I think we have all hear catch phrases growing up. Some of them we really didn't like. Bonnie.Violet and I have found a few that we have adopted and actively use as a reminder of where we want to move to. Join us as we share and open the conversation for other who want to participate.
We are back at it. Bonnie Violet and Tina Frank share how they work through dealing with the cultural issues with their many different ideas and beliefs.
Tina, a conservative christian woman and Bonnie Violet, a trans gender queer drag queen have an anti-cancel culture conversation. While many family members are choosing to no longer speak, we have chosen to sit at the table and engage in difficult conversation to find peace and restoration.
Tune in LIVE on YouTube every Monday at 1030 AM PST
Find Splintered Grace on Facebook at https://facebook.com/splintersofgrace
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s narrative with a spiritual thread.
Big shout out and Thank you to our monthly supporters. With your support we can continue to bring and upgrade Splintered Grace Podcast quality and reach.
To learn more or to join our Patreon go to patreon.com/bonnieviolet
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s n
Engage! Rate, Follow, Subscribe & Share
Book ME! - Keynote, Panel, Guest on Show, Officiate Wedding /Memorial in/out of drag.
Collaborate! - Join Team, Guest, Make a Pitch
Sponsor! Patreon, Venmo, PayPal
I think we have all hear catch phrases growing up. Some of them we really didn't like. Bonnie.Violet and I have found a few that we have adopted and actively use as a reminder of where we want to move to. Join us as we share and open the conversation for other who want to participate.
We are back at it. Bonnie Violet and Tina Frank share how they work through dealing with the cultural issues with their many different ideas and beliefs.
Tina, a conservative christian woman and Bonnie Violet, a trans gender queer drag queen have an anti-cancel culture conversation. While many family members are choosing to no longer speak, we have chosen to sit at the table and engage in difficult conversation to find peace and restoration.
Tune in LIVE on YouTube every Monday at 1030 AM PST
Find Splintered Grace on Facebook at https://facebook.com/splintersofgrace
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s narrative with a spiritual thread.
Big shout out and Thank you to our monthly supporters. With your support we can continue to bring and upgrade Splintered Grace Podcast quality and reach.
To learn more or to join our Patreon go to patreon.com/bonnieviolet
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s n
Engage! Rate, Follow, Subscribe & Share
Book ME! - Keynote, Panel, Guest on Show, Officiate Wedding /Memorial in/out of drag.
Collaborate! - Join Team, Guest, Make a Pitch
Sponsor! Patreon, Venmo, PayPal
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[Music]
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[Music]
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is
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good morning uh i'm bonnie violet and you are at splintered grace uh so
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glad that you could join us today and this is my co-host
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good morning everybody happy monday it's tina frank here hey just very excited to um see you all
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today kinda and i had to have a great conversation welcome welcome right as in kind of see you not that i'm
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kind of glad to see you right oh i got you no i'm always glad to see you hear them
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or however that's going to work today you can tell i'm still not tech savvy
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huh um yes well i was just happy that we showed up on the
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the cr the sides that we like to be on yeah yeah i was wondering about that i'm like
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oh it's gonna be weird if i have to look someplace different so that i can i can see you yeah i know i told
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myself okay you gotta click this one first and then that one that's so funny i'm so glad that's your
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job and not my job because who knows if we'd even make it online right so off
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yeah go ahead oh let's say so should we start by sharing a little bit about our weekends
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sure we can do that do you want to go first um i can um i actually had a pretty
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low profile weekend which i loved um i got to have some extra time with my
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honey he was off an extra day this weekend so that was nice but um just spent some time doing some busy
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work around the house um seeing some friends uh going to church on sunday morning which is one of
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my favorite things to do in the week and uh yeah so it's pretty pretty easy working in my garden that makes me happy
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nice nice you're saying you're like 90 degrees weather so it's pretty comfortable right now yeah
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yeah we we kind of getting up a little earlier playing outside a little earlier but as
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soon as the sun starts to go down it's really nice again so for me it's it's perfect nice
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how about you sounds like you've had a lot going on this weekend also yeah and i got some sun for folks who can't
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see but i got i got burnt pretty bad just on one half of my body um so
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uh but it's like it's like i it's like i don't know like i've burned my whole life and there's
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still some times when i'm like what are you like it's this isn't a new thing
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like put on some sunscreen you know yeah i think just i just didn't realize it was going to be that nice and i
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was standing out watching a drag show on the sidewalk and an hour and a half later you know on
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the like so it's just kind of the way the way it goes it happens i remember
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you and your little brother sometimes in the summer you always had to wear a t-shirt and if you forgot
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sometimes you had to wear a t-shirt over your sunburn because it was so bad and i feel so bad
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my body hurt just to see you guys and it was so not cute i mean we had to
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because we had these huge blisters on the tops of our
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we had them shoulders our ears and tops of our head no matter how much sunscreen we wore so
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we weren't really allowed to be outside without shirts on and you know things like that so it was
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yeah it was no fun thank goodness sunscreen has come a long way since then huh
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yeah yeah it's definitely better um yeah it's definitely works it works really great when you use it yeah yeah you're gonna have to make
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sure you have some in your bag at all times yes yes i did have a
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um i've been uh you know i've been having a challenge with getting in to
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see the doctor around um like a trans specific doctor for my
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trans health stuff so i would i met with a doctor on friday
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to um just to talk about starting hormones and i was really excited to start
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hormones like then um and i talked with them and
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we had a great discussion it was a really great visit and they're like yeah i think that you know hormones seems like a really good next step for you
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and i was like yay let's do it and then she's like oh we can't do it today like we need to give you some time to
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like read through some things and it's just protocol we'll have you come back for another
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appointment and i was like i was so disappointed it was it was um
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it was kind of refreshing in some ways because you can get so caught up in your like i
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can get so caught up in my head that my head starts to take over like my
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heart or my body and so like as soon as um i talked with her and she hung up
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like i started crying um and i started crying about uh not getting getting to start yet and
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so for me i felt that was like my heart and my body like taking over and being like hey
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like get out of your head because the things that are in my head is just like people aren't gonna love you people aren't gonna understand you
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people are gonna you know all these sorts of things um is what gets in the way rather than me just
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doing what might feel right for me you know yeah yeah i i think it's good
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though to make sure that you have a full understanding of everything i think they're they're doing really well with dotting their eyes and
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crossing their teeth i think that's really a great sign that they care about the decisions that
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you're making and they want to make sure that you make them the with all the information so that's encouraging to me as
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as someone who loves you and uh wants the best for you yeah i and i've done a lot of the
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research and like so for me it wasn't like i was just like it was a brand new thing i have a girlfriend in chicago
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her and i wanted to go through the process together and so she's already like three weeks ahead of me so i was just eager to have
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like a buddy um yeah and they go through this process that i can just kind of check in with
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and see how it's going for her and i can see how it's going for me and so it's it's it's just a matter of
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weeks or whatever um but it's so it's not really that big of a deal but i was it was just a kind of a cool i guess
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that's what happened this weekend so i'm looking forward to at this point it looks like i will start in may
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um unless an appointment opens up sooner okay oh cool well that's that's that's
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awesome sounds like you had the kind of weekend that you were hoping for yes yes and you got to be outside
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yeah i i mean i'm happy to be outside and be able to do do stuff i spent so
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much time inside so i'm happy to be outside doing some stuff for sure should we get going on this
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conversation with us all right yeah let's do it let's do it so you know um
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we got we we we're blessed we get to talk a lot sometimes during the week and um talking about we want you guys to get
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to know us a little better so one of the things that i like that i have done over my number of years
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as i've grown older and more wiser is i have catch phrases
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and from the time i was little um my mom used to give me these catchphrases not all of them that i liked
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um but as i become an adult some of those catch phrases for me have been something that's
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tangible that i can grab onto to remind me of where i'm moving towards and i think
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i'm not always ready for this big full-off philosophical or logical conversation but a catchphrase that can
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catch my attention can stop me in my tracks so that i can think through what happens next so we thought today we would share
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some of those i've got a lot and i still have them in my space because i put them on sticky
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notes on my computer i write them on my bathroom i write them in my journal
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so i went through my journal and i wrote some down that i've had over over the years that still come up for me
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once in a while when i'm having a challenge and i thought we would share some of those with you so how about you did you have some luck
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trying to find some catchphrases yeah definitely um and yeah and like like i shared with you too when you
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first said catch phrases i think of like reality tv tv shows when like the desperate housewife comes in or the
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is that what it's called or like crack race or you know like some reality
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show comes in and they have like kind of a catch phrase or like something that kind of says who they are in like just a couple of
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sentences um but then once i looked it up i was like okay catch phrase like that so
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in my circles in like recovery circles we call them like slogans i think so uh so yeah i did write down some of
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those slogans or catch phrases and we'd also love to hear from folks who are listening
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if you have a favorite or maybe you have one that you don't like uh that you want to share
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with us um that would be great as well just put it in the comments and we um we'll we'll bring it up and talk about
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it as well so did you want to come up with one first tina or did you want me
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or how do i why don't we why don't we share the one that we both don't like that you already because we both are
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like yeah no yeah i grew up with it was i i my father said it all the time and i
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i i know it wasn't unique i think it was in the time but my father would always
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say do as i say not as i do oh my gosh do you ever do you hear that now as an
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adult still no the only time i hear about it is when people are like complaining about it
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i i sometimes um especially when i'm in a situation where the family's
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together and i don't want to do something but i want someone else to do something i think oh wait a second
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why would i have someone else to do that if i'm not willing to do it myself so yeah that would come to my mind but yeah i didn't like that one growing up
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at all good morning honey thanks for all the purple hearts oh good morning could join us honey
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yes so was there other ones you didn't like i thought you might want another no no
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that's probably the main one that that i didn't like i didn't like it when people would would tell me about about assuming
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and i think we all know what that one is so and i still hear that as an adult i'm like come on
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so i'm trying to i'm trying not to assume things about people which i think is a good practice for all of us
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um but yeah yeah you just sent like the breakdown so to speak yeah
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yeah i'm like wait a second i i don't consider myself an ass i don't consider you an ass i just was assuming something but
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yeah so anyway those are the two that that i really didn't like that i heard growing up i'm sure if i really sat down
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and thought about it i could probably come up with a few more and i promise if i really really thought about it right
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um so thank goodness they all forgave me so we're all we're all hanging out together as well
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but i have quite a few because you know i'm you're such a thinker and i'm really not
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a a thinker thinker in the middle of stuff so well you know even our conversations
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i'm more of a uh black and white and you're kind of a gray with a little bit of black a little
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bit of white and and it's all good and that's and it's i think that's great but for me i need a quick black and
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white sometimes to just help me to stay focused because i am in a constant state of change and
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that's the desire of my heart is to not be the same tomorrow as i am today i want to always be moving forward
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to be the best that i can be so i'll start with one i've got a whole lot of them so
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try to put some of mine in order because when i write them in my journal sometimes they're kind of going through life circumstances like
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that they've come up for me so the first one that i remember and i think you've heard me say this even now is um
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the details of our day dictate the opportunities of our future
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so that one for me really helps me to focus and prioritize the things i need to get
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done each day because i don't know if you guys struggle with this or if you struggle with this bonnie but
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i get distracted really really easy even this morning i got distracted and i lost like 30 minutes of my mind like dang it
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um because i just i don't know i'll get going and doing something and then squirrel and i and i get over here and
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then i find myself an hour later looking up and i've lost my whole schedule now for the day has gone crazy
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and so i try to when i instead of getting frustrated because i tend to do that and then i just go over the deep end i just say okay
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wait a second the details of my day are going to dictate the opportunities that are ahead of me tomorrow and the next
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day and the month and what so what do i go back to now because i have to cut something at this point i spent time doing something i have to
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cut my schedule so now what do i cut out of my schedule to be back on track so this is one that i i was thank
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goodness i ran into early and i've been able to use over the years
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to help me focus and i feel like this catchphrase right here it had a lot to do with the growing of
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my business the opportunities that i had to work with with people that i have in the past
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and so this one was really good so yeah there's a couple things that came up for me when you mentioned that
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one is in recovery circles we we talk a lot about doing the next right thing um and that's
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a way not to get stuck in the past or stuck in the future and and i like it it's evolved for me to
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just do the next thing i don't do well to label things right and wrong
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um i just feel like i don't know for me it's just better because i've always tried to do things right and i still did
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wrong so i do this to try to just do the next thing um so that's what came up for me uh when
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you mentioned that and then the other thing is i kind of relate to that because i am kind of such a thinker and like i
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kind of all over the place um i've i think throughout my life i've
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tried to control that like i've tried to um say no i need to put this off and do
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this over here and what i've learned to do that i think is helpful
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is to just kind of go with the flow because sometimes i mean there obviously there are some things that have to be
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done and there's like a deadline and things like that but my energy and my interest also kind
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of fluctuates so i usually try to like go with the flow so sometimes i might be like doing
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a whole lot of stuff at once and then i'll have a period of time where like maybe i'm not doing that much
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um but if i like if i zoom out like if i'm just looking at this day i
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might think like oh my gosh i did nothing or i did way too much or whatever but if i look
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at the whole week or if i look at the month then i can see that you know like i had three days of
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this three days of that and then it kind of balances out a little bit more so sometimes it's easier for me just to
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look from a little bit further back at like i guess what i'm doing or what
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i'm not doing that's awesome that's what came to mind for me
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that's i mean that's that's a great opportunity for us to learn a little bit more about who we are
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so that's awesome do you have a catch phrase you want to share well um one that um
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i was trying to i wrote down a few i was trying to think what really sticks out to me um i one of the things that i
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found really helpful is to pause when agitated or doubtful
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um so yeah so if ever i'm like agitated or not feeling right
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i just pause instead of respond and then if i'm just not it keeps me
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from making decisions hastily and it also keeps me from saying words
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or responding to people in a way that i will later regret
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that usually has nothing to do with them and has more to do with like like me and my state of self
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at that time than it really has to do with like with that person a lot of some of the times that's good
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that's a good one i'm going to write that one down michael looks like michael has one
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michael is saying taking a step back and looking at the whole picture is so important i agree i agree and i don't
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always do that i'm guilty of being tunnel visions sometimes well that makes me think of that have
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you ever heard the term of you know it's i can't see the forest amongst among the trees oh yes or like are kind
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of like getting into weeds you know i think that that makes me think of it's like i can't see the whole forest because i'm
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just so stuck in what's like right in front of me yeah it's true i i
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am guilty of that yeah and that can feel like super overwhelming at times that can be
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disorienting um you feel like you're not like making progress
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or maybe even that you're not a part of something beyond yourself or whatever i don't know
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it can also keep you from from seeing opportunity or or moving in a in a positive direction
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especially if you get from that overwhelmed position so yeah yeah yeah that's a good one i
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hadn't thought of that one so cool i'll share i'll share another one um
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okay because i'm a mature christian woman um i read my bible and there's a lot of
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stuff in there and sometimes i'm better at living that stuff out than others
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and so i remember one time being at church and there was a little thing i can't
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remember the exact scripture but it was one of the scriptures that i know you know all the ones we know um
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and the the pastor said read the scripture and he said and this landed on me and
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i've never forgotten he says so now either you believe it or you believe god's a liar
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it blew my mind i'm like so true because if i say that i'm a i'm a christian and i'm going to live
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out what the word of god says about who i am if i will if i read it and i don't believe it then what other alternative
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is there is god a liar and i was like oh my goodness so to and i'm grateful again
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that i got i understood that um young in my walk with christ so that i'm
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like okay i have to every time i read this bible every time i read what i'm saying or wrote what i read what the word of
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god is saying i have a choice to make do i believe it or do i believe god's a liar so this
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little phrase and this little and i hear it every time i every time i hear it it's his voice saying it on have
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you ever had someone say something like that that's impacted so much every time it comes to your mind you hear their voice saying it
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right right yes that's exactly but let me tell you that little catchphrase has freed me up of so much
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it has been amazing it's helped me really to come into my identity um and to understand who i am as a
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christian and it has just like empowered me i think to move forward that one little phrase
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that that he said in that moment it truly truly had an impact on my life and do
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does it is it usually the thing that comes to mind when you're talking about that is i think sometimes is it triggered by
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fear is it the idea that you're like i guess the thing i think of is like if i can find myself
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in fear or uncertain or questioning things then i can like check in with myself and say like but you don't
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believe that like you believe that you're taken care of you believe that you know all these sorts of things so
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i i just didn't know if that's what you meant or if it was something up well any anything like that fear is
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definitely something you know the bible says do not fear all this we've had a lot of fear
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happening over the last year so either do i believe i have i don't have to fear or is god a liar
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you know the bible says that that i'm i'm uh more than a conqueror do i believe it
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or is god a liar you know the bible says i'm saved by the blood of jesus do i believe it
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or is he a liar so these are the things i have to you know he says he's my provider when i look at my checkbook it doesn't
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always feel like that right i have to remember either i believe it or is god a liar
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and so these are this particular phrase here it's a builder of my faith and it's helped me to gain confidence in
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who i am as a christian so that i can move forward and have those things that god has laid out for
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me so anyway that's one of this is one has really impacted me a lot
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i hear that marcus says you go through it to get through it ah isn't that the
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truth sometimes i'd like to skip the first part
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it feels so yeah it's like yeah it's a great sentence it's kind of the
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humor behind it too i think because we all we all can relate to it you go through
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it i remember when i first um was getting sober um
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my sponsor that i was working with at the time um there was i think i was probably
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around i don't remember but at one point he told me uh he had me sit in a chair and he said
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now try to get out of the chair like try to get out of the chair and you
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can't really just try to get out of the chair you just have to get out of the chair you know
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what i mean like if you're gonna get a chair you just gotta get out of the chair and so um that was something i think with um
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recovery as well it was just like if you're gonna like if you're gonna be sober if you're gonna make
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if you're gonna like you say to maybe even choose to to believe what god tells you then you have to like live as if you
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just have to do it and believe it not like be you know that's right yeah that's really good that's a great
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analogy when you said that a person like what is he gonna do sit on you so you can't get out
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or tie you to the chair or whatever how do you try yeah that's good he's just like let me
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figure out how to try and i'm like you can't try you just do yeah yeah see these little things as i
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know as people you can use them enough in a flipping attitude or whatever if you really ponder these things it's
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they really have impact yeah but don't don't fall prey to any little
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cliche that comes around but i know for these had the ability to impact my life
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if i thought through them and so i'm grateful that they have impacted my life because as part of
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these catch phrases and the people who said them to me that have molded and shaped me into the
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person i am today to give me a platform to move on to the person i'll be tomorrow
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and and the system it's just amazing when i think about it these little things that has been used to shape my life
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system it's a miracle in my mind i remember i i remember i often feel uncomfortable
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when people tell me like they kind of like praise what i'm doing or they're like oh my god you're
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doing this and like it's so great that you're doing this like and i'm like the only difference between people who
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are doing stuff and not doing stuff is that they're doing it like there's
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nothing special about me there is but there isn't right like i'm
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doing it like i was talking after the show the other day or yesterday i was talking with linda
24:23
and vera another performer and they were talk we were talking about how like we sometimes
24:30
like decide say we're gonna do something and then when it's time to go do it we don't want to do it
24:35
and then when we do it we're like so glad that we did it you know and uh it's like all we have to
24:41
do sometimes is just show up you know just show up and let let go of like the rest
24:49
yeah that's true that's definitely true yeah any other um
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electrical list do you have another one you want to share i don't want to do all the talking i've
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i've been pretty pretty off track so having these cliches bring me back on track has been
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really amazing i i use um i like i do use something from the bible
25:14
that um i actually tattooed on my arm because that's that's what uh what does it say i can't
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do this uh can you i can't read it still and no
25:29
oh he's still in now okay yeah which the rest of this be still and know that i'm god right yep yeah so it's like and for me this
25:36
was the practice that i used when i um when wyatt passed away
25:42
and that's where he kicked my arm when he when he when he died and so i
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put that um you know how we do back home people die and people get tattoos as
25:54
like a memory pencil i i kind of got that as like a reminder
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and a marker of a really significant time in my life um so for me i have
26:07
because like i don't know if he's like i i can't be that girl who puts
26:15
sticky notes all over their mirror and they're in there and right on their in soap on there that
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remind you like how awesome you are or that like what god is or you're like all those because i
26:27
forget so like i need those reminders but i've had a really hard time with putting like sticky notes
26:34
up so i just tattoo myself or or i have like a piece of art or i have something else that
26:40
kind of reminds me of that of that same thing so it's basically the same thing it's just
26:46
me tricking myself but i feel like that's a lot of what these things do is they just remind us
26:53
yeah of what it is that's true or what it is that we believe or what we
26:59
find helpful what we're pursuing you know i don't know i know we we're both pursuers um we're not
27:07
we're not the kind of people who just do nothing we just don't have that gene and so for me this helps me to pursue
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with purpose because i don't want to just pursue anything i want to pursue with purpose
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and these sketch phrases have helped me pursue with purpose all kinds of things
27:24
you know relationships um business uh faith all different kinds of things
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and so i'm grateful um for these and some of these are things that you guys maybe have
27:36
heard some of them are going to be things that you haven't heard because they're specific to uh my journey so
27:42
[Music] what's another one oh you want me to share another one sorry
27:48
all right so this one you guys may not uh yeah but this is kind of like kind of i just kind of do them in a little bit of an order is why spend
27:56
another night with the frogs okay i know you're not gonna get that but if you don't mind i'll explain it
28:02
in that exodus eight that's the story of moses when he's taken all the people out
28:07
of egypt i think everyone has a general idea of what that looks like there was a whole bunch of plagues
28:12
that um egypt pursued because they wouldn't let the people go well one of the plagues was a bunch of
28:19
frogs and the frogs came and inundated the land was in people's clothes and
28:24
people's food and people's beds nobody could eat or sleep or whatever drink water because they were in the
28:29
water and so pharaoh asked moses to pray and eliminate the frogs
28:35
because he had done that with all the other plagues and it had eliminated right away so moses said to him okay when would you
28:42
like me to do that and he said tomorrow
28:47
why tomorrow why not right now not now and so this is a reminder for me of
28:54
the frogs that i have in my life why in the world what i want to carry in one more day
28:59
when i have the ability to take care of it right now so
29:04
for me this is why spend another night with the frog
29:09
i said catchphrase it reminds me of the like why i put off
29:15
today what you could do tomorrow is that very simple what do i put up till tomorrow what you can do today
29:21
yeah is that right that's funny i'm good at putting stuff
29:29
off until tomorrow too right
29:34
so yeah so that that that wasn't another one do you have one to share one one statement that i really um came
29:40
to love and it is another tattoo um which hopefully we'll see if i can
29:47
show this again um but uh basically
29:52
it's silence equals death ah okay yep yeah this particular artwork
29:59
is from keith herring and silence equals death was very um
30:04
very much kind of a slogan back in the beginning of the aids crisis um when people were dying of aids and
30:10
people were getting sick of like because they called it the day the gay cancer for a while they
30:16
they didn't know what it was like people were just dying and they didn't understand what was happening they started seeing it in
30:23
certain people but you know the president didn't talk about it that because it was impacting the people that
30:28
it was impacting um you know homes they had they talked about the 5hs and
30:34
it's kind of insensitive so i'm just putting it out there but in the beginning they thought it was like homosexuals heroin addicts
30:42
hookers haitians and because they were only
30:48
seeing it in these certain groups of people and they didn't know that it was sexually transmitted they didn't know it
30:53
was um you know like blood or they just didn't know any of that stuff in the beginning and
30:59
because of the people who were impacted by it and the people that were dying were not people that people cared
31:06
about like overall um then like the president wasn't talking about it or
31:12
it wasn't it just wasn't being talked about um in the general public and so we had to people had to stop
31:18
being silent in order to live and so i think it's a very um i think a
31:23
lot of folks can especially if you're in a marginalized group or you're feeling as if
31:29
your voice isn't getting heard for whatever reason then it's just the reminder that like to be silent um is to die
31:36
potentially that's powerful yeah and i think that's also like when
31:42
you see something harmful happening to be silent about it is you know what i mean it's not good
31:48
either so that's a good reminder casa maria is saying absolutely
31:55
uh love these discussions oh thank you for that
32:02
so you're welcome do you have any oh go ahead no what were you saying i didn't say so do you have any other tattoo reminders
32:10
um oh yeah so i have i'm trying to this the the this doesn't
32:17
have like a mirror okay or it does i don't know what it is but it's hard to okay
32:22
it's this side so i have i have my horse yeah i think can you see
32:28
that yeah horse yeah so like i have a seahorse on my neck and the seahorse is my
32:36
it's kind of like my spirit animal if you will and i know that sounds hokey
32:42
but basically it's an animal that reminded me of my childhood so when i was little i wrote a story
32:49
about uh seahorses when i was a kid in school and i remember also being really
32:55
intrigued because their gender roles are switched so like uh the males have the babies in seahorses
33:03
and so the the gender roles are kind of switched and so
33:09
as an i've gotten to a point in my life again where i'm kind of returning to my child
33:14
um because i feel like there was a lot of my child life my a lot of my childhood that i didn't really live out fully because
33:20
i was whatever you know too uptight um but anyway it's just kind of me remem
33:27
me reminding me returning to child later and on in life and then the fact that it happens to be like
33:34
gender gender i want to say gender i don't want to say the f word because
33:40
i don't want to put the e on our on our podcast
33:45
um but yeah like just to kind of mess with gender a little bit as well too um so it kind of speaks to my now too
33:52
so it's a reminder did you know that when you got your tattoo yeah mm-hmm yeah okay i didn't know that
33:58
until you just told me yeah i intentionally got it done well you were with me wait i don't doubt that
34:05
because i got it done in arizona actually i got it done in arizona the our big weekend i was with you i
34:12
think the girls were with you where were we at you might not have been with me i think
34:17
because we went to that sultan it was some sort of biblical actually um
34:24
wording that was a tattoo parlor that we went to oh you yeah i don't think i went with you there the last tattoo parlor i was in
34:31
i was with my daughter and she was actually getting some piercings in her ears right here for her headaches
34:38
oh oh my gosh let me tell you that freaked me out i know i know but i'm a mom it's my kid
34:45
i'm not sure how old she is so she's like come in with me mom i'm like oh please don't make me go in please don't make me go in but i went in
34:52
with her and uh when she's when she shrieked i just wanted to grab that guy
34:58
and say stop hurting my kid so i'm sure i was not with you
35:04
what if i would remember i know your girls were there i just thought i don't doubt that at all
35:10
i knew they were there because they helped me find the tattoo parlor and stuff but yeah that was the weekend that that we kind of i felt like we we like
35:17
had our um our moment where we were like shared with each other
35:22
you know is that the weekend we went to church together okay it was that trip because i got it
35:29
around it was around my 20-year anniversary of getting infected with hiv which is kind of what triggered me to go
35:35
to arizona to begin with um which that was a total god thing because
35:41
i thought i was there to deal with the hiv anniversary situation and i was actually
35:48
there to to reconnect with you um and uh so that that was just like a
35:54
magical moment but yeah so the the unico or the seahorse was a way of kind of like
36:00
um i guess marking that as kind of returning to what was raw i
36:06
guess what was robbed being younger you know by my hiv by just challenges
36:11
while growing up you know i um you know i was mute for a while when i was young i don't even know
36:16
for how long but you know there's times when i don't know i just feel like it's kind of returning to some of those spaces
36:21
where i felt like i've i missed out on something maybe and seeing if i can experience something different
36:27
gotcha do you have do you feel like these markings or your tattoos
36:33
are are positive reminders okay because i i'm thinking man these are kind of the sad sad stories
36:41
good but good but sad you know what i mean i'm moving forward for sure but i'm like oh those are sad if
36:47
anything i think that's what it i think that's what it does kind of it it switches
36:53
the it changes what that what that means right like yeah they might seem like my first
36:58
tattoo i actually got was a red ribbon uh for for having hiv and the reason
37:04
though that i got it and i got it on my hand when people like don't get a tattoo on your hand but i was like i didn't
37:09
want my hiv to get in the way of anything i did the rest of my life so it was me of saying you know what if
37:17
i can't do something because i have hiv i don't want to do it you know like i don't want to have a job that i can't be
37:24
open about where i would you know that's where i was at at that time in my life it was something that i did not want to
37:29
hide it was not something that i was willing to um i guess disregard for for no one
37:36
and so that was like my way of kind of marking it but yeah all my tattoos are kind of those um they're markings of
37:45
their yeah they're like markings of like good things and good reminders your chat your
37:50
tattoos are your growing catchphrases yes they are because i don't like sticky notes
37:56
[Laughter]
38:01
my sticky notes though i can tear down and throw in the trash but yeah so but so i totally get it i
38:08
totally get it yeah but you know like like those sticky notes they can almost kind of blend in
38:13
you know like when you when something's been there long enough you just kind of even don't even notice it and so for me
38:19
they're such a part of my body and myself that they're there but they're not
38:24
they're not like super extreme but they're also not like you know they're they're not extreme they're just a part of me and yeah
38:32
um you know they're both a part of my experience um yeah that's good that's good so i have i
38:39
have another one that i think as i've gotten older has really helped i mean i have a bunch but this is a good one and if we run out
38:46
of time it'll be a good one to end on um i don't know if you struggled with
38:51
this but i struggled with this and i've had a couple of my girls that have struggled with this over the years and i've seen
38:57
my sister's kids struggle with some of this and it's it's the fear of being alone
39:04
and uh to the point where you went there just joking it's
39:10
it's true it's true though i struggled with it for years that i i couldn't stand being by myself
39:16
i'd rather be with with somebody even if they weren't a great person than to be with nobody
39:22
i would leave spaces and you know i just i just had to always be engaged it was
39:28
just and it was not fruitful for my life it was it was actually stealing from me my energy
39:35
my anxiety it was giving me anxiety i mean it was just not a healthy good thing so i found a quote um from
39:43
elizabeth elliott and the quote was a cure the cure for loneliness is
39:50
solitude and i was like oh my goodness i had to think about that at first i was like
39:55
wait a second but i was seeking out attention because i was i was lonely but the problem was i
40:02
couldn't define what that loneliness was what what what in me was missing that i
40:08
required such an engagement that i'd even be willing to compromise and be with people
40:13
who weren't so good for me you know what i mean i just had to go i just had to be around
40:19
whatever and when i learned how to be with myself
40:25
and to find the peace and solitude that whole thing changed and and even
40:33
when i'm physically alone i don't feel alone yeah i find that
40:38
that's a time for me that's really a a refreshiness a freshness for me
40:43
a time for me to think through things that i want to think through a time for me to to develop characteristics that i want
40:51
to develop within myself without any influence from the people around me and it was really really hard
40:56
and this is one i have and i keep with me and i still when i when i'm in those moments because
41:01
i don't know if you ever get overwhelmed sometimes i'll let myself especially with my schedule or with things
41:07
i'll i'll allow myself to get a warm and i'll say wait it's kind of that pause that you were talking about wait
41:12
and and this is what i go to what is this loneliness i'm feeling what is this anxiety that i'm feeling right now
41:19
and then i'll get some solitude or some time with myself and then i can actually think and process and for me
41:25
i'm a i i christian so i read my bible sometimes during those moments i'll just sit still
41:31
and i'll just meditate on all those things all those affirmations on whatever it is i need to do
41:37
and it helps so much so this is one that will probably go with me for my whole life but this one was really uh life-changing
41:43
for me yeah it reminds me of a couple of things in recovery a lot they talk about are like
41:50
one of the things that i do like i used to kind of label label things not so great so
41:56
there are times when i feel like i would isolate myself from everyone and feel like i'm pulling away
42:02
from everyone or whatever and then what i've really tried to look at is like how can this be more of like
42:07
hibernation you know hibernation is a time that we go away and we you know we restore we rest we you know
42:15
we get to a space in which we can go back into the world so sometimes i can relabel
42:20
isolation with hibernation if it's true because i can just be isolating for the
42:27
sake of isolating but maybe if um maybe there's something i can do that within that isolation kind
42:32
of like you talked about with solitude to make it make it matter a little bit more
42:39
it also made me think of don't don't go to the hardware store to get
42:44
milk you know like it's like you and i think
42:50
what that takes is like a lot of you knowing yourself and knowing what um
42:57
what you really need like this might be a little bit of an overshare but it was something that happened to me recently that i thought was a big
43:03
growth moment um and it happened in shelter in place actually i had met this guy that i was talking to
43:08
i think i shared with you that i was talking with him um and i was really really liking him
43:15
um we were having really great conversations and things were going really well and with shelter in place we were trying
43:20
to navigate how we could actually meet each other because we actually never got to meet each other face to face
43:26
until many months after we had been talking and so we had set up times to try to get together and we kept
43:32
canceling them um and so we kind of had had a lot of ever things happen in our
43:38
relationship except for kind of the physical aspects of being with one another and i um we finally were able to do that
43:46
and we had a plan and i was gonna i'm gonna go see him and spend some time with him and then my girlfriend ali passed away
43:54
and i was feeling very um obviously i was feeling very sad very
44:00
vulnerable i i was feeling responsible i was feeling a lot of certain things and in a lot of ways i
44:06
just wanted to be held and i wanted to be like comforted
44:13
but i knew that he was not the person to do that for me
44:21
and so i was able to call him and tell him and just let him know you
44:26
know like i would love to spend time with you i want to get to know you more and be in the same space three with you
44:32
but right now i just can't do that because i am in need of these sorts of things but i don't think it's appropriate for
44:39
me to ask that of you or to to bring that to you and i think that that was a very big
44:47
growth moment for me because i think there are plenty of times where i just would have went anyway i would wait anyway because i didn't
44:54
want him to think that i was no longer interested or because i didn't realize that
45:01
you know like i would be trying to get a different connection than what what i was really needing
45:07
or desiring so i think that's what that statement is all about
45:13
yeah that's good that's a great analogy thanks for sharing i know that was a vulnerable point for you
45:18
yeah it's a i mean it's a little a little scandalous maybe i don't know candlelit
45:27
definitely more personal so okay did you have another one to share do i have another one to share oh well
45:34
one of the things that i think is helpful sometimes is um and you might find this um useful but
45:40
to allow i was talking with a friend actually linda summers who's a good friend of mine and she was
45:47
taught we were talking and um you know sometimes we we have situations and we have people in our life that are
45:53
going through really difficult times and we don't often know how
45:58
to help people and oftentimes there's nothing we can do to help people um and so
46:05
one of the things that um that i find helpful to think of sometimes is to allow people
46:14
um the dignity of their own experience so sometimes it's just like sometimes we
46:20
have to get out of the way and let people have the experience they have they're
46:27
gonna have um regardless if like because it can come from a space of i don't want them to get hurt i want
46:33
them to to have a better life for a better experience but um at the end of the day i'm just
46:40
potentially getting in the way of of them being able to to learn or grow or
46:46
or experience whatever it is that they need to experience themselves with so i find that helpful
46:51
to to try to remember at times yeah it's hard especially when it's someone that you love
46:57
or or your child or your sibling or or someone like that it's it's really
47:03
hard and it can cause all kinds of other challenges too yeah
47:08
but i know that i've i've learned more um through my experience
47:15
than than anyone's ever taught me or told me um as i've getting older gotten older i
47:22
can be more willing to listen to other people's experiences so that i can maybe avoid some but i
47:29
know growing like as a young person and even into later in life you know i still had to
47:36
have some of those experiences on my own and and there were probably people who did try
47:42
try to um intervene and be helpful um in ways that that
47:48
maybe weren't um but i i think those experiences are necessary
47:54
to help us build character and and they're not they're not comfortable for the person going through them
48:00
and they're not comfortable for the people who love them watching them go through it and i've seen where things like that
48:05
happen and there's an expectation sometimes on one side or the other for someone to step in and when they don't
48:12
um it causes people to get hurt or or to even break relationship or change the status
48:19
of the relationship that they have with that person and so it's it's it's not easy it is not an easy position for either person
48:26
but i think you're right i think it's it's it's very necessary and it's a growing point for both people involved
48:32
in in that process so yeah stop it armani you're making me blush
48:40
that's all armani says bonnie you look so good thanks love that's awesome that is
48:47
awesome it's funny because i wasn't feeling it today i was like
48:52
coming together but but uh you know it all works itself out in the end good sure it's great to see your mommy
49:00
okay so is it my turn for another one it sure is we have about ten more
49:05
minutes though okay i have a uh the one that i'm i'm
49:10
working on now and i think we both have been experiencing this together and my church has actually
49:15
adopted this now recently too and it's uh we are better together
49:21
um because i don't believe and i i know i've shared this before that i wasn't created to be all by myself
49:29
and so i believe that the people that i have around me make me better so together we're better
49:35
this show is much better with us together than at least with me by myself
49:42
you can probably i think last week you went away for a
49:48
second for like 10 seconds or something i didn't know what to do i like i couldn't do it without you
49:56
so this is a new something for me that i'll probably also have for my life is that uh we are better
50:03
together because i really i don't want to squander any relationships that i have
50:08
and and man over time i've sure done my share of crazy and then things to isolate
50:15
people from my life and i don't want to do any of that anymore so i definitely know that we are better together and i'm
50:22
committed to the together part and you guys just have to deal with me helping me to be better
50:28
but i'm committed to to the process so it's something i have this is probably the biggest note that i have on my
50:36
computer is that we are better together because i do have a tendency to pull away because it's much easier
50:43
just to manage myself and to try to manage how other people perceive me manage how other people want
50:48
me to be expectations that people around me may have it's just much easier if i can just
50:54
pull back and just do my thing but i know that i'm a better person when i'm with other people so
51:00
we are better together yeah so that's one of those stickies that they use at a conference like those really big ones
51:06
that they write all them yes exactly it's on the whole wall right
51:13
um one more one thing that i so like and i i like like in recovery in
51:20
recovery it's like um but um you know a lot of i look at my
51:26
recovery as like um a disease or an illness um and a part of treating and
51:34
for me i feel like there's also like a spiritual malady i think i had us
51:41
like i needed a spiritual solution i think to let go of my drug use and so um and there was a lot
51:49
of um secrecy and so a lot of folks in recovery um say we're
51:56
only as sick as our secrets and so that's something that i really
52:01
um i really value and think of and it's something that's always been there for me i remember even when i was first
52:07
drinking and using i was very much like one of the justifications was well if i'm being honest about it and everybody
52:14
knows then um it kind of makes it okay right
52:19
or at least it's truth right um so i think in some ways um you know i think i i don't like to
52:26
say that that was bad that was just a time in my life that doesn't work for me anymore so
52:32
i still just kind of like think about like are there things that i'm not sharing with with at least one other
52:38
person um so i think that that's probably one of the biggest tools i think i use is like i'm
52:45
only as sick as as my as my secrets and maybe it's i'm only as spiritually sick
52:51
as my secrets you know um yeah that's a good one yeah and for a long time i just didn't
52:59
know um i don't know i guess i was
53:04
i didn't notice that i was keeping secrets yeah so it's nice to have that awareness
53:11
it was definitely nice to have an emergency one of the things that i have tried to live by is to be the same
53:16
person in secret that i am in public [Music] because if you're not that's a lot to
53:22
manage oh my goodness i've been there right well and you're there all the time so
53:28
it's like you're not full you know what i mean like you're in both of those scenarios so you're not really
53:33
you know fooling anyone yeah sorry yeah so that's so that's something i strive for because
53:39
again i have a tendency to put on that fake persona and walk out the front door and
53:45
i don't want to do that i'm i'm want to be the same person i'm out of here in my house
53:51
we're out in public or if i'm by myself if the decisions come up i want to make the same decision no matter what what this is
53:57
right so and it doesn't and i don't and i don't think that means everybody needs to know
54:02
your business not everybody not everybody deserves to know you in that way
54:08
right um so i think that's the other part too is finding a way to discern
54:13
um who you can share something with you know i have i have mentors spiritual mentors that i
54:19
can talk to you're you're one of those people that i can talk to about some of those things um but i don't take everything to you i
54:25
don't you know got the a function of god can be that you can take everything to god
54:31
um so it just kind of um depends so i guess that's all i want to say to that too it's like
54:38
we don't want to go down a rabbit trail somewhere here right so we are about done
54:44
do you want to take us out and say goodbye say anything yeah i'm happy to do that so as always
54:52
you guys it has been our pleasure to engage in conversation with you i hope that you have some catch phrases
54:58
now that maybe you're living by or moving forward with feel free to still share those with us
55:03
um we would love to still hear those because i could maybe can use those sometimes
55:10
those things are things i'm looking for and i'm trying to work through something in that catchphrase it's just enough
55:15
to get my attention so that i can move forward so thanks for joining us today we are blessed to be a part of your
55:21
monday yes and i next week is our last it's our 12th episode so oh my gosh
55:29
i know so it's our last episode of the season um
55:34
at least that's that was our plan um so i think so next week will be our last
55:40
week um so um join us and if you have things you want us to talk about please do let us
55:46
know um and then we will you know we'll take a few week break um you know and then come back i think i
55:53
know i would like to but we we can we can figure that out but also we've been also thinking about maybe
55:59
is there a possibility of having guests or having you know like maybe in another season so
56:04
if you folks have any ideas of things that you would like to see us spend more time on or to explore
56:12
we'd really love to hear that from you as well does that sound good yeah that's great
56:19
you did a great job you always agree all right well thanks everyone you take care and have a blessed rest of
56:26
your week and we will see you next week bye everybody bye-bye splintered grace podcast
56:36
is brought to you by a queer chaplain follow us on all of our social medias
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56:48
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sandman the chasm between us rest in peace
57:13
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57:21
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