After a full week of fun (and unplugging! Woo!!) at family camp, I’m back and refreshed!
While I was gone I heard the news that Dave and Rachel Hollis were divorcing. I think audibly gasped. I was so shocked. If you’re not familiar with Dave and Rachel, they have a podcast, are authors and hold retreats. A lot of their subject matters centers on marriage and of course, they’ve talked about their own relationship.
And honestly, I don’t really want to talk about this topic. I don’t want to be misconstrued, misunderstood, or be insensitive. I’m not here to judge, and really this podcast isn’t Rachel and Dave, it’s about me, it’s about you and what triggers strong emotions.
When I first heard the news, I had a ton of emotions. I was angry, sad, and I felt deceived. But those are judgments and we’ll talk more about that in a second.
I decided to do the brave thing and really dive into why I was feeling such strong emotions. I want to share these three questions I used to help me figure out what was causing me to feel so strongly about the situation that didn’t really involve me.
1. What triggered inside of me and why?
I interviewed for my team on my YouTube channel and felt like I knew her. I’ve followed her on social media and I know what her kids look like. Even though I haven’t followed her closely in the last year, I still feel connected to her and her life. I realized that one of my triggers is feeling like I’m being deceived. Rachel and Dave talk about having a date night weekly, doing marriage retreats and supposedly sharing their lives. Then they announced a divorce and I felt like I had been deceived by the story she had shown. I had to get honest with myself and see what was really bothering me about the situation.
2. What judgments am I making without knowing the entire story?
I had to take a deep breath and remind myself that I don’t know her story. Just because she shares a lot of her life, doesn’t mean we’ve walked in her shoes. We don’t know the ins and outs of their relationship, we don’t know what it’s like to own their businesses, and we don’t have an inside view of their lives. I just had to have the gut check and remind myself that I don’t know what it’s like to be them and I will never know their whole story. And really there’s no need for us to know. I honestly asked God for forgiveness in my instant judgments and felt grace upon grace upon grace. I had so much more compassion for her and others who are going through tough things.
3. What can we learn from this?
You can ask this question in any and all circumstances in life. When I was thinking about this question for myself, I thought about a time when my marriage was really struggling and it might have shocked a lot of people around me in everyday life. I had to remember that others and myself weren’t always more honest when things got tough in their lives. It saddened me that I hadn’t been more honest in my own life when things are hard. That’s real life! I’m not telling you to go out and be a whiner and complainer all the time. But I’m telling you that people connect with real-life and hard things! I just want to encourage anyone that is going through something hard to seek out help. I’m such a believer in counseling and therapy. I think it’s incredibly brave and not something to be scared of!
I want to encourage you not to throw out everything. Just today I did Rachel’s “Start Today” journal and she’s really helped me learn how to envision my future. I want to encourage you as Christians to take the good and spit out the bad. Use your discernment and make sure God is the loudest voice you’re listening to.
I heard this quote this week and I wanted to share.
"Heal so you can hear what's being said without the filer of your wound"
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