, I am statement, a celebration list and an accomplishment list. When I remind myself on a daily basis who I am by remembering those things that I had, the affirmations that align with my created value and who I am, my identity, now all of a sudden, that person starts showing up.
Because when I know I'm a person of worth and value, when I know I'm worth celebrating before I start anything, when I know that I have a track record on a daily basis of accomplishing things, What do I have to fear when I'm living from a place of life mastery of who I am, when I know that I'm not just good enough, I'm exactly who I need to be.
Not everything I'm going to be, but everything I need to be for this moment. I am all of that. Then what do I have to fear? No outcome changes who I am when I already know who I am. When I don't know who I am, the outcome has to be positive for me to be good about myself. So for that person, do you believe that you're worth loving?
And where are you not hearing it in your life? Where has it started? And how can we walk into that situation and tell the truth to that circumstance so it no longer has power over you? That's good. Good stuff. I have another question. If you need to go at any time, we can stop, but I keep having more questions.
For sure. Um, what if we have somebody in our life who lives in fear? How do we help them? Who doesn't understand their identity?
The Christmas is coming up and there's a wonderful gift you can give them. It's a book called Life Master Living Life by Design Not by Default. Perfect! I love it. So beyond what I can give them is what you can. Right. I tell people that I can't take anybody to a place I've never been. But when I've been there, so the best thing I can do for, there's a book that I read it's years ago.
I can't remember. It was like more than 20 years ago, 23 years ago. I love the title. I love titles of things. The title of the book, it was a very small book, but the title of the book, it was a relationship book and it, and the title was this, the best gift I can give you is a healthy me. Yes. Yes. And I love the title, but because there's a truth behind it.
And so the best gift we can give the people we know who are dealing with fear and worry and stress or whatever the things that they're dealing with is to walk in a journey where we're not. Yes. Because when I know how to overcome those things in my life, I know how to help you get there as well. So for that friend of yours, it starts with that, what's an I am statement?
Who are you apart from your things? What's the celebration list? What do you love about you? Because here's the interesting thing, a sidebar on that list, the celebration list, right? The more I celebrate me, the more I see God in me. The byproduct of that is knowing that it wasn't just God because he intellectually wanted to develop a daughter of his called Denali.
It was a father who passionately cared for his child so much that every single part and portion of who she is was a thought in his head. It wasn't a, it wasn't an accident. It wasn't arbitrary. It wasn't because, you know, he needed to make a billion people just like you. It was a one of a kind unique creation who's got a name called Denali.
And in that place, when you start to see, again, something I can learn about me, here's the truth of the matter. There's a scripture. I'm sorry I keep going on with him, but this is the most important commandments. Jesus was told, or asked, one time he said, he was told, Teacher, can you tell us what the most important commandment is?
And he said there were two, right? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. I'm sure you've heard preaching, because preachers teach on it a lot. You can't do the second without doing the first. And here's the interesting thing. I can't do the first without doing the second.
I can't love God if I can't love myself. And I can't love myself if I don't celebrate who I am. Identity helps me to understand I'm a person of worth and value. In being able to love me, I can actually believe that I'm worth loving. In believing that I'm worth loving, now I can actually accurately see God's love for me.
And in that place, perfect love casts out all fear. Does he love me? Yes, he does. Is there anything I need to fear in walking with him? No. It doesn't mean challenge doesn't happen. It doesn't mean we're not going to walk through hard times in our life and tragedy isn't going to happen. There's parts of life that are non negotiable.
But is your identity something that's non negotiable? And if I could just, you know, if we have to finish, I want to give you this one last story. My mom, so I wrote my book for two reasons. One was because my mom told me I should write a book. And the second was I wanted to have the book as a what I call the shortcut guide to life mastery.
So I have the full fledged course. It's got all the lessons, all of the teachings, video teachings, all of the worksheets, all of the things for that. It's got one on one coaching. It's got group coaching, right? But I knew that there was something I wanted to give as a resource that you could grab a quick nugget, a quick aha moment today.
You could apply it to your life this week and you see transformation this month. So I wrote that book, the very first copy of the book. Because my mom was my encourager, she was my number one fan, she told me to write it. The very first book, I put into her hand when I visited her January of this year. By April of this year, she had passed away.
Four months later, we were, I was there the very last week. It was a gift from God for me to be able to be there for the final week of her life. I was in her bedroom every single day, all day. It was, it was a tragic and blessed time to be able to do it. She passed away and, um, the very next day I was going to leave.
So, I mean, there was so much providence of God in it. But in, in, she had passed away a couple of hours later, things were happening, there's folks coming to take care of the body and all the things that happen after a person passes. And my brother in law, brother in law and myself were sitting in her little, you know, In California, we call it a casita.
It's like a little mother in law quarters that they had on their, on their property in their home for her. We're sitting in her little kitchenette area and he says, you know, sometimes life is really horrible. And I said, you know, life isn't really horrible. Life is amazing. This is just a horrible time.
And so just because I understand God's love for me, just because I'm walking in identity and life mastery, living from who I'm created to be, at the highest level I'm created for in every area of life, it doesn't mean tragedy doesn't happen, but it doesn't shake me and it didn't shake me because I could fully embrace, not ignore the tragedy that I was in, crying and all of the things that are associated with it.
Absolutely. She was my mom and I was just absolutely torn because she was gone. But it wasn't to the point where my experience was telling me who I am. My life isn't and wasn't horrible. There was gifts even in the tragedy that I could see at the time. Because I understood who I was and I could live the life I was created for, fully embracing and understanding the tragedy, but not allowing my experience to tell me who I am anymore.
That's the journey. Are you worth loving? Of course you are. Are you somebody who is valued, who's, who is measuring up before you've done a thing? Of course you are. The only one holding you back is you, just like Gideon. He was a mighty man of valor even when he didn't know it. But when he knew it, now all of a sudden he could live it.
That's the passion I have, is to help people get there. I love it. So, my takeaway is, knowing your identity makes you unshakable. Yes. Yes. That is, that is awesome. I love it. I think it, it is, it is the thing. We have to understand who we are and whose we are. I love it. Thank you so much, Mark. This is, well, I didn't really get to this, but I'm glad.
No, I'm so glad because this was so perfect. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining. This blessed me, but if nobody sees this, I, I am changed, but people will see it. So I do appreciate that. And if you are watching, please check out his program. It is in the links and you can get his book, sign up for his program and.
and be changed and be unshakable and stop living life in fear. Thank you. And we may have to do a second one because I think I have more questions.
This is my passion. I'd love to do it. I appreciate the time. Oh my gosh. You're an incredible speaker. Thank you. See, I don't have to be, I have incredible guests. Thank you so much for taking time to do this with me. I really appreciate it and accepting our invitation. Absolutely. My joy.