All right, welcome, welcome, welcome.
Here we are already, gate four in the From Pressure to Partnership series.
I'm super, super excited to be back.
And the whole idea of this is a transformation of moving from an internally contracted, you
know, we get an internal wedgie, right?
You know, fear, doubt, worry, all of that stuff, and we get internally contracted.
And yet we're trying to build an outwardly expansive, right?
We want prosperous businesses and prosperous lives and prosperous relationships.
So we're trying to build that from an internally contracted state.
And so we have been working through, this is a gate by gate, a step by step.
And these steps are extremely transformational, any one of them.
So I encourage you that you keep notes, maybe you keep your notes in one notebook for this.
Of course, the replays are on the membership site.
You've probably discovered that if you haven't, let me show you.
And this is something that we're going to, Romans 12, right, be transformed by the renewing
of our mind.
That's both spiritual and scientific, neuroscience, okay?
And so let's just review really quick.
And let's just chat for a second.
How are we doing?
Do you have questions?
This is not something like, oh, I got it, check the box.
It's something that we're beginning to transform from this internally contracted to this outwardly
expansive, right, place.
And it is as we are just continuously implementing these steps.
Welcome, Linda.
This is how we are moving.
We're talking about moving from the whole idea from pressure to partnership is moving
from this internally contracted state, okay, fear, doubt, worry, all of that, anxiousness
to completely surrendered, partnering with God, life expansive, open, okay?
And we're doing it very step by step by step, okay?
So let me pray that let's review, let's talk about it.
So Father, I just ask that what we need to hear, what needs to be spoken, Father God,
for total and complete breakthrough for every prosperous sister here live and listening
to the replace.
We just ask that your words will be rich in us.
And that we will be transformed as Romans 12 says, by the renewing of our mind.
So have your way, Holy Spirit, may the words of my mouth, the meditation of my heart be
pleasing in your sight, open our spiritual senses to hear what you are saying for each
one of us today, in Jesus name, amen.
So we opened, if you remember, gate one was moving from reactivity, right, to partnership,
to starting our day with a morning spiritual practice.
So that the circumstances and the busyness and the craziness doesn't consume us first
thing in the morning, but we're beginning to train ourselves that even from the time
we open our eyes, we begin to command the morning.
We begin to direct the direction of the day.
And so you can do that, just opening your eyes and even start with gratitude.
You make that a habit, right?
So much of what we do in our life is habits, and it just becomes an awareness, okay?
and knowing that how you set your thermostat,
your internal mood thermostat first thing in the morning
can shape your entire day.
And that comes from the mind, heart, mouth.
The Bible talks about the mind, heart, mouth connection.
You see it in salvation.
If you believe in your heart
and you confess with your mouth,
like it's all the way through scriptures
that you think a thought and then you tap into the feeling
because the issues come from the heart, okay?
And then you speak it and you declare it.
Our words have power.
Our words have power externally and internally, right?
So we start with the morning spiritual practice.
And that's why, of course,
that I created the Prosper Daily Planner.
The morning routine is on the top part of the planner
as you order the day.
It doesn't matter how much time.
We're not religious about it.
It doesn't matter if you get them all done.
We're not going for perfectionism.
It just gives you a roadmap
and you could just kind of check off.
But for me, it reminds me, I open it.
I live by it myself, okay?
And it just reminds me the power of the I ams,
the power of the I will declarations, right?
The reading, the journaling.
So we talked about opening.
Gate one is commanding our mornings.
So before I talk about gate two, gate three and gate four,
how are you doing with that?
Are you starting to change your habits?
Are you seeing, is there things that are working
you wanna share with everyone?
Like this is really helping me.
Like for example, I have found some amazing YouTube music.
I think it's AI generated,
but it's beautiful gospel music.
And it's all scripture and declarations.
And it's like having that playing when I'm doing my makeup,
having that playing when I'm taking my shower.
It's nice out here in California in the morning.
I do what I say when I open my eyes.
I actually go outside barefoot and stand in the grass, okay?
There's a whole science to grounding
because we wear rubber on our shoes
and we're not connected to the earth, whole nother subject.
But I can then just declare and say,
this is the day the Lord has made.
I will rejoice in it.
Like I can prime my mind, right?
These are things that we can do
that can become a really simple habit that take minutes,
but they shift the atmosphere.
Any of you have some morning routines,
some things that's really helping you?
Or I know some of you said you're starting
to do the journaling and the two color.
Share with each other real quick.
How are you doing with gate one?
Gate one, which is commanding the morning.
Anything that you do that helps you?
Anything that moving from reactivity
to partnership in the morning?
Brenda, the thing that helps me,
I've been doing it for a long time.
It's been my habit is I make sure that I get up 15 minutes
or half an hour before everybody else does in my house.
And that way I have the quiet moments.
I have peaceful moments.
And I make sure before I open my phone,
before I do anything that I am just focused.
The first thing I do is I play worship music
because it gets my body moving
and just my mind and everything.
And then I just sit in the presence with God.
I'll get my water and my lemon and stuff like that.
And then I just either pray or I start journaling.
But journaling has really helped me a lot
just to really reflect on all of my thoughts.
And sometimes I get a half an hour,
sometimes I get an hour.
Now it's a lot hotter here.
So I have to take my morning walks very early.
So I kind of spread it out
where if I don't have time for journaling,
then I'll come back in the morning time or something
and do that journaling.
But I used to do it all in one,
but now I'm like, you know what?
There's different seasons.
So I'm learning to prioritize it.
Love that you're staying flexible.
And yeah, and especially, there was a time
when I had little ones in the house.
I don't anymore.
My kids are grown.
But when I had little ones in the house.
And I had, in my case, I had in-laws that lived with us, too.
And all the demands of life just start pressing in.
Everybody needs and wants something.
And so setting your alarm early.
And to this day, I still do that.
I, you know, I know I've got these calls at eight.
For me, I back it up a couple of hours early so that I know that this is gold, that what
I do in that time.
And when I started, you know, if I could just carve out, and I tell new people, even 10
minutes, cool.
You know, but what's happening, you're going to love it, and it becomes 15.
And you love it, and it becomes 30.
Because it's so nourishing when you do this, and you know that, right?
And of course, it's different on nights that I dance late and all of that.
But I love that.
So for you, journaling has been something that is improving.
I love that.
And as you do your walks, Amanda, um, do you do any type of prayer walk or declarations
or like turn your walk into a spiritual practice at all?
Yes, I'll.
That's when I listened to a lot of my music.
Okay.
This, you know, I like that, too.
But you know, I'll pray as well.
Yeah, just a little bit.
I do have to work on my declarations.
That's one thing I do need to implement a little bit more.
I am starting to do it, but I need to start making it more of a habit.
Because it really does reinforce that positivity that I need.
It replaces instead of the negativity, you know, like the lack that you said, that's
really helping me.
So I love that.
And you know, my journal here, too, is I love the declarations also is declaring scripture
over your life when you're walking.
And you know, my favorite verse that I've been I've been declaring lately, and it's
a second Corinthians nine, eight.
And so I've just been speaking this, just listen to these words, God is able to make
all grace abound toward me, that I always having all sufficiency in all things may have
an abundance for every good work.
And I'll probably do that during one of our power hours.
But I'm just like, as I'm walking, I'm just like, thank you that you make all grace abound.
And that I always have all sufficiency when you think about when you have Christ in you,
you have all sufficiency of all sufficiency in all things.
And so a lot of the declaration can be, you know, this is the day that the Lord has made,
that I will rejoice and be glad in it.
Thank you, God, for this day, I choose to rejoice and be glad in it today, I'm going
to rejoice, rejoice, bring back the joy, rejoice, right?
You supply all my needs, thank you, God, that I have more than enough today, you supply
all my needs.
And so like, you're like declaring, so you're getting the word in you, you're speaking the
word.
And so I'll do a lot of that walking too.
Well, thank you.
Thank you for sharing.
Love that.
Okay, so that was gate one.
And then gate two is really big.
It's a it's a complete mind shift.
It's a complete perspective of our, the way that we view life and the world.
You remember, we were moving from external control to internal stability, right?
Because pressure increases when we're dependent on conditions.
We're waiting for someone or something to change so we could be happy, healthy, prosperous.
So this is scriptural.
Everything happens on the inside, biblically.
Out of the heart flow the issues of life, right?
We are the temple of the Holy Spirit.
We have the mind of Christ, Christ in me, the hope of glory, biblically, biblical reasoning
is that you start on the inside and that works outward to our conditions out of the heart
flow the issues of life out of the heart.
The mouth speaks.
Guard your heart with all diligence, says Solomon, the wisest king.
So
We stop looking at conditions and waiting for conditions to change in order to be happy, healthy, prosperous.
This is a big mindset shift that takes back your power.
In other words, I will choose to walk in joy today. I will choose to rejoice.
I will choose to stand on the promises of God. I will choose to walk by faith and not by sight.
We're activating our God-given ability to choose.
Alright, then last week we did vision beyond circumstances.
Vision beyond circumstances.
And so we really talked about Habakkuk 2.2.
The power of knowing and writing our vision and how vision fuels everything.
Well, today we pick up and even deepen that.
I did a one-day retreat. We led a one-day retreat here in our area.
Linda was there. It was beautiful.
We had like 25 women gather.
Linda and I have a non-profit called His View.
If you ever went to hisview.org.
It's not this Linda. Linda Brown. She's shaking her head.
Linda's everything but not in this particular one.
I have two beautiful Lindas in my life.
So I have to say Linda with a Y who makes everything beautiful.
You see all my graphics. You see everything.
That's Linda with a Y and she's just my sister and I adore her.
Linda with an I. Together we co-founded hisview.org, our non-profit.
So anyway, you can check that out.
But anyway, we did this retreat and God had put on my heart two words.
Return and remember.
And that's what I spoke on. That's what I did.
The breakout rooms and I got that talking about a morning routine.
I got that on my morning walk.
I was like, Lord, what do you have for the women at this retreat?
And he said, I want you to talk about return.
And I'm like, oh, I mean, the retreat is called Whispers of the Heart.
How does this tie in, Lord? And it just felt it felt off.
It didn't make sense, but it just kept staying with me.
And I journaled and I prayed and I stayed with it.
Wow. It was so spot on.
Women like Linda shaking her hand.
Women were just in tears and moved and deeply touched.
And so I want to bring a little of that here.
I desire to bring a little of that here today for gate four.
Gate four is about reclaiming.
Holy desire.
I put the word holy in front of desire.
Because so often we've been conditioned to see desires negative,
like the lust of the flesh and the heart is desperately wicked and we can't trust the heart.
That's the unrenewed heart.
When your heart has been dedicated to God and your heart,
he's replaced your heart of stone with the heart of flesh and it's been regenerated.
There's something fresh that happens in your heart and there's something beautiful that happens.
And we're going to talk about desires.
And how God uses them and how important they are.
In us moving from this contracted state to this expansive state, they play an incredible role.
And so we have to reclaim because we have stopped.
It's not that God has stopped speaking, but a lot of times we've stopped listening to the desires that God has placed in us.
They get buried, right?
Under responsibility or under disappointment or pressure or performance or survival or striving or all those things.
And so the invitation today is to remember to return.
So I want to ask you, when was the last time you stopped and asked the question,
What do I desire?
What comes up when I say that? Do you feel like an ick like I'm not supposed to or a long time?
Or, oh yeah, every day. Like, where are you guys at? You know, touch in here.
When it comes to desire, when's the last time you've asked that question? What do I desire?
And I'm going to tie it with the Lord, trust me. I'm not saying that you're
being selfish and all of that. Don't go off on a rabbit trail.
Anybody? What comes up for you when I ask that question?
Have you asked that question?
Yes, I have because of you.
And I will tell you that a lot of times I don't know.
Okay. I don't know.
Okay. I feel like sometimes I have been on a path to make sure other people are happy,
but I haven't actually paused long enough to assess what I desire.
And I think that other key point that you keep bringing up is I look around at my circumstances
and I go, I shrink it. Yeah. What's possible in this little box instead of what's possible
in God's big box. You know what I mean? I love that.
I love that you have because, because awareness, that's a cute hat, by the way,
awareness is the first step to transformation.
So the first step is we become aware.
And your awareness is the awareness that I don't even know what I desire.
What I desire. And that's not uncommon as we saw even at the retreat.
And so we're going to talk about opening that back up today, but you have the awareness that,
oh, I shrink, I shrink what's possible because I let my conditions and that's like when they
arrived at the promised land, right? The giants, it says that they saw giants in the land.
Let me tell you, every time you enter into a promised land that God has for you and he does
have it, you're going to face giants. And you have a choice to make the giants bigger, which it says
in scripture that, you know, eight of the 10 spies did. And they said we were like grasshoppers
in our own sight. Right? So we can become grasshoppers or we can make God bigger like David.
Oh, you're a giant easier to hit. Boom. Right? Like how we can view my God's way too big.
And yes, Stacy, that these giants are our own making. Thank you for sharing that a hundred
percent. So yeah, Linda, thank you for sharing. That's like, it's awareness that I don't always
know and it's okay. Stay with it. Stay with it. Keep asking the question. Keep asking the question.
You know, I'm going to give you some scriptural foundation,
but I'm going to tell you that sometimes the answer you get often,
it's the answer you'll get asking that question is not always logical.
I remember after my divorce in 2012, and if you've read my book, you know, my story, you know,
I walked away from everything. I moved into an empty rental house. I walked away from large
companies and large houses and large lifestyle. And so I was sitting there and all the roles
that had defined me didn't exist. I, I wasn't a corporate founder. I, I wasn't a homeschool mom.
I wasn't like all, I wasn't a Bible teacher at that moment. I, I wasn't like all the roles that
I would put after I am instead of who God says I am. We often put a role. I am a teacher. I am a
mother. That's not who you are, your identity. That's a role. All those roles were stripped
away. And I remember looking out the yard and the rental I moved into, there was none. It was just
weeds out there. And I had a cheap bed that I sat on. Literally, I started from nothing and sitting
on this bed. It didn't even have a bed. It was just, it was just, it was just, it was just a bed.
didn't even have a frame.
I mean, it just had what held the mattress,
no headboard, nothing, looking out the window.
But I knew this.
I knew enough to ask this.
And God was rising up in me.
And I said, what do I desire?
And I took it further.
I just go, what would I love?
What would give me bliss?
And the little quiet answer that came up,
I could have shoved it down.
I could have shoved it as trivial.
I could have really logicked it out, I promise.
Because what popped up is I would love to learn to dance.
There'd been no music or dance in my life
since I was 17 years old.
I could have really just squashed that.
That's not practical.
You got to build a life, you got to build a business.
You got to like, learning to dance
does not fit here right now.
But I didn't.
I said, okay, it's just a little quiet thing.
I looked up, I found a dance class at a local health club.
And I said, I'm going to learn to dance.
And if you read my book, you know that God used dance.
And I didn't even understand the power of movement,
the way he, I was living from the neck up,
the way he reconnected me to my heart, to my body,
but most of all, how he taught me about God,
what I learned about God in dancing,
what I learned about following and being led by the spirit.
So sometimes what you get, it seems so trivial,
like how can I entertain a desire
when circumstances are like this?
You're here, you have no money, you have no future,
you have nothing, like dance, that does not fit.
So it's that little small voice to listen to that.
And so you may actually know what it is,
but it seems too small or too trivial or too crazy.
Listen for that.
Let me give you a little scriptural foundation
and then let's do some exercises together.
You guys can study this out.
Psalms 37, four, Psalms 37, four says,
delight yourself in the Lord
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
There's so much in that verse.
David, the psalmist, was a worshiper.
So his delight was in God, his heart was in the right place.
You can tell this wasn't about selfishness,
he delights himself in the Lord.
He was in the right place.
He was in God's heart.
You can tell this wasn't about selfishness,
he delights himself in the Lord.
And he, God, will give you the desires of your heart.
Nowhere here are you shamed for having desires.
God will give you the desires of your heart.
You know, Jesus said it a little different in Matthew.
Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness
and all these things will be added.
Also, Psalms 20, verse four says,
may he grant you your heart's desires.
There it is again.
But this is a big one.
Proverbs 13, 12.
This is what I saw played out in the retreat.
This is what I see played out in women's lives.
This is huge.
Hope deferred makes the heart sick.
But desires fulfilled are the tree of life.
There's a contrast.
In Proverbs, there's often a contrast.
On one side, you've got hope.
So you've got a desire, you've got a hope, right?
And it's delayed.
You just keep putting it off.
I'll do that after the kids grow up.
I'll do that after we retire.
I'll do that after I solve this.
I'll do that after my business.
Like hope deferred actually makes the heart sick.
We now know this psychoneurophobia.
Immunology, we know all about this, okay?
The contrast, a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.
It actually breathes life into you.
So this thing we're talking about with desires is not just some little thing.
This is going to breathe new life, and we're going to see that,
how it affects your vision, how it affects your motivation,
how it affects your drive, how it affects it.
Beautiful.
You also will notice that the question is often asked before a miracle.
Before God does something, he'll often ask, what do you desire?
What do you desire me to do for you?
Now, some of our modern translations use the word want.
In our language, we've replaced the word desire with want.
I recommend getting rid of the word want.
If you look up the origins of the word want, it means extreme lack.
That's why Psalms 23 says, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
Want is not meant to be desire.
Want means extreme lack.
That's what the root word.
So I've learned to replace the word want with the word desire.
Two parts.
Desire, de, de, of, the sire, of the father.
What we're going to see here today is that desires from the father,
and they are a clue to your divine purpose.
They are a clue to your divine vision, your divine call.
So Luke 12, 32, fear not, little flock,
it's your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.
Like any father, he loves to give, he loves to bless.
Mark 10, 51, Jesus asked, what do you desire me to do for you?
Notice, Jesus would often begin with that question before miracles,
before healing, before provision, he would ask, what do you desire?
You have to know these.
We have to be aware of these.
We've been taught, many women have been taught desire is selfish.
Have any of you thought that?
It's selfish to desire.
Didn't your parents say, how can you ask for that when your sister needs that?
How can you think about that when we don't have like,
how many of you got like squashed when you had a desire?
And so you learned, oh, that's selfish to desire.
And so this is part of the healing as we go from internally contracted to expanded.
We're healing from this.
We think that it's dangerous or worldly or something we need to suppress,
and yet scripture talks about it as life-giving, even a tree of life.
So could it be that desires are actually whispers from God?
Could it be?
Not all desires, but holy desires, kingdom desires, purpose-filled desires.
And like I said, little did I know,
all that God would do in the last 10 years of dance,
how he would heal my body, how he would heal my heart,
how he would heal my body, how he would heal my emotions.
I didn't understand back then that trauma is stored in the cells
and that dance is a way of that moving out.
I didn't understand what dance did for the brain
and salsa dancing, one of the top things to prevent dementia.
I didn't understand that he would teach me what it means to be led and how to follow.
It sounded so superficial, learn to dance in a time like this.
How could I learn to dance right now?
There's no time for trivial stuff like dancing.
God would use that.
You see, we have to be so careful.
We think it has to look one way and God's wanting it to look a different way.
And so this desire to create, this desire to serve, write, lead, build, teach, heal, impact lives,
these can be invitations from God.
Right?
And so when I had suppressed all of that back in that room,
I had forgotten, this is where the return and the remember,
I had forgotten who I was.
I had forgotten who I was, his dearly beloved.
daughter of the most high God, heir, co-heir with Christ, the bride. I had
forgotten and that's why when you read chapter 1 of Total Soul Prosperity and I
I shared the story in that church when the Holy Spirit spoke words that forever
changed my life. Cast out the slave woman. I knew, I knew he was talking to me, that
inner slave woman of striving and perfectionism and performance and
sacrificing. Desire? There was no room for desire with the slave woman. The slave
woman consumes it, always giving you something to do, someone to please, some
performance, some striving, some next step, some perfectionism. That's the inner
slave woman. This is what's changing here and now. This is what moves us. So let's
do some some exercises, right? First of all, y'all know, like if I ask you, what
what buries desire? What do you think it is? What have you found in your life as
maybe quieted desire, buried desire, suppressed desire? Any of you?
Let me see, you're putting stuff in the chat. Fear? Rejection? Okay, okay. If I desire,
it could be dangerous, I'm afraid. I might get rejected. Okay, who else? I
appreciated, I appreciated what Linda said a while ago about she didn't know
what came up when she asked that question. I have the same thing. I feel
like I'm stuck or frozen when that comes up, but it's probably because of
unworthiness. There is a scripture that says to be content in any situation that
you're in. So maybe I feel like it's going against the Bible to want
something and will not want but to desire something, because the scripture
says be content in every situation. And that was, of course, Paul talking when he
was in some bad things. What do you think about that? How do you get over that?
I think there's this divine tension that God has us in that I love. And it,
first of all, it's realizing that when we have Christ, we just read it, we open with
all sufficiency. We have everything. When I have Christ, I have everything, right?
And also, God is calling us to dream big dreams, and we can do a whole study on
that. He's called us to, like Jabez, enlarge my territory, right? And so
there's this divine tension, and this is how I like to say it. I have all, because
I have Christ. I have all. That's my contentness. I have all. I'm not
coming from a place of grumbling or lack or discontent. That's
where that comes in. We're not content when we're focusing on lack, right? So I
have all, and I desire all. God, I want it all. What do you have for me? What's a
divine adventure that we can? I want to ride on the Holy Spirit. I'm using magic
loosely, not sorcery, but Holy Spirit magic carpet. Like, I want to go on a wild
ride. God, I want to see the things you want me to see. I want to, you know, I
desire, I desire to travel to the places you have me. I desire to do the things
you want me to do. I desire to meet the people I want to try. Like, I don't
believe God made creation so amazing so that we can stay in our little bedroom,
in our little neighborhood, and never leave it and say, I'm content. I was born
here. I'll die here. I don't believe God made this whole huge world. I think he
wants us to float on the oceans. I love floating. Like, I take my raft out there
in the ocean. And I think he wants us to run our feet through the sand. And I
think he wants us to watch the sunrises and the sunsets and gaze at the stars
and see his wonder. And I think he wants us to experience joy and try all the
different foods. I don't believe he made all these cultures and all these
foods that were supposed to stick to just, you know, meat and potatoes.
I think he desires us to like live, like truly live.
And why is it?
And I have relatives that have gotten
cancer diagnosis and you know what happened, they go, OK, that's it, I'm dying.
I'm going to live.
And they finally they went and they just like, you know, he bought a motorcycle
and traveled the world and went to all the places and fell in love.
And guess what? The cancer like is going away.
Right. It's like it's like, do you see?
So I have all I walk in gratitude.
I wake up, I say, I thank you.
I have a bed. I have a roof.
I have health. I have a sound mind.
I have all I have you, Jesus.
I have all and I desire all Lord, the dreams, the ideas,
the things you placed in my heart.
And so this is where, Colette, I believe God wants to set you free.
He didn't make you a caterpillar, you were transformed to a butterfly.
You were meant to fly.
Where could you fly?
What and this is where the whole idea of this from pressure to partnership is it's
this divine partnership with God, right?
And so when you understand Christ in me,
it's like God live through me, right through me now,
create through me, serve through me, heal through me.
I don't think anything about laying hands
on someone and them getting healed and they get healed all the time.
I had a person I looked over not long ago, a very successful author,
a very successful woman in the kingdom of God.
And her knee was swollen.
And I noticed that as we were talking, she kept rubbing her knees.
And Holy Spirit said, go pray over her knee.
And I barely knew this woman.
And I kind of little scared, you know, like you say, fear, rejection.
I said, can I pray over your knee?
And she said, sure, took her in another room.
And I laid hands and I expected God to move.
It's not me. I can't heal an ant.
But I I have Christ in me, the one who heals.
And so I expectation faith and I expect healing to happen.
Laid hands on the knees and the swelling went away and she
could move the knee for the first time and it didn't hurt for the first time in months.
And she wrote me the next day to tell that.
I remember the woman that had been
mangled in a bike accident and had come to my Bible study.
And she was she was on a scooter and she was not going to be able to walk anymore.
And the Lord told me and I took some very on fire kids from Bethel.
My daughter was going to Bethel at that time.
And they love laying hands and praying.
And I took a handful.
I said, can we come to your house?
And we laid hands.
And I'll never forget the day that I was holding this ankle.
It was purple. It was mangled.
It was swollen. It was ugly.
And we all prayed and worship and laid hands and expected healing.
I'll never forget watching in my hands the purple going away, the swelling going away.
I'll never forget the text I got that night.
Guess what I'm doing? What?
I'm walking in the grocery store.
I'm grocery shopping.
Haven't been able to do that in months.
You see, this is like God live through me,
speak through me, heal through me, love through me.
You see, this is the divine adventure.
This is not a stale, boring, sit in a corner of a church life.
Do you all understand what God is calling you to with these desires?
We're called to live.
We're given a life, the breath in our lungs.
And so this, you know, disappointment,
disappointment, pressure, responsibility, performance.
It brings up the fear, the rejection that it brings up the slave woman.
And I want to mention neuroscience and then I want to do some exercises.
OK, first of all, understand our brain.
You've got something called the RAS.
If you want to appear real smart, say reticular activating system,
reticular activating system, you'll sound like a real nerd, OK?
It determines what gets our attention, it decides what are you going to focus on?
What gets your attention?
The RAS, reticular activating system.
When your desire becomes clear, you've spent time on this,
you've journaled it, you've spoken it, you've thought about it,
you've put it on your vision board, you've thought about this.
Brain starts noticing things in line with that.
And guess what?
It'll see opportunities.
It'll see resources.
It'll see people.
It'll see ideas.
It'll see solutions.
They were already there.
But without desire,
the brain has no clear destination.
Opens your eyes to what's already there, honestly.
I think about Hagar,
when Abraham sent Ishmael and Hagar out
and she gave her son the last of the water
and she's thinking she's gonna die.
And God, it says God opens her eyes
and there's a well right in front of her.
Now that well didn't get dug right then.
It's been there all along.
There's so many wells in your life.
There's so much water just wanting to gush up.
And when we become aware, the floodgates start opening.
We started the call and Stacy got on first
and Stacy said, yeah, I had this opportunity open up
and this person called me and this happened.
Like when you start activating the flow
and I snap my fingers
because I'm like, yes, flow is opening, right?
I understand that.
So now your brain starts being open.
It's not focusing on lack
and it's not focusing on the slave woman
and it's not internally contracted.
You're opening up to the idea of God,
what can we do today?
And all of a sudden partnerships open up
and opportunities open up and people approach you
and ideas and everything just opens.
But without desire, there's no destination for your brain.
You haven't, it's like you have in your car
the GPS system, right?
I have a Tesla, love my Tesla, God bless me.
It was on my vision board and it was a red one
and that's what God gave me was a red Tesla.
He gives us the desires of our heart.
I looked at that on my vision board for years.
God gave me the exact car.
But on that Tesla, there's a huge screen as you know,
it's like a giant laptop in the car.
And so there's a GPS
and it's always ready to take me somewhere
and give me direction how to get there.
But I have to click on the destination.
If I don't put something in, that screen stays empty.
I just see the roads, but it's not.
Your reticular activating system
is the same thing you've plugged in.
It starts giving you the ideas.
You start having dreams at night.
You start waking up.
You start having divine appointments and meeting people
because that desire provides direction like the GPS.
You've got a direction to go.
You've got focus.
You've got motivation.
You know, dopamine isn't just primarily pleasure.
We think about dopamine as the pleasure hormone,
but it's actually anticipation.
It's excitement.
It's movement toward a future possibility.
And so, you know,
when it says a desire fulfilled is the tree of life,
I think there's just a life that floods in our soul
when we get clear on our desires.
Okay?
So let's do some exercises, okay?
And so, you know, let me just summarize
that when desire's buried, energy drops.
If your energy's really low, you haven't tapped into,
there's nothing stirring your juices.
You're not excited.
You ever notice when you start a new project
or you get an idea and you actually start moving on it,
you ever notice that new life starts coming in, right?
And without it, your creativity drops,
your motivation drops, your vision fades.
Like, this is not just spiritual.
This is neurological in our brain, okay?
God desired, designed desire to help us.
So this is why desire, this is why Gate 4 desire matters.
This really, really matters.
This is not a trivial thing.
I've taught this.
Linda's been around me since, I don't know, 2000,
whatever, 12, 13, 14,
whenever it was that we've been working together.
And she's heard me talk about this
and she's seen how it brings life.
When people start tapping into their desires,
it brings life.
So without desire, there's no...
vision. We talked about vision last week. And there's no clarity. What direction are
we going? And there's no consistent action. Again, many people think purpose is coming
from the outside. No, it often appears first as a desire. Often purpose like appears as
just a little subtle longing, a dream, just a little holy dissatisfaction.
I've heard that in you, Colette. I've heard your desires. I desire to do this, to do that.
Yeah, you've got it. You told me you don't, but you've told me your desires. So I know you have
them. It's just being willing to stand on them. It's often a whisper. It's just a holy, and it
often points towards your divine assignment. Okay. I'm going to give you a reflection exercise,
just so we know, because we're going to run out of time. And then we're going to do one
guided thing together right now. Okay. And I'll send this to you afterwards as well. But
here's for your journaling, for your morning journal, okay? Ask some questions like,
what desire have I stopped expecting? Faith and expectation. What desire have I stopped expecting?
What desire have I buried beneath responsibility?
Also, what desire, it might be ever so small, but it keeps returning to my heart.
You know, little did I know, I come from such a troubled background, and at 16, I started dancing.
And I got the desire to enter in Placerville, California, in the fairgrounds, enter a dance
contest. And I choreographed. I grabbed someone that I knew, and I choreographed, and we entered
the dance contest. And we won. Now, this was before I was a Christian, 16 years old. Watch
what God does. Isn't God funny? I won the dance contest at the Placerville fairgrounds.
Guess what the prize was for winning the dance contest? I got an album,
a record album. And guess what? It was by a man named Chuck Gerard. Never heard of him.
He was a Christian recording artist. Guess what? I love that record, and played that record,
and God started speaking the gospel to me straight out of a dance contest. Huh.
What can happen when we follow our desires? Where does it lead? Where does it lead? So,
you know, Stacy, you mentioned fear. This journalist, if fear were removed, what would I pursue?
If fear were removed, what would I pursue? If disappointment were removed, what would I pursue?
If I fully trusted God, what would I desire? So, I want you to close your eyes right now. Put your
feet on the ground. Close your eyes. Take a breath. Close your eyes and just breathe.
Let's do our Yahweh breathing we learned in gate one.
And I want you to imagine for just a moment you're sitting in a grassy field. You're on a comfy
blanket. The sun is shining. The cool breeze is on your skin. The flowers around you are so beautiful.
And you're sitting with Jesus.
No pressure. No performance. You're just hanging out with Jesus.
And I want you to ask right now, Jesus, Yeshua, what do you want to do?
What do you want to do?
What desire have you placed in my heart that I've forgotten?"
Just be still right now and ask that question.
Yeshua, what desire have you placed in my heart that I've buried, suppressed, forgotten?
I want you to open your journal and write whatever comes to you.
Take a minute.
What sprung up when you asked that question?
What desire have you placed in my heart that I've buried, I've forgotten?
Write it down.
No editing.
No judging.
Just listen.
What desire have you placed in my heart that I've forgotten?
Okay.
You can take some more time in your morning spiritual practices to go deeper with this.
Right now, I want you to complete these sentences together.
I give myself permission to desire blank.
Whatever's coming up for you again.
Just say it out loud right now.
I give myself permission to desire joy again.
I give myself permission to desire whatever it is again.
The desire I'm reclaiming is ... And lastly, one small step toward that desire I can take
this week is ... Let's move in the direction of our goals, dreams, and desires.
One small step I can take toward that desire this week, preferably today.
One small step toward that desire this week is ... So Father, I just pray that you seal
this word.
I pray that you stir up the desires of their heart.
I pray that you give them courage to dream with you again, Lord.
Just stir up the desires that you've placed inside of them.
Bring them to recollection.
Remind them.
Help them return to their first love.
Help them return to their childlike faith.
Help them return to their childlike joy.
Help them return to the joy of the Lord.
Help them return, Father, to living life full on, full on, full on with you as we partner
with you.
I ask in Jesus' name, the mighty name of Jesus, amen.
All right, ladies, I'm going to sign off and sign back on for office hours.
I'll see you in a minute.