Hello friends and fellow seekers of the Good Tree Beautiful. Welcome to The Sojournist Profiles.
These are conversations with spiritual sojourners who are exploring the frontiers of freedom and wholeness and intimacy with God. These are raw, unedited conversations with some of the incredible, soulful people that I've met here on substack and during my travels living full time in a van this past year. I think of these as true-hearted seekers, modern day pilgrims who are on a peregrination in search of the Good True Beautiful Way. They are my kind of people, and once you hear what they have to say, I'm confident that you'll find that they are your kind of people too.
In this premiere installment, I'm excited to share some time with Amanda Held Opelt. For those who may be unfamiliar with her, Amanda is a speaker, songwriter and the author of two books: Holy Unhappiness: God, Goodness and the Myth of the Blessed Life, and A Hole in the World: Finding Hope and Rituals of Grief and Healing. Amanda spent 15 years in the nonprofit and humanitarian aid sector, and lives in the mountains of Boone, North Carolina, with her husband and two young daughters.
Click the video link above to watch our full conversation, or read the transcript below, which has been shortened a bit and edited for clarity.
Mike: It’s so cool to share this space with you!
Amanda: Michael, it's really good to be here with you. Thank you for inviting me into this conversation. It's been great getting to know you a little bit the last few months — from a distance, mostly.
Mike: Right?! We met at a writer's retreat in Moravian Falls, North Carolina. You were one of the speakers and singers there, guiding us through worship in some parts of it. I don't know how many days were there, but I did not know … I mean, I knew of your sister through the things she'd written, and her presence on social media. I didn't know you were related. When I saw you, I thought wow, she looks a lot like Rachel Held Evans, and she's got the name “Held" in her name. But I honestly thought it was all just a fluke. And it wasn't until like day two or three that I realized, oh, they're sisters. Then I put it all together. So that's how much I was out of the loop. But it was great to meet and connect there.
Amanda: One of the nicest things anyone ever says to me is you remind me of your sister. I consider that a great honor.
Mike: Yeah, definitely. So I wanted to bring you on because I got to hear you speak there at that retreat. Subsequently, I’ve read the books that you've written. I know that you are a spiritual sojourner and I wanted to just draw out some of the things I think that you have learned and experienced on that journey and pull them out for us to look at together. I thought I would start by going way back in your life. I'm curious when you would say you first noticed that there was a deeper spiritual dimension to your life? How did that show up for you and what was that experience like?
Amanda: Well, like many people, I grew up in a household of faith. I grew up with a lot of the accoutrements of evangelicalism in the 80s and 90s. I'm an elder millennial, I want to say that, an older, wiser millennial, which meant that we had a lot of the Christian media emerging and Christian music and, you know, all of that coming into play. But it was really the quiet conversations around my dinner table with my family, my parents who always asked important spiritual questions of us. They were just curious. My parents were curious about what we believed, not in a judgmental way or in an attempt to try to keep us on “the straight and narrow,” but they really genuinely wanted to know what we thought about God and what we thought about the world. And so those dinnertime conversations were really, I think, a place of spiritual awakening for me. I realized that Christianity was not just a cultural religion for my parents. It was a true personal journey with God for them. And they were curious what that journey was like for me, even as a five-year-old, even as an eight-year-old, as a nine-year-old. So I'm thankful for that because of my parents’ legacy. It's a gift they gave me.
Mike: What I hear in that too is how curiosity was the bedrock of your spiritual life in a lot of ways. How your parents modeled that open curiosity for you in the way they engaged you, and through their example saying, “This is the way in.” I know that's not always the case in religious homes. You know, the stories we've both heard, I'm sure, of spiritual journeys where curiosity is not welcome or even a thing that you consider. Now I understand even better the way you approach your spiritual journey in your books. You lead with curiosity. You look beyond the surface of things, you go down dark roads and want to understand things.
Amanda: Yeah, I mean, I think, again, that the dinner time table was one, but another, my dad used to always come in every night and pray with me before I'd go to sleep. And that was when we would talk. My dad's a theologian. He went to Dallas Seminary and was a Bible professor until just recently, he retired. But he was never a professor in those moments. He was a fellow traveler and a father. And so it was like, we just got to kind of talk about, he was like, well, I don't know, what do you think? What he did offer me, the only thing I feel like he was adamant about, was the reassurance of God's love and trustworthiness. So, you know, those rituals with my parents, again, they really mattered. As a result, Christianity for me has been experienced as love, security and belonging more than anything else.
Mike: After we met at the writers conference I started following you on Instagram. I started seeing all these pictures of your hometown and I started to notice how deeply connected you are with your community but also with the landscapes you inhabit, which I related to quite a lot because I'm very connected to the Rocky Mountains being from Colorado. I think of those mountains as the land of my soul, just like the Appalachians are the land of yours. And then when I read A Hole in the World, you wrote a fair bit about your deep connection with Appalachia and in particular, the way those ancient mountains are able to hold and nurture you in a way that is as grounding as it is healing. It’s clear your connection with the land has a deeply spiritual sense to it. I’m curious when and how your connection with nature and those landscapes began.
Amanda: You know, I think I loved the land with my body before I knew I loved it in my head and in my heart. I sometimes think it's kind of like the same way a baby loves their mother before they even know what love is. I grew up on the other side of the Blue Ridge in the Cumberlands. There wasn't a lot to do in town, so we would spend all our free time in the woods, in the lakes and the creeks, climbing the mountains. And I just remember feeling as I, you know, would ascend, climb up Walden's Ridge or climb up Snow Falls or swim in Richland Creek. Something in me felt safe and in touch with God. And I, you know, I can't scientifically tell you why at the molecular level, I react to the land in a way that makes me feel so grounded. I do know that my ancestors have been in this part of this country — actually in the Boone area, specifically, where I live now — since the 1700s. We have a long rich history here. Appalachian people are known for their deep relationship with the land because they're so dependent on it. They’re so beholden to it. They are at the whim of the land in many ways. It's quite a rugged place to live. So, you know, I don't know if it's just length of time that my family has been here, but there's something about the land here that in my blood and bones feels like I belong, you know.
Mike: That’s so rich. It makes me think of how we're so disconnected these days from the earth, how technology has pulled us away so we engage nature less and less, how loneliness is epidemic and disconnection from people is epidemic, and how all the stats reflect the sickness we’re experiencing as a people because of our lack of grounding in place and in physical community. Yet, you seem to have a really keen sense of a spirituality of place. I mean, there's something you got. I can see it. How would you begin to talk about that? What it is and the importance of it? What is a spirituality of place for you?
Amanda: Yeah. Well, I certainly have benefited so much from the works of folks like Wendell Berry, Ben Norquist, the theologian who writes about place. I mean, Wendell Berry often says, like, we are placed people. Our lives, the story of our lives, the story of our salvation plays out in place, in physical time, and space, in shared space with other people. And we live in a society that's just increasingly transient. So we're moving around a lot. There's some benefits to that. But one of the detriments is that you become quite uprooted quite easily. We're also people that live far flung because our technology is sending our hearts and minds across the world at any given point, whether we're watching a war unfold in Gaza and Israel or fires burn in the coast of California or just, I don't know, a soccer game in the UK. We're all over the place in our minds because of these digital connections. Again, there's huge benefit to that. But the detriment is that we're spread thin. And I don't know that our bodies were meant to be so many places at once. So I think being in one place, it’s important. Because we are here, whether or not we name it. We are shaped by the community that we're in. We're shaped by the people around us. We're shaped by the culture, the food, the land, the ecology, the health of the ecology and the environment. It's all impacting us, whether or not we name it. So number one, I think you just need to acknowledge that. And number two, I think it’s important to ask yourself: How do I live more purposefully and intentionally into this space I inhabit? I think that really matters. I'd also like to hear your thoughts on this. I suppose we owe this to Plato, this idea of the separation between the material world and the spiritual world, and how many Christians don't necessarily think of their material reality as being that important even. And I just don't believe that's the Christian way at all. I am curious why you think maybe we've lost a theology of place.
Mike: Well, I'll answer that with my journey around it. For most of my life, I’ve been deeply disconnected from my body, the physicality of my body, because of abuse I experienced in my childhood, and because I was raised in a shame-driven family. Because of the particular brand of evangelical religion I was raised in, the body was almost gnostic. The body was not supposed to be anything other than a thing to manage. And so it me a long time, and a lot of internal work, to actually get back in touch with the fact that my body — and this is according to Christian scripture — is an eternal thing. It will be resurrected. It is going to be a part of my eternal life. So, my body is me. And I think coming to the realization that my body is me, that “me” is not just my heart, it's not just my mind, then it also opened up the intrinsic spiritual nature of the material world around me. I began getting the sense of the eternity being in this tree, or eternity being in this rock or in this stream or in that mountain. And the thing that C.S. Lewis talks about, and John O'Donohue talks about, that Beauty is eternal and shines through these things. So in a way everything in the physical world became mystical because it is material and it is eternal at the same time. So there is something about this sense of groundedness and place that I'm only now discovering in a more rich, full way, which I think is why I'm asking you about it, because I think you understand something that I'm growing in.
Amanda: Oh my goodness. I'm still growing in it because I, I mean, I've been indoctrinated with the same ideas, — I mean, the hymns we used to sing, like we're just strangers passing through … I am a poor wayfaring stranger wandering through this land of want, but I'm going to a better place … as if the “better place” is wholly apart, wholly separate, wholly other from here. But some of the first things we read in scripture is that the Creation is good. It is good. It is good. And that hasn't changed. I mean, of course it has been through a lot, but its goodness is fundamental. Is it God breathed? Is it God created? Our bodies are good. The earth is good. I still believe that's true.
Mike: I think just yesterday, or today, you posted on your Instagram, a photo of an iron skillet. Do you remember this picture of an iron skillet? You said it's a thing of beauty. And then like, like an hour or so later, you posted a photo of the stew you were cooking in it. Was it a stew?
Amanda: It was green beans and taters, boiled and ham hock, a thing of beauty.
Mike: Ha! Yes! It was also a thing of beauty. And this to me is a great example of what we're talking about, this goodness of life here and now. It’s all so very earthy grounded. It's like that notion of holy hedonism that you write about in Holy Unhappiness, but this earthy grounded, very deeply material and physical and sensory and savory and spiritual and eternal all in one place. I love that you point to it, because when you see it, I see it. That's what's so cool about it. My own experience of grounded spirituality is expanding through a lot of what you're writing and posting.
Amanda: I love that it's oozing out. I met someone at a conference once and they're like, Oh, you're, you're like that Appalachian apologist on Instagram. And I'm like, I've never been happier with a nickname like that. I think everyone should be an apologist for their place. Like make a case for your place. Yeah. And what's good about it. And what's beautiful about it. And who's there and what they're doing and what the culture is and what the food and the history and all that is make a case for why when the new Jerusalem comes, it’s gotta be built right there.
Mike: Exactly. Gorgeous. I think that sense of place, the sense of creating beauty where you are, is something our world is crying out for. I really believe most of our hearts are crying out for it. We're so escapist in our strategies at the moment, most of us in culture, but the thing we're actually longing for is this grounded spirituality, this hyper-localized connection. So I love that about the journey you're on and the reclamation of that and the spaces that you're in. In your book Holy Unhappiness, you make a great distinction between the quest for happiness, which you describe as a surface level reward for following Christian religion’s “emotional prosperity gospel,” and the quest for wholeness.
Amanda: Yeah.
Mike: And wholeness is like such a different thing, and such a powerful thing, but it doesn't come easily and it doesn't come without pain. But it does come with a lot of learning how to be present, and to experience authentic joy in this moment.
Amanda: I mean, I take that as a pretty serious mandate. Find what joy you can in this moment, because life comes in seasons, and there are seasons of sadness and seasons of joy. And when you're in season of joy, whether maybe that season lasts over the year, or only as long as the coffee mug is full and the pancakes are there, that moment of joy is what sees you through a really challenging day. I think rejoicing and living in the moment, it's something we really need to pay attention to.
Mike: You really prove that out in both your books as well, because you go for the hard questions in both of them. One with grief, with the sudden death of your sister Rachel and the miscarriages that you've experienced and the health challenges that you've experienced. And then in the other one, of course, with just the malaise of an ordinary kind of life that's “okay," but leaves us asking, why isn't this amazing? This brings me back to the idea of you as a spiritual sojourner, and how you've opted to dive in not just to the joyful experiences, but also the sorrowful experiences that come into our lives. You’ve opted not to check out or numb out or avoid the difficult path or the hard questions that rise out of those dark days. I’m curious what has been the most challenging part of being that kind of spiritual sojourner for you.
Amanda: You know, in some ways I feel like being a sojourner doesn't make me unique in any way. I think anybody who's walking honestly with God is a sojourner at some point in their life. That said, you know there's always going to be people who don't really understand your doubts and people that view certainty as a sign of strength of faith, but that’s not how I see it at all anymore. So the hard part is sometimes the loneliness of being misunderstood. But again, yeah, maybe your story has been a bit more … well, there's a prophetic element to what you're doing because the prophet lives out what's going on metaphorically. There's a “living out” that you're doing that I think is pretty profound and important. So I'd be curious if I were to bounce that question back to you, what you would say.
Mike: The most challenging part of being a spiritual sojourner? Yeah, I would say that you're always at risk of being stoned. So there's that, whether metaphorically or for real in some cases. But I think the part that's most difficult for me is what I would call the moreness of God. Part of what has historically been so comforting to my ego is that God was in a box that I understood and knew how to navigate. But the more I have gone “outside the camp,” or I've gone off the map, or I've asked the harder questions, the more God has revealed how much larger he is than my box of him, how much he transcends even my highest imagination about what he might be. For example, even the notion of mercy — our highest concept of mercy pales in comparison to what God’s mercy actually is. So once you get into that kind of place, the way becomes harder. You go from cataphatic to apophatic theology, where now I'm trying to understand God by what God is not as opposed to what God is. That part of it for me has been more unnerving because I'm in love with Someone who can be frightening to me. But at the same time, it has also been immensely freeing. You look out in the culture and begin to see what I think every sojourner sees, that there's some version of “the emperor has no clothes” that begins to become clear to your mind. You start to notice, wow, these systems that we're operating in are actually quite restrictive compared to the actual gospel. They’re not actually what Christ is up to. This thing we’re doing is a smaller version that makes us feel safe because we can control it, but isn't what God is actually up to. And that becomes a whole different conversation, and a very exciting one.
Amanda: Yeah. Because certainty feels so good. We spend so much of our time in the Western Church talking about what we can know about God. But there’s very little emphasis put on what we can't know about God. But I have come to a place in my life where there's a lot of theological questions that I'm very comfortable saying, “I don't know.” And I don't know that I'll ever know. It doesn't mean I give up on searching and seeking. Truth is beautiful. Let's move in that direction. But I am realizing there's gonna be a lot of things I never understand.
Mike: There’s a line in your book Holy Unhappiness where you write something like: When we fully accept Mystery, it becomes light. It becomes an answer in itself. With all the profound losses you’ve experienced — personal health challenges, three miscarriages, the sudden death of your sister Rachel — how has your relationship with Mystery changed? What have you learned about Mystery that you would love for other people to know?
Amanda: Well, stage one of accepting mystery is like, almost despair. Like, my brain has been so trained to want all the answers and to come to the end of the thing and know it fully. Um, step two, I don't know about step two. At some point you come to a place where it actually feels more freeing. You actually kind of take off this yoke of needing to know. It is a heavy, heavy yoke. It feels really good to just be still and know that God is God. That's pretty basic, pretty bare minimum. I'm not saying that's all we can know about God. I'm just saying that once you get past the shock and the malaise and the disorientation, there’s a freedom in realizing you don't have to be certain. Daniel Taylor’s book, The Myth of Certainty, was deeply formative for me. He counters this idea that you have to be certain to be a good Christian. He's like, no, you just have to keep moving. Faith is a footstep. Faith is a step in the dirt in the direction towards God. It’s in your body as much as it is in your brain, if that makes sense. You can be faithful and have all sorts of doubts. Are you choosing to trust God? Are you choosing to keep listening? Are you choosing to keep seeking? That is the life of faith. It wouldn't be faith if you knew everything.
Mike: So good. I once did a study of David, the famous king in the Old Testament, who scripture described as “a man after God's own heart." I wanted to find out, “How did he get that title?” Like, what was it that actually caused God to say that about David? And after all this exhaustive study, I found it really was this pretty straightforward, simple thing that David did, because obviously, the dude made a lot of mistakes in his life, he was not all that great of a parent, you know. He had all these issues. But the one thing he always did that whenever there was some dissonance between him and God, or something he realized he'd done wrong, his first reaction was to move toward God. Never away. Always toward God. And whether he moved toward God with anger or with sadness or with, in some cases, repentance or with sorrow, it was always toward connection, toward relationship with the Divine. And I realized, okay, that's it. That’s the quality. And then I thought of the phrase, he was a man that was after God's own heart. Literally, he pursued God. That was the point. So I think that's it. And whether I'm after the mystery of God or I'm after some quality of God that I can know is largely irrelevant. Because at this point, I just want to move closer to God, whatever that means for me in this stage. That's the Sojourner way. That’s the journey.
Amanda: It implies movement, you know? I worry sometimes these days, as doubt and as a kind of “questioning the system” becomes more in vogue, there can be this kind of romanticization of the wilderness where we just you leave the known, you you deconstruct, and then you just stay there. I mean, I get we're all on a wilderness journey. But I want to always be en route to the Promised Land. I don't want to romanticize staying in a place of stagnant faith. Now there's a time for wandering in the dark, and I’m not saying it's not dynamic and there may be moments where you are really genuinely stuck. I just think movement really matters. We need to keep moving toward God.
Mike: Along those lines, here's a question for you that will speak to that movement. What do you know about God now that you didn't know before your sister died?
Amanda: Well, in some ways I know less, Michael.
Mike: That’s a good way to put it. Yeah, so maybe talk about that.
Amanda: Well, less and more. It’s kind of both-and, right? There was a lot I thought I knew that wasn't true. I thought that if I prayed in my grief for the peace that passes understanding, God would give it freely. I thought God would make me feel better. I thought, you know, death no longer “had its sting.” Well, this stings a lot. Like, this is awful. So in some ways I had to unlearn some things. But what I know now, I know God is sad sometimes. I know God is a griever. God is sorrowful. God is an emotive God. I didn't know that until I went back and read the Bible as a griever. God is upset a lot and pretty vocal about it. He grieves. There’s Jesus crying out in the garden against God — God arguing with God over this cup of sorrow he must drink. Do I have to do this? Do I really have to go through this? So I know that now. I didn't know that before. And, you know, somebody said something to me not that long after my sister died. She said, I don't know if you're ready to hear this, but when my mother passed away, a friend said to me, cherish the moments of your grief for God is close to the brokenhearted. And I have found that there is this intimacy that you feel with God, though some of it's just the wrestling with God. It’s like the story of Jacob in the Old Testament, when he wrestled with God, that's when things actually got really intimate with God and his name was changed. Grief can bring you into that intimacy. You've had an encounter with God, you have wrestled with God. That's your name now. And of course Jacob left with a limp, a lifelong limp. But there's an intimacy that comes and a closeness with God as you wrestle with him, as you draw near for comfort.
Mike: Like in your book, A Hole in the World, you talk about this utter stripping away. Everything you thought was going to happen with God didn't happen. And there were no waypoints. There was no mile markers. There was nothing that made any sense during the initial months after Rachel's passing. You write about how you lost a sense of yourself in a lot of ways. So, to your point, as I'm thinking of Jacob, I’m realizing that your encounter with God was probably similar. Like a place of such close intimacy with God that you're actually stripped of everything you thought you were. And it feels like not only like a death, but a violent death, like a death that is a violation in some ways. And that's the thing, I guess: realizing that that that is part of the deal. That’s part of what it means to move toward God.
Amanda: Yeah, and if I'm not mistaken, it was after Jacob had been really hoodwinked by his father-in-law. Everything he'd worked for was kind of taken away from him, threatened he had to leave, pack up his whole family and all those goats and leave and cross country and go back to his brother who hated him. He was in this liminal space of “what's going to become of me and my household and my children? My children are at risk.” And he was camping alone, right? Like on his way, the others had gone ahead.
Mike: Yes. He went across a little stream called the River Jabbok, which literally means “to empty out.” So like he was literally set up so he is fully emptied out when he encounters God. He’s got nothing. He's all by himself. And that's when he meets God.
Amanda: It’s like, that's the moment.
Mike: And he walks with a limp for the rest of his life.
Amanda: Yeah, that doesn't get healed. I mean, that's probably pretty bothersome for the rest of us.
Mike: So you get a new name of strength, but you also get marked with weakness, right?
Amanda: It’s beauty and sorrow, it's taking away and a filling up at the same time.
Mike: That’s the other thing you talk about some in in both of your books. You intimate a truth about suffering that I think most people overlook or don’t want to think about. I would sum it up something like this: “There is secret beauty in the heart of suffering. And that beauty is a part of God, too.” Firstly, did I get that right? Secondly, what is the beauty that you have found in suffering?
Amanda: I mean, I tried to clarify that we don't have to find this redemptive storyline in our suffering. Right. To say, look here’s what my brother-in-law calls “looking for the silver lining to the atom bomb.” I don't have to find all the silver linings to make the bad thing good. The bad thing will always be bad. But at the same time, the beauty in suffering is just that you learn more about God because God suffers. And suddenly you're a bit more like Christ, I think, you become more Christ-like, because you know this path of suffering. You're able to empathize with people in a way that you never were before. I cherish that. I value that. That doesn’t mean the bad thing was good. It's not like, well, Rachel died, but look at all these things that happened. It's like, Rachel died. And these good things have happened.
Mike: I don't think all suffering necessarily produces beauty because I think it depends in part about how you choose to engage it. You can become brittle and bitter. But people who engage with their suffering in a humble way, and allow themselves to be crushed by it like grapes in a winepress, they allow a certain kind of wine to be produced. That’s not even a consolation prize. It's just something that gets produced. But it is a kind of beauty. I hope I'm not going to offend anybody when I say this, but I saw this guy at the gym today who was physically disabled. I don't know the specifics of his disability, but he didn't have full use of all of his limbs. But he was in the gym, and the was working out. And I teared up watching him because I thought “that is such a beautiful man.” And it wasn’t because of his disability; it was because of the way he was holding his body in that space, because of what he has done with the suffering of it, I suppose. It has made him more beautiful.
Amanda: You just made me think of something I don't think I was able to name at the time. It was a commitment I made to myself within moments of hearing of Rachel’s death. I remember thinking something like: “Pay attention. Don’t miss this moment. Don’t numb yourself in this moment and in the many moments that will follow. Bear witness to your life. Bear witness to this tragedy and pay attention and be curious. Give all your attention to this.” I wanted to notice all of it. I wanted to experience it in its fullness. I was fully committed. If God is going to work and move and do anything in my life I don't want to miss it I'm not I'm not going to let Satan take that from me. — I’m talking about Satan, which is getting real but like I'm not I'm not letting him take that from me too. This helped me a lot after Helene hit our region and the flood. I just remember having a moment where I'm said to myself, “Your job is not to save everyone. That’s too much. Your job is to bear witness to this, and help if you can. And also, your number one goal is to remember every detail that you can remember, because when you do that you actually do see the beauty, and you see the it's just this Divine Love that somehow appears in the very worst moments through other people, through God suddenly showing up, when he was missing in action for three days before that and then suddenly shows up in a very palpable way. Don’t miss it. Don’t miss it. Pay attention, child of weakness. Watch and pray. Watch and cry. Watch, watch, watch, you know?
Mike: Yeah. Truly gorgeous. That may actually be the answer to the question I'm about to ask. But what would you say to a fellow sojourner who is in the throes of suffering like that? Maybe there's been a collapse in their life or maybe a great loss or they're confronted with the mystery of the Great Spirit that they once knew as God. And now they don't know what it is. As someone who's been on that path and knows something of that path, would you begin to counsel them?
Amanda: Yeah, it’s similar to what I just said. Picture yourself as the night watchman. You are the night watchman now. This is the night. You're in the night. Welcome. It's dark here. And sometimes cold. Watch for the light. Don't miss it. It’s now your job to declare when the day comes, even if you're just declaring it to yourself. Pay attention to the details. Don’t numb yourself so much to the pain that you aren't able to feel the joy when it comes. Now, you occasionally need to maybe go watch some TV. I'm not saying don’t read a book, or have some distraction, you know, but pay attention to your life. You know, that's the advice I would give.
Mike: In the coaching work that I do, we talk about fulfillment a lot, and according to all the research, we’ve actually learned that fulfillment basically has two key components. One is to give yourself to a purpose that is larger than your own life. That's a key thing. But the other thing is to be fully present to the life that you have right now. If you don't have one of those, you'll never be fulfilled. You have to have both of them. We're pretty good in America at the first one: you’ve got to find your purpose and discover your life mission! But being fully present to your life as it is right now, we don’t do that one very well. And that includes being present to grief. It includes being present to pain. It's not just when everything's happy, happy, joy, joy. So I think that's a beautiful piece of counsel. Thank you for that. Speaking of that, in your life, what are you noticing right now? What is inspiring you? What are you reading or practicing or doing that’s bringing you joy?
Amanda: I made some pretty stellar pancakes this morning. That's why they're on my mind. Oh my goodness. I'm kind of paying attention to my own vulnerability in a way, not to get all Brené Brown on you, but we have experienced vulnerability at what feels like a primordial level in recent years. We humans are at the whim of the weather still, as much as we think we can control. It has been a hard season on that front, but I’m learning to pay attention to where I’ve come to the end of myself and make it okay to say that. Like there's something, there's something here you might not be able to handle. Like you can maybe delegate that or say no to that or you can't fix that. I think that matters in our political season right now. Acknowledging my weakness, acknowledging my limitation, acknowledging that I'm gonna get beat up and thrown around by life sometimes, and I don't have to fix everything. But also, as my counselor says to me, well, what's yours to do in this? So I think that's the discernment piece for me right now.
Mike: Well, this has been a beautiful conversation, Amanda. Thank you for the time. I really do appreciate it. Thanks for taking the time. I know it is busy for everybody, so I appreciate you taking the time out for it. Any final thoughts before I sign off for today?
Amanda: I just wanna thank you for the work you're doing. Your story is compelling. You’re a teacher, your life teaches and your life, I think it can inspire many people that are struggling. So I'm grateful for the conversation and grateful for your work and hope people find you and subscribe to your work. Thank you. It's good to talk to Kindred Spirits.
Mike: Yeah, always. Thank you so much.
Connect with Amanda and her writings here:
Website: www.amandaheldopelt.com
Substack:
Instagram: @amandaheldopelt
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