Hi there. I'm Jill Allen and this is find your fierce, the show designed for women to discover your fierce, unlock and unstoppable mindset. Build unbreakable courage and completely transform how you show up every single day. Each week I will bring ideas, methods and strategies that will inspire you to step into your greatness and live life on purpose. Let's be fit, fierce and unstoppable.
(00:35): Hey there, gang. Welcome to find your fear so glad you were here. Today's chat. We are continuing the coffee talk series today, and we're diving in to how to kind of trick through that hard while keeping our peace and our joy and our sanity and how to get through the tough conversations and how to show up with this fresh perspective on life, which is truly all about communication and relationships and growing that strong thing foundation with our faith. But before we dive in, I pray that you will come hang out with us in the just brief sisterhood. It's a Facebook group, a place where all women can come together to inspire others, to grow in faith, to pray and to love and to become more, to celebrate our gifts from God. And we are certainly on that mission to live out our purpose and God's plan for us as we bark on this journey that we are on together called life.
(01:22): So we invite you to come in, hang out, hope to see you there, but Liz is back with us today. And how are you, girl? I'm good. How are you? Good. I am excited to dive into this week. I know last week we talked about the noise and how to decipher what is coming at us from all directions and how to get out of the chaos. And yeah. And so let's just continue that today with a talk on loving through the hard disagreements and the vision that we are all faced with right now. So where should we begin? Gosh, where do you give him a vegan? I think with all the noise that it, it's a big contributing factor of the division it's creating, cause there's different opinions and perspectives. We talked about that last week and to educate yourself another perspective, I think, in, in that.
(02:11): So, okay. And it happened, what I'm seeing is like there's even divisions being created in what we're normally closed their circles, you know, like people that you're normally close with there there's even division creeping in there. And so it's like how the question is, how do we continue to keep to, to shine, to love through those divisions and to maintain those relationships, even with division, even with different perspectives, even with different beliefs and different opinions and stuff like that. So I think it was really important. Yeah. I think it's okay to have perspectives and I, I mean, it's okay to have different ideas. I think it's important, honestly, because we, none of us, we weren't really created as robots. We were all created uniquely. And so in our own unique, you know being, we have different perspectives and different, different ways of thinking in and stuff like that.
(03:04): I think it's really important. I think diversity is important in unity, in, you know, and in relationships and stuff like that. And I think it's easy if we focus on the differences, that's kind of what creates the division and, and, and whether we realize it or not, we get in this mindset that everybody's got to be like me or think like me, or talk like me, or act like me. And we lose the beauty of the diversity. We so boring life would be so boring if every bloody was the exact same. Right. And we've actually probably don't get annoyed with each other.
(03:40): Right. We need to wait, but we need to work on, but we just wouldn't know any different. And we can't, and we don't learn. I mean, there's just, yeah. So much. I think learning is part of it. Yeah. That's a huge part of growth. You know, it's like opening my mind to the reality that not everything is the way that I perceive the world. And honestly, that's a lot of what Jesus teaches, you know, is like not to be, you know, if, if repentance is a transformed mind, it's a changed way of thinking. How do we even know if everybody thinks? Or if everything is just the way that I think it is the box that I think it is, how is my mind ever transformed then? You know, because everything is just the same. So yeah. More or let alone our heart and our, wow. Yeah. It's just, so where do, I mean, it's going to start with, I mean, we all, you know, we always go into like, okay, what we think, you know, and our thoughts then become what we speak, what we speak and turns into what our actions and our actions then, you know, or our reality. And it's just like that cycle of, of going through there. So with, with it being communication and how it is that we speak, do we take it one step back and start thinking about what we think about?
(04:56): I think so. Yeah. And even I mean, I know there, you know, one thing to think about too, like it's like this balance of not, not getting afraid to speak out, we don't want to, you know, silence ourselves because if you're sharing, cause sometimes even when we think we've communicated as best we can and our, our motive is pure. It can still be misunderstood, but at the same, same token, you know, there's this balance of then just being very thoughtful, like you said, change our thinking and how we communicate and what we say and what we portray. And so like, this is balance is you can't, I think you can't just be completely frivolous and just run around, like, but that's not what I meant though. But at the same time, not being led into fear to speak out, because what if somebody does or misunderstands what I'm saying?
(05:45): So I think there's a balance there and it really, I think all comes back to your motives, like the motive of your heart, and it's so key to speak up and we should, but maybe sometimes it gets lost in translation when our motive is I'm speaking up to be absolutely. Right. And I will never hear another perspective versus being heard and explaining, well, you know, like this is where it came from. This is why I believe. And I believe this is the foundation. And then, then also having, you know, honoring them to be able to do the same. So we don't have to be a right fighter. Right. And I think that's kind of sometimes what happens and it, and like you said, it perfectly, I think it is the translation of how we put it out there because we can come out and, you know, if there's some bitterness behind it, if there's something behind it, if there was understand that your line of thinking behind it versus it's okay, I want to hear and learn from you. But I, I got to put the love with it. Right. That's the hardest piece.
(06:45): And I admire people that can just speak that strength yet. It's so calm and firm and there's, you can hear the love. You can feel the love. Yeah. Right. But they're competent. Or in, in that position, it's like speaking the truth in love. There's love there, but it's like, I'm not wavering on this. How do we do that? Because you can hear it. You know, even in our voices, you can feel the energy shift, tone shifts, there's some sadness going on. And then there's like, it could turn back when there's disagreement or when hard conversation, whether it's in the workplace, whether it's at the family dinner table, in the home, out with friends, how do you do it? Well, one thing I thought was interesting. So we actually had just been going through this online course called relationship 1 0 1. If anyone's interested in that, there is a website called loving on purpose.com.
(07:43): Danny silk is the owner founder. He has lots of online courses, but the relationship 1 0 1 is really good. I felt like for even addressing like this and what's going on in his whole slogan, if you want to call it, that is keep your love on. So how, and one thing we talked about was how to love to disagreements and stuff. And one thing I think was always hard for me is like, when there's tension, you know, like, oh, I don't want there to ever be tension. But the reality is, and you have people who have strong perspectives on a certain thing. There may be them like a conversation may feel a little intense and that doesn't necessarily mean it's bad if you're still honoring one another in it, does that make sense? Like you're not attacking and accusing and things like that, but you are confidently standing on what you believe that makes sense.
(08:30): Those kinds of, some of it is like maybe being, learning to be okay with a little bit of discomfort. And it not, it's not doesn't mean that I'm bad or they're bad, you know, it just is, you know, we just have different perspectives. It's a little uncomfortable. But another thing is like recognizing it's really kind of like this personal boundary of not of not allowing what's going on around us and outside to get inside. So it's really about, it's a personal boundary of me managing my own internal dialogue, my own internal heart, my own, you know, remaining in this posture of I'm not going to take up a fence and that happens, dude, it's so easy. And especially when you're in a conversation, if you believe passionately about what you're saying, may be passionate about what they're saying. And then there, it's a little intense, we easily can take up a fence.
(09:19): And so really it's really about managing your own heart. I'm not gonna take up that fence. I'm not going to pick it up in a character pack. Yeah. It's okay for them. Like I want to be, I want to be allowed to be passionate about what I believe. So why would I not then allow them to be passionate about what they believe as well? You know, not take the bait, right? Yes. Because the enemy loves to do that. I'll ultimately, that's what it is. Like he loves to get into conversations and just stir the pot and then it turns you against you, you turn against one another and that was never the design or the intent either. You know, it was like to live, we can live in harmony with those around us. So I thought that was really interesting. Really good. And being honest, honestly, it was a big part of it, like being honest.
(10:02): And then when, you know, okay, so if we're talking about division and close relationships, there does have to be, it's one thing to say, oh, you're an acquaintance and we have a conversation and maybe we disagree and that's okay. We can still keep our love on. Sometimes that feels easier versus when we have disagreements or division and really close. Yeah. Yeah. So how do we maintain that? I think what's really important is to be honest and vulnerable, maybe about if you felt like, you know, w when you feel like somebody was, maybe doesn't understand what they said or unkind and, and their address towards you, or if they were attacking or accusing or things like that, vulnerability is really important and close relationships. And then, you know, there's one other thing we talked about in the classes, a lot of like, kind of almost like different levels of relationship, not sounds terrible, but they kind of described it as like boundaries can be fluid, you know, they kind of can change.
(10:53): And so if you're noticing that, you know, okay, so we talked about having Congress hard conversations that maybe could be divisive if that's becoming the regular norm, and you're finding it really hard to manage your own heart through that, the Navy, you might have to like, take a step back from that particular conversation and not the person we don't. The goal is not to create distance from the person that maybe we just won't engage in those seasons. Well, I kept hearing avoidance. Like I know when it gets tricky and tough and there's the awkwardness, I will be completely honest. I avoid I'm going to run the other way. I don't want to deal with it. And then I can use to build up and build up and go up. And then it's like, man, it's too late for the con, is it too late for the conversation? Right. Or there's just so much distance in between. And so then you're trying to recover from that distance. I completely agree. I've been super guilty of that too. And honestly, maybe it wasn't even a little hard when I remember hearing the holy spirit, like you can't avoid, like, don't, you know, that's all loving. Don't avoid them. Like, ah, that's so hard. Cause that's what you want to do. You don't want to face. Right. Right. The difficulty that's actually. Yeah. And it gets worse through that.
(12:09): Or, you know, I think that's also where humility comes into, you know, you can humble yourself. I know, right. The trench in my nose. I mean, obviously you guys can't see me, but I'm scratching my nose on this because that pride yeah. It gets in there too. Yeah. The pride needs to be broken down. Right? Yeah. Can we go into humility and say, I value you and I value our relationship. I love you. And so I want to maintain the connection, even in this agreement. So that's part of it too, but it's about choosing connection over a need to be. Right. Does that makes sense? How many of us are seriously the right fighters? You know, my husband and I, we always joke and say, okay, fine. You're right. You know, or I'm right. But you're less right. Or you're less right. Or if we're both right.
(12:56): He'll say, okay, fine. You're right. But I'm less, it's just, we go through because it's like, neither one of us want to be wrong in this. And so we try to work our way out of that, but the communication piece is critical. Yeah. So, yeah. So do you design, like, okay, do you say like, okay, we're going to have this talk right now. Do we, do you suggest like preying on this first, do you take a step back before we get to it and then schedule an appointment to talk about it? I mean, I know that's crazy, but it has to be almost intentional, right? Yeah. Especially, yeah. If you know that there's a difficult conversation that needs to be had, I personally think any difficult conversation should be especially if, you know, it might be confrontational, should be approached with prayer. I mean, even scripture, like Jesus talks about, you know, evaluating your own heart first and it'd be really easy to go and say, it is my job.
(13:54): It is my duty to enlighten you. And the Lord's like, Hey, your crying needs to take backseat. You know? Like that's your own thing too. And so I would always, always, I don't know how, if you go in, in a blaze of glory, you know, guns blazing, I got prove you wrong. How that can never be translated. Love, you know? And sometimes honestly, you know, I don't know. Sometimes I think you had mentioned at one point too, like there was a time to be silent. Sometimes it's not necessary to, you know, we want, we want so, so badly to open their eyes or share our side or enlighten or whatever we want to call it. That sometimes that it's just better to be silent and maintain the connection, that relationship over the particular issue, you know? So sometimes that's necessary too. I know I've had the holy spirit say that to me before, like just keep your mouth closed.
(14:52): And be obedient and that's that's yeah. Just vomiting on people. So let's break this down cause I know we're going, like we could go in so many different directions on this, but let's, let's break this down in terms of shining our light or sharing our love through the disagreement, through a tough conversation through any type of divide one. I think number one should be pray. Yeah. I a hundred percent agree. Yep. Listen, hear and listen. Yeah. That's good. Do not avoid. Okay. Do not run away. So that's number three, making this up as we go guys. I mean, we're, we're bringing it all together so we can have these steps right. With you on that. So do not avoid. Okay. So sharing our love. Can we break that down even further? Like what does that look like? Does it look like I mean, you know, I, I feel like that's, it's hard, you know, it's like, what, what is that can be, so what is your interpretation of love?
(15:47): Ideally, we always get our interpretation of love from scripture because you know, from, from the Lord, because he is love in him, we know love, that's how I know love and then how to love and you know, what, what the person would expresses that to somebody is different in different situations. I really feel like that goes along with even the prayer piece. Like I know that in times, you know, in choosing to pray first, okay, Lord, I'm just going to talk to you about it. He can really give wisdom and insight and how to approach the conversation. And what's amazing is his approach has so loving. It's like in that moment it was exactly what that person needed to express love. And, and then also sometimes being silent is the expression of love. You know, I, I don't know if there's really, what about compassion?
(16:37): Yeah. Yeah. Understanding grace showing grace. Yeah. Okay. I jotted, I'm taking notes guys. As we're going through this, but never wavering. So even if we're disagreeing, we don't waiver from the truth, compassion, grace forgiveness. And then as we're praying though, and we're listening and hearing from him, we need to listen and hear from the person that we're having this conversation with. Yeah. With honor, I heard you say that multiple times and I love it. It's huge. How much do we approach? How easy is it to approach life and people without honor, we, we want to be honored, but we don't think about then that giving that honor and returned. But yeah, that's good. I kind of want to wrap this up here with this, I think is if what we want to say is not kind and loving, it's like, it's not coming from the Lord.
(17:37): Yeah. Like we need to be in tune in tune with that. Yeah. I don't know. So our homework, this is the, this is the tough part this week because we're guys, we're giving out challenges, you know, through this coffee talk last week, we, we gave you the challenge of deciphering the noise and discovering whether or not, you know, we're one sided and we we're flipping the script on that. Okay. So this week we're going to have, we're going to ask you to have a conversation you don't want to have. Is there someone that paints to your head like right away? Cause that's probably the person that we need to reach out to. Yeah. And, and it's tough. And so, you know, having that conversation, not just think about it, but breaking down, busting down that pride wall and having that conversation with love and listening to hear and you know, not being the first to respond.
(18:30): Right? Yeah. Do you have anything to add to that awesome homework assignment? That's going to be so challenging outside your comfort zone, right? That's nothing more than to just champion you to think connection over the need to be right. And you know, that doesn't, are we saying that means you have to be best difference the person disagree with no, not necessarily, but you can. You're choosing love and honor and humility to have that conversation that is really uncomfortable for you. And that alone expresses the love of Jesus. So I'm excited to hear the feedback on this and stepping out in their faith. That is definitely for sure. So we are challenging ourselves to reach out to someone have that conversation fueled with love, you know, so it's going to be good. Something to get us outside our comfort zone this week. And we hope that you're loving the series.
(19:24): I know I am having these talks with Liz, Liz, thanks for being here. Yeah, guys. And if you have not grabbed a copy of my book, set free head on over to Amazon, check that out. And if you have, please leave a testimony or a review because that definitely helps spread the message to more women. And you know, we're, it's gonna be a team effort over here. So thank you for that heads up on the next episode, we are continuing the coffee talk and we are going to be, you know, talking about having joy even through the hard times. So be sure to come back and check that out. Thanks so much for joining us today. Please subscribe, share this episode, link on your social media. If you felt encouraged or inspired, as we all know someone that can benefit, I would love it. If you would give some feedback and review as well, talk with you next time. Beep it be fierce. Be unstoppable.
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