Okay.
How are you today?
I'm doing pretty good.
How about yourself?
Doing good.
Is it a better day than yesterday?
Yeah, it's a little bit.
There'd be days like that, right?
Oh, yeah, that's true.
Yeah, it's a really nice spring weather.
And it's incredibly windy and like 40 degrees.
So it's just kind of one of those like gloomy stay inside days.
So I like had to pull on my sweaters.
So cold today.
I know.
So the past few days I've been very hot.
So, and I'm sorry about the lighting. Let me fix that really quick.
Probably just in the dark, actually, instead of that, let me just.
Let me just turn.
And then I'll just move to a different part of the table.
And then I'll just move to a different part of the table so that the
outside light is actually shining on me.
Let me scoot over. Sorry.
No, you're good.
I was like, Oh my word. You can't even see me.
Okay.
So, yeah. So anyway, my central air has been out.
Since before Christmas.
And the, the.
So I did not have. Whoa.
Sorry. I've not had.
I was, in fact, I was even out of my apartment for.
Three.
Three weeks.
And then I got back in.
Sorry.
Getting all this.
Usually a lot of times the other direction works better,
but I guess this time of day, this one's going to work better.
So.
The warranty company won't.
I don't know what the deal is.
They're.
It's been described to me as that they're dragging their feet.
I don't know what the deal is.
There's something going on, but.
And that means that.
I had to get some heaters. So I have some heaters now.
And so I've been having, I've been using those, but now that the wet,
but then whenever they get the weather gets hot.
Well, the Hager's aren't going to help me. And so I.
I bought a little fan to like stick.
To my apartment.
And it was over.
It was 85 degrees in my apartment.
Window open.
And the fan going in.
Oh, my goodness.
I know. So I'm like in my apartment, I'll be sweating.
And so anyway, when it, when the weather turned cool today,
it was a little bit nice.
85 In my apartment.
And so.
For Dawson.
My little dog.
We're kind of.
I don't know.
Not at the mercy of the weather, but we're just, we're very.
Very in tune to the weather.
Yeah.
Well, it's good to see you.
Oh, man.
I just feel like, I don't know. I feel like my whole life is changing.
And.
I just, I feel like.
I don't know, like the past couple of years have been so intense.
And I feel like all of a sudden.
I'm being awakened to something that I never knew.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. I'm trying not to cry.
But if I would have only known this years ago.
When I went through.
Hardest time.
Or it would just give anything.
The past couple of years.
I don't know.
a psychotic ward, and going through all of that. And I have never been shaken so incredibly hard.
It almost ruined me. I mean, Eric was six weeks old at the time when he got admitted to the
hospital. And it has just been so intense trying to recover from that. And then realizing all of
these truths and realizing who God and who Jesus actually is to me. It's like, how can I accept
that and realize that, but still come to peace with all the pain that I've been through?
You know what I mean? Like, how do you... I feel like this is still such a process of
understanding everything in a way, but I feel like all the things that I've been through in my life,
it's hard to see the big... it's just hard to make a sense of it all.
Because I feel like the things that I went through, the things that our family has gone through,
and then if you look in light of who God is, it's like, how does that line up? You know what I mean?
How can that... is it simply because I wasn't abiding in him or that I didn't have the right
or that I didn't have the right mentality that we went through that? Or was it just God's will
that we went through that? And it's just, I guess I have so many questions, so many questions about
everything in my life right now. And I feel like it's the right time to start to be okay
with questioning it and to just kind of just let the light into the dark basement of my heart.
That's how I feel. But it's just so, so overwhelming when it is just years and years and
years of stagnant, like there was no life in what the light is being shed in now. There was no life
in there before. And now it seems like there's so many boxes I have to dust off and sort through.
And it's like, where do I even go? Does that even make sense?
Oh, yeah.
Very normal part of the process. The difference is so many people aren't willing to press in
like you are. And that is something that's very precious to the Lord. You remember when Jacob
wrestled with... in fact, this was something that God brought to... taught me last night after I
got off the call. So I know, so it's kind of, it's very fresh, very new. It's like, oh, this is
interesting. Jacob wrestled with God. And as a result, and he said, you know, I will not let you,
he told the Lord, I will not let you go until you bless me. And what God ended up doing is not only
did he bless Jacob, but he named an entire nation, his firstborn chosen son that he considered to be
very precious because they called Israel his firstborn son. He named his son for the rest,
you know, of forever, by the name Israel. And Israel means he wrestles with God. So he named
his son off of, by the aspect of their relationship, that of all things that it could have
highlighted is it highlighted the struggle that Israel, you know, Jacob, the nation, his people,
whoever, would choose to have with God. In other words, it means a lot to the Lord. He considers it
very important to him, very precious, that when we feel that we're hurt by him, because that's what
Jacob felt. He'd been going through, I mean, think of how much that he'd gone through for 20 some odd
years when he'd been working with Laban, not to mention, you know, how he'd been, how we kind of
get the impression that maybe he'd grown up with Esau. And then, of course, he was the deceiver,
and then he stole Esau's birthright. And I mean, what kind of animosity did there have to be
between two brothers that he would steal his birthright, you know, with a bowl of soup,
and then he would actually do it by deceiving his father. So we went through all of that,
and then the whole 20 years, and working seven years for a wife he didn't intend to get, and
then work another seven years for the wife he really didn't want. I mean, talk about thinking,
God, where were you? Why on earth did you allow me to do all this? All this pain. So he wrestles
with God, and so it was very precious to the Lord, which is surprising to me, but it's apparently
very precious to the Lord that
that when we feel hurt by him and we don't understand,
that we don't abandon him, can you hear me okay?
Oh, there we go.
Okay, yeah, maybe it's Zoom,
it'll just shut down.
You know, it did it last night,
it just would shut down and then reboot.
I think it's just overloaded poor thing.
I'm sure Zoom is doing what they can
to like build new servers with all of the traffic
that they're getting.
So it's something I've just kind of learned too.
Okay, well, it shut off again.
Let's just be more patient.
So anyway, I find it very interesting
that it's important to God that we don't abandon him
when we feel hurt by him, but that we press in
even to the point of struggling with him
because it means that we're determined to not let him go
and their relationship with him is important enough to us
that we want to work it out.
There was a time where I was struggling with the Lord.
I was going through a major PTSD,
major clinical depression that got me down
to suicide level, which is very hard for this personality
that's always very happy.
And it got me down to suicide level
and I was very, very angry at God.
And God told me, he said,
Ashley, I understand that you're struggling
and I understand that you're going through all of this
and I have patience and I love for you in it.
And I know you're angry at me and all of that.
He said, we can work with that together.
He worked through that together, but he said,
whatever you do, he said, do not shut me out.
He wasn't mean when he said it
because I couldn't handle mean.
I was very, very delicate and fragile at the time.
And he just said, whatever you do, Ashley,
don't shut me out.
He said, if you need to struggle, even if it's with me,
he said, that's fine, we'll partner together with it,
but don't shut me out, don't abandon me.
So I found it interesting that apparently
that's an important enough element
in our relationship with him
that he defined a whole nation by that,
not that characteristic, but by the aspect
of how they chose to engage and interact with God.
That when it got serious, when times got tough,
when they felt not only hurt,
but they felt hurt by him specifically,
not hurt by somebody else out in the world,
but like, God, where were you?
And why did you do this?
And why did you allow this?
Or whatever the struggle is,
that they were willing to know,
I'm gonna grab ahold of you
and I am not going to let you go
until we get this thing worked out.
It's apparently very important to God.
So I say that as an encouragement
that when you're going through this
and you're working on this with the Lord,
you're not, you don't feel condemned by yourself,
to yourself, because understand
that God doesn't condemn you for it.
He actually is very pleased
because while others have chosen to abandon him,
you're not, you're pressing in and you're pursuing
and you're determined, we're gonna work this out.
I'm not gonna let you go.
Dad, come on, until we get this worked out.
So I just wanted to say that as an encouragement
through all of this,
because it's already hard enough to go through,
but then when you add this self-condemnation
of I shouldn't be doing this on top of it,
it just pulls you down and it doesn't have any validity.
It's not real, it's not the truth
from either you or for the whole point
that he just made a whole nation after it.
So that every time someone would say the name Israel,
Israel or another nation,
they would constantly say,
what would come out of their mouth
is he who struggles with God,
he who struggles with God.
I find it just really interesting.
So anyway, just encourage that he loves you
that much more what you're going through
is that important to him
that you're still willing to engage with him on it.
But yeah, as far as like all of the reconciliation,
et cetera, yes.
So I was very, I've been through this as well.
And so the things that the Lord has shown me
about what to do during this time
is similar to what I explained yesterday
when you asked your question,
there's different ways to do it.
And I've done both.
So I'm gonna tell you what it is that I choose to do now
because it's out of a place of rest.
It's out of a place of understanding who it is that I am.
And it's just to,
you know, like we were talking about last night
where we feel all this shame,
we feel all this condemnation.
It's the same thing for.
Lord, where were you? I mean, I feel that the balances need to be reconciled. I feel
entitled to demand restitution. You know, all of those things. We're having that struggle.
How do we overcome that? The only person that we know that can heal us from it is the very
person we're mad at because he's not healing it. As long as we allow it to happen in the
first place, what we think of in our mind, in our heart, is he's the one who did this
and he's not healing it. Then it's like this double whammy. And then sometimes even going
through in this struggle where we're like, God, why aren't you doing this? And why didn't
you do this? We then sometimes feel like he's not even talking to us, that he won't respond.
So then it's a triple. It really bad. So the fastest way that I've learned to heal, because
I've learned two different ways. I have learned by pressing into the point where it was, I pushed,
and I tried to figure out, and I tried to learn, and I went to teachings, and I scoured the Bible
for reasons to try to give my soul peace by understanding, at least. I mean, if I couldn't
even get God to reconcile the fact or admit the fact that he'd done something to me, again,
and the fact that this is how my mind thinks is in that spot is you've done this to me and it's
wrong. Even though I know God does never do anything wrong. Like, well, then why do I feel
that he does? Someone's got to pay for this because I didn't hurt myself. So somebody's got to pay.
So I'm just saying that that honestly is what we think. And I wanted it to make sense because I
thought that if things made sense, and if I could understand them in my soul, then I could heal.
And what God, and so I did do that, but it only got me to a certain point and it took years and
years and years and years and years. So what God then did to begin to heal me within weeks
instead of years is if I did what I was talking about last night with it regarding like shame and
condemnation, but it's the same principle that would apply here where I stopped thinking about
all the negative and trying to call him to account for what he did. I stopped giving it
time, effort, and energy. And I just focused on, he says that he's love. He says that he's light.
He says that he's this, he says that he's that. And I just focused so much on it that I allow
it to fill my world because I'm choosing to believe it's real because I don't feel that it's
real. In fact, I feel the opposite, but I'm having to make a choice that God gave me dominion over
creation, including my feelings. And I am choosing to have dominion. And so even though I don't feel
it, I am going to choose that if he says it, I'm going to believe it. And I try to fill my life
and with, and focus on all of the good that he's light, that he's love, he's abundance,
that he says that he calls me into nothing but freedom, never into hurt, never into pain,
but always into more freedom and always into more love and never into death and all of that.
And I just focus on it. And I noticed that when I did that, it got so big and bright in my world
that there wasn't any room for the other. And it, it, in my spirit, it made fun. Everything
finally made sense as opposed to me trying in my soul for it to make sense. Once I finally
understood in my spirit, it just felt like it made sense. My soul accepted it as enough of a reason,
like it completely makes sense. So I didn't go backwards. I went from this direction,
going from this direction works. What's most counselors teach. It's what most preachers
preach, but it's, it's a long, hard path. That's all of that inner healing stuff, et cetera.
So the reason I wanted to point out those two paths is you have a choice and they both work
because I don't want it to sound like the things that I'm saying may mean that all of this other
stuff that we learn about isn't true. No, it is absolutely true. In fact, you can read about it
in the Bible that all these things work, but you also read about this other, and God says,
you have the opportunity of which one do you want to choose? So I've chosen this one. I've
walked the other one. It's just hard. It's long. It's arduous and it's working. It's.
really painful. And sometimes it'll take an equal amount of time to heal that it took for you to go
through the pain, but over here it doesn't. Over here, you know, the Israelites went through 40
years of, you know, wandering around in the wilderness and Jesus redeemed it in 40 days.
You know, everything happened really, really fast. So I just wanted to mention there's two
different paths, so it didn't sound like I was saying all the other didn't exist. No,
it absolutely does. I'm choosing this one. Everyone has the opportunity to choose.
The other makes our soul feel good in the fact that we feel like we've got this right,
but in the end, we're coming to the same conclusion. We always come to the fact that,
oh, God really wasn't meaning to be mean. It was how I received it. And I received a lie
thinking that actually wasn't happening and that actually wasn't the truth. So that's what I have
done and it allowed me to heal years worth of stuff in weeks instead of taking years to heal
from years, which is what I was doing before. And it even only got me to a certain point.
But yeah, I mean, there's more I could say on that, but that's,
but I mean, what are your, what are your thoughts so far?
Yeah, no, I feel like that really helps me. I mean, I feel like that really resonates with me.
My thing right now is that I don't even feel like I know where to begin with my relationship with
God picking up where we left off. Because honestly, it has been years and years and
years of silence. There's been times of like, wow, that is really God. There is still a lot
of peace in certain directions. Like when Josh quit his full-time job and we had really good
income to start being self-employed. Like I still have the ability to feel peace from God
with certain decisions and even certain things that I've seen very clearly have been God.
But then the day to day, like who God actually is, it just seems so vague to me. Like,
how do I tap back into that? Do you know what I mean?
Yeah, I know completely.
And like when I, especially, especially with reading the Bible and praying or communicating
with God that they're like, the communication part is just non-existent or else that's what
it feels like.
Communication to him or communication from him or both?
I would say mostly to him, but I would say, I would say definitely feel it from him too. Yeah.
Yeah. So one of the things to do in stepping into, how do I explain it? In shifting into
working from a place, not just, how do I, sorry, I'm trying to figure out how to actually begin
this. Based off of the understanding, our new, our understanding of how we're positioned in Christ
and our identity in Christ. It's important that the only, to understand that the only way that
we can receive that is to completely dismantle our old paradigm. The old paradigm.
If you have the old paradigm and the new paradigm, the old way of understanding things,
the old way of doing things, the old way of making decisions, the old way of communicating
with God, the old way of learning who God is and growing in knowledge of him and all of that.
If you, we take our understanding of how all of those systems work, but try to receive a new
revelation of a new paradigm. And we try to like get them to reconcile. They will not ever reconcile.
The only way that we can actually step into this is to take this one and completely get rid of it.
Now, sometimes it's very scary for people and they can only, they feel that they only have
a measure of faith to get rid of part of the paradigm at a time. So maybe they feel like they
can only get rid of this one, but they need to keep these others in order to keep themselves
balanced because otherwise it's just too much. So they get rid of this one to replace it with this
one. You know, so that at least they'll do that, do it in parts and in bits and whatever,
but there's no way for the two to exist at the same time. So they choose which aspects that they
feel of the old paradigm that they feel that they can get rid of in order to kind of help their soul
kind of teeter-totter is if we're like learning to walk kind of teeter-totter into a new understanding
and God allows that and it's fine. We don't have to traverse a hundred miles in a second. It's just,
it can take some time, but then there are certain times in our lives where we decide to make very
dramatic choices and we take all of this and get rid of all of it.
it at the same time and I've done that too. I'm just like check the whole thing because I was just
burnt out spiritually, emotionally, physically, whatever. So I made the decision at a certain
point in my life, the whole thing's gone. I'm throwing the entire thing out. I have no idea
what on earth is going on and I'm going to pursue this thing that I'm even worried might even be
wrong. It might give me no foundation whatsoever. It might be or it might be contradictory to the
Lord or whatever it is that I was fearful at the time but I was so desperate and I was like okay
this is presenting itself to me as what I believe is a new revelation from the Lord because it
sounds so wonderful. I would love life to actually work like that. I would love that to be true
without God and he's presenting to or I'm being presented with the idea that it might be true,
that he really does operate like that and he really is like that and this is who he is.
So instead of doing it piecemeal, I was like the heck with that. I want to jump into this
thing with both feet even risking my heart, whatever it was that felt
difficult to make the leap. Risking it because I thought I might land on nothing.
Then I have nothing to go back to because I burned it. I burned the bridge. So it just
depends. It depends on where you are in your life at the time, the season as to whether or not you
want to get rid of parts of it or just throw out the whole thing all at once and jump into this
force. If you do that, it will happen faster. If you get rid of all of it at once, it'll happen
faster. It also though will feel more, you'll feel more pressure because you'll feel the
pressure of getting rid of all of them all at the same time, but you'd also move faster.
So it's your choice depending on what you feel in your spirit like, I don't know,
but where you are in your season. But just know that whatever it is, however it is that you've
approached the Lord before and assumed this is how we communicate, this is how God communicates,
this is who he is, this is who I am in relationship to him, this is whatever,
know that in order to claim something very drastically different,
it can't, that this thing has to go either one at a time or all at once. But regardless,
it has to completely go in order to be able to accept this new thing that in your heart and in
your spirit, you might be so concerned about this huge risk of what if it's not real or what if it
doesn't work. I've burned my bridge over here. It's scary. That's faith. Faith is the substance
of things hoped for. We're really hoping it's true. And it's the substance of it, meaning that
we're actually going to act on it. It actually has weight to it as opposed to some ethereal vapor of
wouldn't that be nice. We actually create substance out of that hope. And that's called faith,
because it says that faith can't exist without works. In other words, if we really do believe it,
it's going to manifest in our life, because we believe it's reality. And we always make decisions
based off of the way we think that reality actually works. Whether it's conscious or
subconscious, we always make decisions on our actions or thought, whatever, based off of what
we believe is actually true. So anyway, my point is that we talk about where do you actually, where
do you even start? I wanted to say all of that as preparation for you to understand, you know,
okay, going into this, what it is going to mean so that you wouldn't feel that, oh, my goodness,
I feel like I don't have my feet under me. Yeah. You have to get rid of this, because if you keep
trying to get the two to reconcile, you're going to get frustrated. And then if you finally, if you
know that, oh, no, I'm going to have to get rid of one of these in order to accept the counterpart
over here. Well, then you can feel like, oh, my word, I'm going to burn my bridge. And what if
this is even wrong? I just wanted to prepare you for the mental and spiritual decisions you're
going to have to make so that when they come to you and you feel overwhelmed, or you think, oh,
my goodness, this sounds scary. It sounds irresponsible. It sounds spiritually responsible,
all kinds of things that you're prepared to know that, no, this is normal. This is the process.
This is exactly the process. It's not, it's not odd. It's not, oh, well, some people go through
it. And some people don't know this is the process so that you'd at least be prepared.
It's going to be hard enough anyway. But at least, you know, it's coming.
least you don't think that, I think that somehow something's off and this isn't
the way it's supposed to be, not the way it's supposed to be.
And then as far as like so what to do, the way that I appealed the fastest
is I had to abandon myself to just allow God to, if I didn't know who He
was, in fact I got really bad, really bad. I got to the point where 12
years ago maybe, that I almost walked away from the Lord completely and I told
Him, I didn't know if He was even real. And this is somebody who's been
saved since they were four. I was baptized when I was nine. It's just all
kinds of stuff and I was known as the perfect Christian girl among the parents
and the children that knew me. It was a very, very oppressive reputation because
I felt that I had to live up to it. So anyway, my point is that when I got to
this point, this is like consider, I didn't think that it was possible for
someone like me who had a close relationship to the Lord to get to this
point, but I did. And I thought, well I don't even know if He even exists because
I was so hurt. I was so hurt by Him and it took me years to get to the point
where I thought, if I'm this hurt and things are this bad and He's not
talking to me, maybe He's not even real. Maybe everything that I that has I
lived up to this point was just fake or I thought I heard Him all kinds of stuff.
I questioned everything. So I was at a very, very, very low point and I had to
and I didn't even know if He was good or not. I thought, okay, well I finally made
the decision. It was all in a ten minute amount of time. Fell on my knees and in
the middle of that, I'm just trying to shorten the story for you because I
don't mind telling it to you, but just try to shorten it for your sake. I
finally made the decision, no, I apparently believe that God exists
because I am so mad at Him that I'm refusing to let the anger go because I
have to let it go if I don't believe He exists. I'm gonna have to drop it in
order to pretend to live life however I want because God doesn't, you know. I had
to let go of my anger and I refused. Even how much it felt like,
oh, I wouldn't live feeling this weight anymore, looked so palatable to me, it was
not worth me letting go with how mad I was. I was that mad at Him. And so I
thought, apparently I believe He's real because I'm refusing to let my anger go for this. So, I then told the Lord, it's like, okay, Lord, I don't, I don't, if I feel like this, I don't, that means that I
don't know if you're good or evil anymore. I used to. I now don't know. I really
don't know. And so I told Him, I said, but even if you're evil, because I
don't know who you are anymore, even if you're evil, if you exist, I can't not
follow you. So, even if you are walking me in life to the point that you are trying
to, that you are getting me to the point where I'm martyred for your name and I
will have just pain and suffering after pain and suffering and other people get
guess that I don't or whatever it is, I was the depressive state I was in and
terrible mental and darkness I was in. If that is true, I mean, even if you tell me,
even if that is the path that you have for me, if you exist, I can't not follow
you. So, even if you're evil and even if that's what you intend for me, I'll choose
it. That's what I'll do. And I'll just die as a martyr. And so, then He told me, He
was very sweet about it. He said, you're right, Ashley, you don't know who I am.
You don't know if I'm good or evil anymore. So, I'm going to completely
dismantle everything that you know about me. I'm even going to rip out your
foundation, because you don't even know who the cornerstone is anymore. You don't
even know if Jesus is real. I mean, it's like, it's like, you know, nothing. He
said, so I'm going to rip everything out. And we're going to start all over. He
said, in this time, I'm going to reveal to you who I am, instead of you coming up
with your own ideas and your own doctrines from reading the Bible and
listening to teachings and creating your this house, based off of what it is that
you understood. So, He said, I need you to get with the being of who I am, and know
me through that. So, and He did, He had to completely dismantle that. And the reason
I say that is that was His answer to me. And what He ended up doing is He said,
there's two things I want you to, He said that I'm going to reveal to you about
myself. I'm going to reveal my goodness. And then I'm going to reveal my love. So
it took him several years to reveal his goodness to me, because I was, I had, I
was, again, you know, you were talking earlier about, you could choose to do it
the hard way or the easy way. I was doing everything the hard way. So it took him
years to teach me his goodness, because I felt I had to work for it.
Everything had to make sense to my soul.
It was the only paradigm in which I understood to spiritually mature.
So it took him a long time.
The love was taking a long time until finally I started,
I abandoned everything in my old paradigm
because before I was just getting rid of parts of it in order to set parts.
I finally just thought I'm still too burnt out.
This is taking entirely too long.
This has been over 12 years or 11 years or however long of it at the time.
Since I had fallen on my knees and gotten to that point with the Lord
and I'm still hurting, forget the entire thing.
Forget my entire paradigm.
Lord, who are you and what on earth is going on?
And when I did that and I opened myself up to just allowing him to love me
and to go about my day and to know that he delights in me
and I can make decisions and he was pleased
and I didn't even have to hear his voice
in order for me to have permission from him to make certain decisions
and that he would enjoy that which was something new for me
because before I didn't even make a move unless I heard from the Lord
and to just accept and believe because I wasn't even sure if it was true.
I chose to believe.
I think that he delights in me enough that if I make my own decision without asking him,
I think he'll be happy.
And so I started doing things like that
and so I came to understand who he is and the fact that he loves me by observing.
By observing my spirit when I went about my day
because I wasn't trying anymore to be a good Christian.
I wasn't trying anymore to obey him.
I wasn't trying anymore.
I'm not saying that I was disobeying him but I'm saying I wasn't trying.
Oh, yes, God, I'm so sorry.
I've got to make sure.
I just gave it all up.
I'm like, forget it.
Forget what everybody else thinks about me.
If I start doing or saying things that normally I wouldn't have ever said
because I'm finally trying to give myself freedom.
I started doing all that and finally when I just let go
and then I would just watch the Lord in my life.
Either he would do things or he would make me feel a particular way
or I could just rest and the fact that I wasn't worried anymore
about whether or not I was going to obey him.
I was just going to let his very being somehow come into my spirit's understanding
and my spirit's knowledge by osmosis somehow some way during the day.
And that's how I began to heal.
Fast.
I've always been taught the opposite.
That in order to learn who God is, in order to know whether or not he loves me,
I have to learn by having read the Bible and studied it to the nth degree,
looked up all the right words and songs,
and obey him no matter what.
And somehow he'd always still come through for me.
That would prove his love for me and all of that.
And that's the paradigm I had to get rid of.
And so and just accept his being.
So that helped me heal because I was no longer trying to reconcile
the two different systems, no longer trying to reconcile this old paradigm.
Well, maybe I should just read the Bible more.
Maybe I should spend more time in prayer.
Maybe I should spend whatever.
Also, someone revealed God's book to several years ago.
And they said and gave me the prophecy.
They said, actually, I was driving.
They told me my pastor told me this in front of the whole church.
He's standing up on the platform.
Actually, you said, I very rarely get the Lord to tell me something about
somebody else.
But he said, I was driving down the road the other day.
And he said, Ashley, God told me something about you.
He said, I was like, the whole church is looking at me.
He said, take the verse where it says you were fearfully and
wonderfully made.
He said, God has told me that you don't like who you are,
that you're always concerned that you're,
that you're not enough and that you wish you were something else.
Because see, I thought I wasn't pleasing to God.
I thought my character, my personality weren't pleasing to God.
And so he said, God,
God told me to tell you that to switch you were fearfully and
wonderfully made to switch them and to say,
I am wonderfully and fearfully made.
He said,
because God says that if you come to accept and
observe and understand and receive how wonderful you are,
in other words,
to start taking delight in yourself as you go about the day and you make
certain decisions and you do things that just feel like you, he said,
it's from,
it's from fondly receiving how wonderful I made you that you will
come to understand that I love you.
And therefore you'll fear me not fear as in like, Oh my word, he's holy.
But fear is in, you know, as in being able.
to receive his love and understand how wonderful he is because of how wonderful I understood
he made me and he liked that. He liked how wonderful it made me. So that is how I have
begun to heal. I've not fully healed in that, but that's how I began to heal very quickly
and from a lot of the pain of what I've been through where I was trying so hard to reconcile
the fact that God, why? Because in my old paradigm, I believed that God's love came
through spiritual maturity. So in order to earn God's love, I had to be spiritually mature
and that spiritual maturity came through pain. So in other words, if you shorten that,
I believe that God's love came through pain. The only way that I could earn God's love,
the only way that he says that he loves me, that he would love me is if I went through a lot of
pain in order to be taught and be spiritually mature so that he would love me. Because the
more spiritually mature I am, the more he's pleased with me and the more that he loves me
and it was wrong. So anyway, I thought that that was the paradigm and I was mad. I had to get rid
of that whole thing and just accept that, no, I'm fine the way I am. I don't have to obey him.
I don't have to love him. It's not that I was trying to disobey him, understand, but I got
rid of the feeling of obligation. I don't have to obey him. I don't have to love him. I don't even
have to receive his love, but he says he's going to love me anyway. So I'm going to just watch him
do it and I'm just going to observe it and he comes fast. He's so fast. So because remember,
if he was willing to love us as much as he did while we were hating him and killing him,
then he can handle us dropping that feeling of obligation where we're not even feeling
obligated to receive his love. He'll still go above and beyond to love us because what he sees
is we're struggling with him. We're not abandoning him. We're struggling with him in this.
That's part of this whole idea of like, I'm just going to drop my obligation. We're not abandoning
him. It's still a willingness to struggle with him and he delights in that. And so he's like, okay,
all right, now that you've dropped everything and you understand you're not even obligated to
receive my love because I gave you free will to choose to receive it or not, I'm going to pour
out my love on you and you are naturally because of how I made you, you're naturally going to
receive that love and it's going to grow that same degree of love in you to which you believe
that I'm loving you. It's going to grow that love in you to the same degree that you're going to
want to work back out on me. So we don't have to worry that it's something you have to drum up.
And that's how I did it. I healed by letting go.
All right. Well, that makes so much sense because I've like, since we left the conservative church,
it was just like my, my world flew apart. And I've seen these, these different sides of when
people leave church or people leave Mennonite church or they're finally free. Either they like
eventually go back or they stay in the form that they were in, or they go on this completely crazy
crazy. Like I have to learn as much about God as I possibly can. I have to listen to all the
podcasts and like do all of the things because my view of God was so warped and now I can finally,
you know, I just have to learn and learn and learn. And something about that still didn't feel
right to me. One of my good friends, I mean like all she does is just read and podcast and she
doesn't have peace in her heart at all. And she really admits it. And so then it leaves me stuck
to where I'm like, okay, well, everything I've been taught is not going to help me out of this
and everything that I see them doing isn't working. So where do I go? Yeah. And how do I
navigate a new relationship with Lord without falling off the deep end, becoming new age
and adopting all these crazy new ideas, but still just basically become free. You know what I mean?
Just break into the freedom of who God actually is. And I don't know, just not forcing God's hand
to move or to show me his love through the actions that I'm doing, like reading the Bible, praying,
doing all these right things, you know, in a way, whoops, my battery is dying. In a way,
I can see now that that is a form of me forcing his hand to manipulate him, to act upon my actions
that I have been doing so faithfully and so good to him. Sorry, I need to plug my phone.
Really insightful. That's exactly.
All of that work is a form of manipulation.
We're working for it.
And God's like, we're not working for it.
You can give it to me, but don't work for it.
No, that helps a lot.
But that definitely helps a lot to know how to navigate.
Because I felt frozen for so long because we were,
I mean, I have seen the destruction of moving
into this weird freedom of like, I
guess it's just almost a new age thing where they all
of a sudden get so Holy Spirit crazed
that they're free to do whatever they want.
And I'm like, that's not what I want.
And then there's the other side where it's just
there's no balance of actually finding
the reason why you left the church to find freedom.
There just doesn't seem to be that balance
or that actual truth.
Like, this is how you break out of it.
This is how you find freedom without losing your mind
on either end of the spectrum.
Because God isn't ever anything to be afraid of.
So if we abandon ourselves to His being, that's fine.
You know, He won't be safe.
He won't lead us down a dark path.
And also, there's another thing that's
really important for us to know on this journey.
And it kind of touches on what we were talking on last night.
You know, when Holly was talking about the fact of so
concerned about, you know, am I going to?
Was she saying that?
Or was that me?
It was Holly.
I think it was Holly.
Was it Holly talking about where we're also,
I know that she was talking about the possibility
of missing out.
But I thought that somewhere in there
she mentioned, like maybe in a statement
before she actually asked a question,
that we talk about the fact that we get concerned
that we're going to mess up, or make a mistake, or miss God.
He's guiding us in a particular direction.
And we're like, OK, I think this is what I'm supposed to do.
But I'm not sure.
But what if it's wrong?
What if it's wrong?
And the thing is that if we desire,
that God desires us more than we desire Him,
He is more excited about us dropping all sense and belief
of obligation to Him or of anything.
He is more excited about us stepping into sonship
than we are.
And He's more committed to our progress.
In other words, to our journey to be closer to Him.
He is more excited about it than we are.
And He is more determined than we are
that it will come to fulfillment.
And in fact, He's promised and He's
committed that if that's what we desire,
He promises on His own self, I think that's in Hebrews,
promises on Him, He made an oath to Him on His own self
that He would fulfill that and that we would do it.
If that's what we choose to desire,
He promises on oath to Him on Himself
that He will allow it to happen.
So my point is that we don't have
to be worried that, oh, I'm going to be making mistakes.
What if I step out and in my old paradigm, oh, my word,
that would have been a sin.
And that's part of the whole letting go,
is to watch God and to observe our lover.
Love us, because remember, love is all about the giver, not
the receiver, that His nature is so loving
that even when we do something that in our old paradigm
would be a mistake.
Maybe even in the new paradigm, it's
not like the best route to take.
But regardless of that, even if it's not the best route
to take, it doesn't matter, to watch that in the new paradigm,
we can do things that we would have
used to determine as mistakes, and it does not
change how He interacts with us, even to the point
where if we don't do anything, if we don't do things
perfectly right, because we're like toddling
and we're trying to learn, He'll still
allow something to happen.
He'll still give us good gifts, when in the old paradigm,
He would give us that if we had done X, Y, or Z,
because in the old paradigm, we had to work for it.
We had to earn it.
And if you do X, you'll be blessed.
And if you do Y, you'll be cursed.
There's no such thing as that in the new paradigm, which
is not something that I've talked about yet.
But that's very, very Old Testament,
that if you do X, you'll be blessed.
And if you do X, you'll be cursed.
There's no such thing as that anymore under the new covenant
if we choose to operate according to the new covenant.
By the way, just a little nugget for something
we'll talk about later on.
But the reason.
That whole blessing curse thing, it does still exist if we choose to operate in it.
That's why we have seen it in our lives previous to this point.
And that's why other people see it in their own lives.
Because if we choose to operate according to that system, God said, well, fine, if you
want to choose that covenant, if you want to choose to live under that covenant, if
you do those things, if you believe that you do those things, you'll be blessed, I'll bless
you.
If you do those things and you believe that you'll be cursed, fine.
He's like, why?
Why do you want to do that?
That was an old covenant, you don't have to operate like it anymore, you can operate like
this if you want to.
So in other words, we have a lot more power and authority to dictate how the Lord interacts
with us than we thought.
Again, I just want to point out that there's two systems working at the same time.
Prior though to the New Testament, we weren't allowed to step into this one, but now that
Christ died, we now have the option to step into this one, that's what's new about the
new covenant.
It's not that the old one isn't in operation, we still have a choice to choose the knowledge
of the tree of good and evil if we want to, both trees are still in existence in the garden.
But now we have the opportunity to come to the tree of life when we couldn't before.
So my point is that, yes, sometimes even if you feel like, oh, my goodness, you know,
I'm so afraid, what if in the new thing, I'm like, let myself go so much in order to observe
God's love, that I start making mistakes.
I start saying mean things, and I've never said mean things.
Or what if I start, I don't know, being, feeling like I made a very selfish decision.
Oh, my goodness, I must have let myself go too much.
No, that's part of it.
Watch yourself do things, trying to live in greater abandon to his love and observe how
he continues to love you.
And what will change our character, so that we don't do selfish things, so that we don't
say mean things and all that, what will change our character is his love, as opposed to trying
to change our character, which is what we did over here.
It's a list of do's and don'ts, a list of good and evil.
And we were choosing, I need to do these things by my sure willpower, I need to not do these
things by my own sure willpower.
Under the new system, we'll naturally do those things, the more that we understand that we're
loved by God.
But in the beginning, you're two or three years old.
So you don't know what his love looks like, and God, and so you'll grow in that character.
And so in the new system, you might feel that you look uglier for a while, that you're acting,
not like physically ugly.
I talk about a lot of things we do or say, you know, kind of like training wheels, training
wheels on a bike.
The old system, we had all these training wheels, and I was like, okay, it looks to
the world like you're riding a bike.
It looks to the world like you're functioning.
But now I'm telling you take the training wheels off.
So now you're going to have greater freedom than you had riding a bike with training wheels.
What's the problem with making the transition?
You were really good at this one.
You were really good at riding the bike with training wheels.
You take the training wheels off, often at the beginning, it looks like you can't even
ride a bike.
You're like, I'm, I'm doing, I'm falling off the bike.
I haven't fallen off the bike in years.
I've had trouble for how long?
Why on earth am I doing it?
Your life or your, your decisions, you look uglier.
Your character looks uglier on the outside because you're learning.
It's part of the process of transitioning and God created the process.
We have to stop vilifying a process in thinking that, that the process of transition, because
we're not perfect here and immediately perfect here when we change, that the in between is
sin.
We need to stop vilifying something that God created, process that God created for a toddler
to toddle around and get off balance and fall.
We need to stop thinking that when we do that, trying to transition into something new with
the Lord, that that's a sin.
We don't think it's a sin for a toddler to do that.
Why on earth?
And God created that process.
And he did that as a type and shadow to show, Hey, by the way, in the spirit, when you're
transitioning and you're learning something new, you're going to look worse for a while
than you did in the old system because you're now learning how to do it in a different way.
If God created the process to look like that, we have got to under, we have got to stop
condemning ourselves by thinking it's, it must be bad.
It's not bad.
If God's the one who created it to work like that, it's okay.
So I just wanted to say that because otherwise, you know, if you move into that, you know,
when you move into this, you could like me and so many others, I was even talking to
somebody the other day that was so discouraged with themselves.
self. And they came, it was one of my clients and they were just like, Ashley, I messed up again.
I knew better. And I knew all of this and I was operating a lot, you know, in the new system.
And then, and I was doing so well for so long. And then all of a sudden I made this decision
over here. And they're like, I was so embarrassed. I'm so disappointed in myself. And I had to remind
them, you know, if you're learning to ride the bike again, or you're learning to walk,
you're gonna toddle and you're gonna fall over. It's part of the process. And I had warned them
about it ahead of time because I didn't want them to not be on a call with me going through this
and get discouraged and start piling on this self-condemnation again. So I just want to
prepare you for it as well. When it comes, it's going to feel ugly and it's going to feel like
that's embarrassing. I can't believe that came out of me. It's part of the process.
So it's just like, go watch God love you like that. When you were never able to receive his love,
when you did those things, you were never able to hear or feel or receive his love over here.
So now in this system, you'll do those things and you'll now see that he loves you and it never
changes. And that he still gives you blessings that you think, yeah, but I don't deserve that.
Because I did, I didn't, I did something bad. We have a hard time getting rid of that word bad.
I've done something bad. Why would you give me something good? If I did something bad,
Lord, that, that really, really bothers me. My whole world feels upside down right now. How
on earth can that be true? That's part of how we feel overwhelming and loved by him.
And it's stuff like that. That's going to heal the fact that we're trying to require restitution
of him because like you did this to me, you did that to me, whatever it's making part of that
is making mistakes, making mistakes over here and watching his love. Absolutely overwhelming
that all of this, that is what starts healing us and starts taking care of all of this. And
we're not even paying attention to it, but I just wanted to mention all of those things are
natural part of the process. It don't self-condemn or to be discouraged or disappointed in yourself.
When it happens, I do it. I probably did. I think I did some things yesterday too. Like,
oh man, that's disappointing. And I, but I, I, I noticed that heaviness settling in. I was like,
that's not a God. That's my old paradigm of self-condemnation. I've got to deal with that
first before I even deal with whether or not what I did wasn't was a wise action or not.
I have to deal with the self-condemnation first. That's more important to the Lord.
And then once I deal with that, then I can deal with the action, deal with my reputation, deal
with saying sorry to somebody or whatever the issue may be. It's this I have to deal with first
because this is more important to the Lord. So I just want to prepare.
So it is, yeah, I think that we are, um, that your time is good until, I mean, it's good.
We can talk however long you want. I just wanted to make sure that you knew that I am fine on time,
you know, for when you are. And, um, so anyway, did you have any questions about what it is that
I said, or did you have another question? I don't know if this might feel like a lot to you. I mean,
like in other words, if I've just kind of like overloaded you, um, I just, I just know that
these are the things that I wish someone had told me. And I didn't, I didn't, um,
know them for so long. Finally, I had someone to start speaking. Uh, and, and it was Cindy
Anderson teaching for a while that began to kind of give me something on the outside, not just
from my spirit. Um, but, uh, I'm just saying the things that I thought that I know that mean the
most to me in this transition period. I want to not self-condemn. No, it makes a lot of sense.
I feel like, yeah. I mean, how can you feel when you feel like your whole world being clipped
upside down, but I feel like it's just in small matters and in small amounts that I can process
and take all this in and let, let the small amounts of the new truths transform the old parts
and just letting the process take place. And no, I feel like everything you've said has brought a
lot of clarity to, to me and it's, yeah, it helps a lot make sense of everything that's going on.
I'm glad. I'm glad. I'm sorry for what you've been through. I do know, um, we are the outside
of what we go through all looks different. We all have different experiences. Um, but internally,
but because God will use different outside expressions to do the exact same spiritual
work in all of us. So we've all been in the same place, but it's just.
which triggers that happened on the outside
that makes it look different.
But because the world doesn't know that,
they keep thinking that there is this hierarchy of sins
or traumas or whatever, and it's just not true.
Different triggers are used for us based off of,
you know, based off of our own personality
and what it is in our own background
and what it is that's going to pull up
and expose something in us that needs to be gotten rid of.
It's why certain things bother some people and not others.
Well, then those aren't gonna be trigger issues
for those people, but they are gonna be.
So it always brings us into more credo
and pulls us into a place that we feared.
He only does that to prove himself,
to prove that he's gonna appear there
and to prove that there was nothing to fear.
He doesn't take us there to learn something.
He takes us there to prove himself.
It's like, I'm gonna show you that,
I'm gonna take you to the place of your worst fear
and gonna show you that there was nothing to fear
because everything that I told you is actually true,
as opposed to believing it, but not experiencing it.
And we could either, we could do, you know, two things.
We could think, oh, well, I'm really afraid of that.
I hope that never happens.
Or we could all think, oh, I have such faith.
Even if it were to happen, I'd be fine.
Either way, God's like, okay, well, let's go there
so I can prove to you while you're in there
that it's no longer theory.
It's actually something that settles in your spirit
as eternal knowledge that you're here,
you're in like your worst nightmare,
and the thing that you feared actually wasn't true.
He's proving it.
And what he's doing is he's proving himself.
He's proving he's like, see, Ashley, we're here.
Now, this is what you were afraid of.
It was your worst nightmare.
And look, it's fine.
I'm like, wow, I really am free.
He really is that loving.
He really is everywhere.
They're really, I'm sitting here in my worst nightmare,
and it really is nothing to be afraid of.
But until I was there, on the outside,
I was always afraid of it.
I'm like, oh, yeah, but oh, that,
you know, I really don't want you to take me there, Lord.
I really don't want that to happen in my life.
And then when God puts us there,
it's like, see, there wasn't anything to fear.
I'm like, oh, and then it gives you faith
for other things that we haven't walked into yet.
Anyway, it's always, it's a different way to see testing,
to understand that testing is not,
and like God with Abraham, for Isaac,
God wasn't trying to teach Abraham something.
God already knew what decision that Abraham was gonna make.
What he needed to do was he needed to teach.
He needed Abraham to see who God was in that moment
so that Abraham could be freed from the fear
because it was not theoretical anymore
that God would come through.
Abraham was there and God came through.
So he experienced it.
God actually walked it out.
So that's what testing is.
He's not testing us to see if we're gonna,
and I don't even know how I got on the subject,
but God isn't testing us to see,
well, are you gonna make the right decision?
I have taught you up to this point.
So let's give you a test
and let's see if you make the right decision.
See if you're gonna get the right door.
And that's not what he does.
He does it to prove himself.
He's like, I want you to see.
Everything I've been telling you is true
and I want you to watch it.
We took it as the opposite.
We thought that he was using it
to prove ourselves to him that we are.
And it's not, he's like, let me take you there so that,
and I want you to receive it as me proving myself to you.
I want you, I wanna take you there
and I want you to watch me come through.
I want you to observe who I am.
That's how we know that we're loved.
We observe it.
Yeah.
That's good.
Don't know how I got off on that, there you go.
No, it was really good.
I was just thinking if I would have known,
if I would have had that mindset going into
the past couple of years,
it would have been drastically different.
I know.
Drastically different.
I know, me too.
I always thought God was trying to bring me into more pain
so that I'd have greater,
so I'd prove myself in greater spiritual maturity
so that he'd love me.
And God's like, no, no, no, it's opposite.
We thought it was going this direction,
it's going this direction.
I approve of to you, why on earth are you continuing to try to prove yourself to me?
He was like, I don't need it. I already know everything. I'm God. See, that's another thing
that always frustrated me. If he always knew, why on earth was I proving anything? He already
knew how I was going to act. Why was he doing it? He's like, because I'm the one who needed to learn.
Therefore, he's taking me to it so that I, you know, he already knows it.
If it was going, he already knows it. I don't need to prove myself to him because he knows the answer
that he needed himself to me so that I would know the answer. It's the other direction.
And it's free, you know, with your father or with everything else. And, you know,
and everything that you, that you went through, you know, with the Lord, God's wanting to prove
himself to you. He's like, you see the situation? Isn't this your worst nightmare? Where am I in it?
You know, how am I, how am I presenting myself? How am I there? When, if you hadn't been able to
anticipate this, wouldn't you have feared this like nothing else? So God's like, let me put you
there to prove to you who I am. I don't need you to prove yourself to me. I don't need you to like,
oh, God told me to be strong. God told me to do this. God told me to do that. We're naturally
going to be strong, relying on the Lord. If we understand what it is he's saying and what he's
trying to prove of himself in the moment, just watching it, we're going to be filled with love.
We're going to become more like him because we feel loved by him. So we're going to respond back
in love. And we're naturally going to, what's naturally going to come out of this, of us is all
of those fruits of the spirit, love, joy, patience, all those things that in this system we kept
working for. I'm trying to, trying to become more patient. I'm trying to become, you know,
I'm going through all these exercises to teach myself patience and going through all of these
tests in order to teach myself endurance, or God is taking me through them, whichever.
And it's not, God's like, no, no, no. Observe how much I love you. And the more that you are filled
with my love and the more that you are filled with understanding that you are one with me and
that you have my very nature and essence within you, you will naturally bear the fruit of love,
joy, peace, patience. Over here, we were trying to work to actually create the result. Over here,
no, it'll naturally happen. That's why it's called fruit. A tree doesn't have to work for fruit.
It naturally comes by it just absorbing the nutrients it's supposed to. And then everything
naturally happened. It's not striving to create fruit. It's naturally going to because it's an
apple tree. That's what it is. It's nature. So our very nature, if we, if we submit ourselves
to the Lord, subject ourselves to his love, and allow it to fill ourselves up, this is all the
nutrients, it's naturally going to be a fruit, as opposed to being over here and trying to,
trying to like back engineer it. Okay, there's an apple tree. I wonder how I can get an apple.
Okay, so how did it do it? And then we're, and then we're having to try to create all this
system that's exhausting. It worked. He wants to do that. The fruits of this, it's supposed to
naturally result. We don't have to think, okay, I'm in this, I'm in this test. So I'm supposed
to prove my strength. I'm supposed to prove I've learned that I can be strong. That's not what's
going on. If we commit ourselves to our love, his love, his love strengthens us. Without work,
we're going to be strong. Without trying, we are going to be strong. Without trying, we're going
to be patient. Without trying, we're going to be, we're going to endure. Because his love in us
transforms us without us understanding what's going on. God showed me this several,
but three months ago, maybe, that the soul doesn't know how to heal itself. It can work and try and
learn in this system. But this over here, the soul doesn't have to learn how to heal itself.
All it has to do is sit back, watch the spirit do it. And then the soul is watching the spirit
heal the soul. And then the soul knows what's going on. Like, oh, apparently that's how it's
done. The soul didn't have to do anything. The soul didn't know how to do it. It didn't know
what was going on. It didn't know how to heal it. It didn't know what needed to be healed or
how to heal it. It didn't understand anything. And it was frustrated and it was confused.
All it knew was, is it was in pain. So if the soul submits itself to the Lord, and just allows
the spirit to come in while the spirit is healing it, all the soul is doing is watching it happen
in their life and realizing, oh, I'm getting healed. I'm not even working for it. The soul
isn't. I'm just watching the spirit to it. Apparently that's how it's done. Apparently
that's what I needed. Apparently that's what needed healing in my life.
didn't have to know prior to it happening.
It just gains the understanding later.
So operating the spirit allows a greater power
to come into our life and to take over.
So that's why this is rest.
Rest, this work, striving for rest.
Having to strive for it.
We work, in other words, we've got activity.
But we're not working.
We just rest in our work.
So that's why all of it, that's why I always talk about rest.
This entire thing is always just sitting in rest.
All of these things just happen as we submit and we receive.
That makes so much sense.
Yeah, well, one thing, I guess as far as business
changing gears here, I feel like my business is
a little monster baby that I created out
of all of my malfunction.
That's hilarious.
But I feel like we're in a very unhealthy relationship.
I haven't been doing much at all this month,
just because of everything that I've
been working through personally, spiritually and stuff.
There has been not much going on at all.
Last month was kind of the same way,
because I could feel it coming.
I was like, oh no, something's coming.
But last month, it was still a really good month for me.
But this month, it's just like there's nothing there right now.
And I feel like the fish out of water, in a sense,
in the group, because I am not a business lady at all.
I don't understand how I get paid.
I don't understand anything.
I just get a check, and that's great.
I do not understand anything as far as money, numbers, nothing.
And where was I going with that?
Oh, I forget where I was going with that.
But I feel like my business has been
an expression of all the malfunctions in my life,
that that's where I turn to.
I don't know.
Does that even make sense?
No, that's exactly right.
That's the thing.
My heart is the things that we've
been talking about all up to this point in the conversation.
The reason that I say business is because most people are not
in the place or don't understand that they're
in the place where you understand
that you are spiritually.
Business is an extension of our life.
So when people are having a problem in business,
the problem is them.
Not that they're a problem, but it's
that all of the issues, all of the struggles,
all of the things that they doubt about themselves,
it expresses itself into the business.
So if the business is unhealthy, it's just a created thing.
So where on earth did it get its life source from?
It's its life source that's the problem.
The reason that I tell people, hey,
I work with business people, I do that for two reasons.
One, because they take ownership of their lives a lot easier
than people who aren't interested in the business.
And so people need to understand and stand
and stepping into this shifting in the spirit.
They need to understand I can't fix them.
Because the longest time my message was different
and people kept coming to me that wanted me to fix them.
I'm like, no, no, I need to try to be able to understand
I can't fix them.
They have to take ownership of wanting to do this
for themselves.
Business people are more likely to do that
because people that like to take ownership of things
for themselves, because they have a dream,
they tend to gravitate towards business.
So that's one of the reasons.
God has also just put it on my heart
and he's just guided me to it.
I tried to escape for a long time
because I was burned out on business.
And so anyway, that's another reason that I do it
is because the Lord just put it on my heart
and it's just like, actually, this is what I've given you.
I've taught you things.
So it can't hurt you anymore.
What hurts you in the past can hurt you
if you go into business.
And then the third thing is that I want people to understand
how to operate from a place of rest.
But the reason I talk about business in my message
and I'm always talking about work, et cetera,
is because that's what people think
they're having a problem with.
So if they're looking over here and I'm saying,
no, your problem is over here,
this is what you need to get your answer to this.
They can't see or hear me because I'm over here.
So I have to put myself where they are
so that they can finally hear,
oh, you're talking to me.
Because they're using the words of business or whatever.
So I have to start talking like that.
But then when they become my client,
they were like, okay, so let's work on your business.
We're starting from here.
And all of the sudden.
and they kind of realize, Oh, my word. So this is what's wrong with my business. Like, yeah,
but I guess at the beginning, I had to tell you this so that you'd understand because it's all
the only language that they have, right? People don't know what you know,
most people do not understand have not made that connection. So say that as an encouragement.
It can tell you really listen to spirit because things like that only come because that the
spirit has revealed the father to them. And, and so you've come to understand that your business,
that, that the unhealthy aspects of whatever it is you're struggling with are evidencing
themselves in their, in your business. That that's why I got burned out on business.
The problem was me and the issues I was struggling with. And one of the areas that
evidenced itself in was business because I didn't, I wasn't married and I didn't have children.
So all of my effort, energy, focus, and time, it went into a career. So if that's where I'm
putting all of my effort, energy, and time, that's where all of my problems are going to express
themselves. And before I knew that I would burn out on business, I was like, business is awful.
No, the problem wasn't business. It was me. So anyway, so no, you're absolutely right.
Yeah, that makes sense. And I keep thinking like, man, this is my type
of business coaching. Like, this is so like, I could sit and talk about what we've been talking
about for hours, but then like sitting and talking about like actual business is like,
puts me to sleep. That's why I'm like, is it okay if I just forget about my business
for now? Like, is that irresponsible of me to just not even go there? You know what I mean? Like,
uh-huh. I feel like I can't go there right now. Yeah. Well, then that, you know, that's fine.
It depends on what it is, not as to whether or not it's right. I mean, that's perfectly fine.
I mean, there's no, you don't have to worry that, oh, well, is there a right or wrong in this
situation? I'm saying that if, you know, it's interesting for you to think, okay, why do not
want to, well, I mean, I suppose it really doesn't matter that you have to necessarily understand. I
just like to understand these things, but it didn't matter as to what is for your sake thinking,
why do I not want to do it? Do I not want to do it because I'm burnt out or do I not want to do it
because I just don't have the energy to do it because I'm focusing on these other, but here's
the thing you buy and you are working on your business by focusing on the other. You can't do
anything healthy in your business until this is taken care of. So you don't have to worry about it.
It's not going to go anywhere. It's going to be fine. And I just highly recommend that you
don't villainize it like I did. You're going to have to overcome whatever it is that you vilify
about it. You're going to have to overcome that image if you create, start creating that image.
So I highly recommend that you, that, that you don't do that because that's what I did.
And I, I, oh my word, I just rebelled against the Lord for so long because I couldn't handle
business. I, the word made me mad. It was, it was that bad. People talk about starting a business
and I'm like, why would you want to do that? The other night, she's like, oh, I'm just like this
wild serial entrepreneur. And in my mind, I'm going, why?
And it's funny that I have been a turnaround business consultant for so long teaching people
how to do it. That is what I have done for a living. And I now still do it. And yet I'm like,
why would you want to start a business? I do not have the desire to be an entrepreneur.
That does not fascinate me. But the reason why I do this and the reason why I do like business,
there's this draw that the Lord has created in me towards it. Because in the spirit, I see what it
can be. But what, what burned part of what burned me out is that when I got there, that when I got
into it, that is not what it looked like. And I thought, this is ugly. This is awful. But the
Lord still draws me to it. And what he's shown me is, Ashley, I want to reveal to you and to
others that the way I created business to work is actually should operate totally differently.
So no wonder I was frustrated with this. And that's what I keep hearing when people say that
they have this desire to be an entrepreneur. Because all I can think of is this system.
But what fascinates me about business is I know what it can be. In fact, I don't fully know what
it can be. But it's like my spirit knows something that my soul can't quite see yet. It's like
seeing this big fog. And I'm like, okay, there's something there. And I know that
And the more and more that God,
God will bring more and more substance out of it,
where I'll actually start to see eventual pictures
of what it could be.
So now, understand that you're not abandoning your business.
By focusing on this, you're focusing on the health
of the life source that the business is coming out of.
And right now, it sounds like you feel like there's,
that you don't have to give what it needs.
Right, to make it unhealthy, yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I'm not saying I wanna put away with it,
like forever.
I just feel like,
I feel like that is the least of my worries right now.
Cause I feel like I can't, I can't do both
because with my business, I take it very seriously.
Like it's all or nothing.
And I can't just kind of be there
because of the type of person that I am.
I have to feel connected to my audience, to my group.
I do a lot on Instagram and blogging and stuff.
And I have to feel that connection
or else it's just, there's nothing there.
And my audience can feel that.
I declare they can.
And so I'm like, if I am on there
and trying to make everything all happy and whatever,
like it's gonna hurt me more than anything
cause they know that something's going on.
I mean, it always happens.
Like when I am not, when I don't feel that inspiration
and I don't feel that life, it just, it goes so horrible.
And I'm like, I don't even, I can't even right now
try and create things when there's like,
everything is like literally being sucked out of me.
Yes.
Yeah.
Cause your business needs your spirit
and you don't know in some ways who your spirit is
and you don't know how to let it effortlessly flow.
So you don't even have what it is that your business.
Right.
I don't know what I need to give it.
Yeah.
And once you discover your spirit
and the way that God effortlessly flows out of you,
your business becomes effortless.
Then you, then you rest, you know, you're resting from work
which is what we're learning to do now.
We're resting from work so that we can work from rest.
It's when everything comes effortlessly out of your spirit.
That is what your business is.
Your business is the way that your spirit flows
into the earth, manifesting heaven into earth
and impacting the world in a particular way.
So when our spirits flow, manifesting heaven into earth,
it can do it in different ways.
It can do it in finances.
It can do it in relationships.
It can do it in business.
And so when it comes through business,
business, interestingly,
and this is something that I need to tell the group,
is business is not about money.
Business is about the movement of money.
And it's all about money moving from one place to another.
That is the purpose of business,
is to create flow of currency in some form.
And it doesn't even have to be money,
but it needs to be an exchange of good
and services between people.
That's the point of the business model
is to create flow in that particular area of life,
goods and services, currency, whatever.
And so, but flow, in other words,
any part of creation needs some aspect
of the spirit of God, which you have flowing through you,
in order to give it the power
that it needs to actually move.
And if you can't give it the power that it needs
to make the money flow, or the goods or services,
well, then there's, the business isn't doing anything.
And it's just dead and it's all of,
and you're trying to drum up this non-life source
out of your own sheer willpower,
get it to move just a little bit.
And that's exhausting, there's no point in it.
Your business brings life into the world,
if you're giving it life, which comes through the spirit
that's flowing through you from God.
So you're out, right.
Just don't, yeah, so don't think
that you are abandoning your business by focusing on this.
No, you are at the actual root of the problem.
In other words, you are actually at the root
of what it is your business needs.
So it is working on business, and it's focusing,
in a way, it's focusing completely on it.
Yeah, I guess that makes sense.
Yeah.
Yeah, I'm just wondering how in the world
do you talk to clients that aren't Christians?
Do you have a lot of clients that are different faiths?
I don't have a lot, I'm trying to think.
Currently, no, I don't have a lot.
Most of them are Christians, though.
It makes it easier.
It makes it a lot easier.
And they're attracted to my message.
But I do have some people that I've worked with.
Um, and, uh, and, and so, like I said, one of them is a Muslim, another, I have another
one who's a Mormon.
And so the Mormon though, I can actually talk to him about all of these things, but he's,
he's still, there are certain things that he believes that I don't.
So that really doesn't come into play that the Muslim though is very interesting to talk
to.
But remember that we're all children of God, even though we're not all sons of God.
You know, and the fact that we're not all, we don't all believe that Jesus Christ died
and all of that.
We were all born from God, God created all of us.
So we all have that in common.
He loves all of us all the same.
Um, so I can talk from the perspective that even if, even if I had an atheist who didn't
believe in God, I can talk to people and this is how we have relationships with anybody,
whether or not they're clients.
We talk to people who, according to who we see in the spirit that they actually are,
they may see themselves down here as something different and they might present themselves
to me like this.
If I talk to them like this, their spirit over time begins to recognize that this is
who they are.
It's almost like they tell me that their name is Jane and I keep calling them Sally.
And, um, and so eventually they realize, you know, I'd forgotten my name actually is
Sally.
That sounds right.
I don't know how I knew that.
So it's almost like you awaken something in them that they didn't realize was there.
Yes.
So I love them to God.
I don't have to fix them.
I don't have to convince them.
That's that old paradigm.
That's an old system where we had to commit somebody and we had to preach and we had to
evangelize, but like shoving things down your throat, Jesus, when he came into it,
he just loved.
Yes.
He talked in any spoken, whatever, but he didn't condemn when he do it.
And when he did it back to the adulterous, you didn't even realize it.
He didn't even reveal who he was, that she was brought to him by all the Jews, not maybe
particularly the Pharisees.
I don't remember brought to him and, uh, and, and first he's like, look, we even caught
her in the act.
So Jesus said, okay, well, you know, what, whoever he gets down there and writes in the
dirt and he says, well, whichever one of you, you know, that has not sinned, you get to
cast the first stone.
They all eventually walked away.
And so the adulterous is sitting there.
So he looks up and he asked her, well, where are all your accusers?
In other words, the people who are condemning you, you found out what it is that you did.
You've declared over your identity.
They declared that this is who you are.
They made a declaration that they determined this is your identity and they're speaking
that.
And he said, where are they?
She said, well, they're not here.
And he said, I don't condemn you either.
I go and send no more.
He didn't ask her to repent.
He didn't ask her to feel sorry or not repent.
He did ask her to repent because repent just means to not do it anymore.
What I meant was he didn't ask for her remorse.
He didn't ask her to feel sorry.
He didn't tell her, by the way, I'm the son of God.
He didn't tell her, by the way, this is, this is the kingdom of God and I need to reveal
it to you.
He's the son of God.
He could, that was his moment to reveal to somebody, hey look, for, because wouldn't
we think, oh my goodness, Lord, but if you let her go without telling her, isn't your
blood, isn't her blood on your hand?
We just think, oh my word, we have to fix people.
We have to reveal it.
We have to say it.
We have to say the name Jesus so that they'll hear him and does it.
And God's like, no, my spirit will draw, I draw people to me by my spirit.
We don't have to make it happen.
Even the son of God, when he was on the earth, he didn't even tell her who he was, let alone
the fact that, by the way, you need to know that there's this thing called the kingdom
of God.
Do you believe in God?
And he didn't ask any of that.
All I just, he didn't even ask her to feel sorry.
He didn't ask her to be remorseful and like put on sackcloth and ashes.
He just said, don't do it anymore.
And that was enough.
And if the son of God, if that is all that he decided was enough to say, why on earth
do we think that we are called to carry a different burden?
That's exhausting.
So when I talk to my Muslim friend, she keeps calling him Allah.
I keep calling him God and we have a conversation.
I don't bring up Jesus.
We talk about God and we talk about how loving he is and how he means this and how he means
this.
And she says, oh, you know what?
God, you know, God doesn't intend for women to be like, uh, to, to be oppressed.
God did not intend women to be like this and God, you know, God loves them just as
much as he loves men and whatever.
She's covered in everything.
And she's like, in fact, I can tell you all this
because she's mentioned on Facebook,
on my Facebook wall, who she is, that I helped her.
And that she's been, in fact, she has a,
not a ministry, but she has a consulting business
where she helps women, Muslim women
who are in abusive situations,
understand who it is that they are,
and then to get out of those abusive situations.
Like I said, she's covered.
She wears these, you know, long dresses.
It's not like she's like some new trendy Muslim.
No, she's very orthodox.
But she believed God has a hold of her spirit
and a hold of her heart
where he's revealed to her, I am love.
So in his timing, he can reveal to her
that the way that she can connect with him
and become one with him is through Jesus.
But in the meantime, I enjoy her as my sister
of someone who was created by God.
My sister, and I acknowledge that,
and I call her out in her spirit response to it.
She has told me, Ashley, I've talked to so many people,
so many business people.
In fact, I don't know,
but maybe she's talked to other Christians too.
And she said, of all people,
she said, you're the one that I want to talk to.
Wow.
I accept her.
I'm like, you're fine the way you are.
I understand you have one religion and I believe another.
And I said, isn't it fun?
I said, don't you and I have fun
just understanding that we believe totally differently.
I mean, not totally differently,
but that we have different religions,
but that we can really love and enjoy each other.
And she said, I love it.
Wow.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
She's the Lord's, I'm not,
he doesn't hold me responsible for her.
And anyway, so that's how I do it.
I just talk from the perspective of the truths of God,
not having to bring the whole Jesus in line with Christ.
And I talk about what it is that she knows she,
which is universal love.
Love is the universal language.
Talk about love, talk about God's love for us,
how other people, there's value in other people.
We talk about those kinds of things.
All of those are principles of the same God that we serve,
speaking life into her.
That's really fascinating.
So you call her out basically from who God says she is
and call her spirit out.
That's really interesting.
Yes.
Yeah.
In fact, that's what we'll be talking about later.
Like much more specifically when we start talking about
how to interact with clients and customers
and all of that.
And of course we can apply it in every of our life,
talking to spouses, talking to children,
talking to parents, whatever.
But because it's a group talking about business,
we can talk very specifically about how to talk like that
to clients, to customers, potential customers,
whoever, team members, like say for instance,
your upline or your downline,
and then how people respond to that,
how they respond to that type of leadership
of talking to them here
when they're presenting themselves to you
like they're down here.
And it's an effortless way of leading other people
because you don't have to work to pull them up.
You just talk to them up here.
They will naturally start to hear themselves
because all it is is they're remembering
who it is that they are.
And they've just never had anybody
call them by their real name.
But over time, God prompts their spirit
and like, that is my name.
I didn't remember that that was my name.
I didn't even know what to call myself.
I just knew that this where I am now
just couldn't be all that there was.
And I was so disappointed this is all I could ever find.
Finally, the first person in their life
is telling them, is always talking to them up here
and refusing to talk to them down here,
always talking to them.
They will rise up there
because you're agreeing with God
that this is who they are in their spirit already.
And so God's already declared it.
And then they'll rise according to what's already,
God's already declared that they're up here.
So we're repeating God's words back to them
and we're speaking it into the earth,
which again is manifesting heaven into earth.
And it's, they're gonna respond to it.
And it's, so it makes leadership less effortless.
I mean, less effortless, less striving to like bolster,
support our people.
That's awesome.
Right.
Yeah.
It's a lot easier.
Wow.
That makes everything make sense.
Everything can rest.
Yeah.
That's crazy though.
It's amazing though.
Like when you start thinking about
The old, like the system that I was functioning for
or functioning in, it's so me-centric.
Yes.
Or so centric on my actions
and everything revolves around what I do
that's gonna tip the scale in the wrong way, you know?
But then when you can actually focus on God
and just kind of forget about yourself,
everything seems to kind of make sense.
Yes, everything operates
because we're seated in the heavenly places in Christ,
meaning that there's nothing left.
Yeah.
If everything's from a place of rest
and God will naturally produce
everything we thought we were abandoned
to try to produce on our own.
God's like, no, I produce it.
I provide the increase
and then I raise you into maturity of how to govern it.
Anyway, you know, remember the prodigal son's father?
The one who owned everything.
The older son, he told him,
look, all that I have has always been yours.
You know, have it whenever you want.
I'm providing you the increase.
You don't have to work for it.
You just are my son, so you get to benefit from it.
And he said, and I thought we were co-laboring together.
He said, but apparently you thought you were working for it.
After you'd worked for it,
you wouldn't give yourself a go.
You wouldn't take a row.
You just, you know, you just kept working.
And so anyway, God provides the increase
and then he teaches us how to govern it.
And governing it isn't from strife.
It's governing it as in the way that he does.
He rules the world.
He reigns as a king and he's teaching us
we're the kings that he's king of.
He's just got a rule.
It's not striving.
So, it's awesome.
We are not out of what we do.
It's really good.
Well, I think, I mean,
I don't think I have any more questions.
I mean, I feel like I've,
I feel like I'm up to the brim of what I can take in.
You know, you eat too much
and you're like, I've got to stop.
I'm full.
I do.
I've got to let this digest.
It was so good.
Yeah, and,
yeah, anyway.
Yeah, I'm good.
I was thinking, do I have anything else?
No?
No, if you have anything else, I mean, feel free.
I could just talk about this for hours and hours.
I was just thinking, if you would like,
I don't know if you know,
but I record all of my client sessions for myself.
I do.
And I've only done this to one other client,
but I think that I'd like to offer it to this as well.
And so I was trying to make a split minute decision.
I'm like, do I want to do that?
And that is to offer this as well,
because for me, I find it helpful if I re-watch things,
because kind of like, you know,
posting all those lives on Facebook,
people have the opportunity to go back and re-watch them.
So if you would like,
and it also frees people up
to not constantly have to take notes,
so that they can actually get more out of the sessions,
because there's just life interaction.
So if you would like,
I can actually give you our recordings
that we make of our private sessions.
Would that be beneficial or useful?
Yeah, I would love that.
Yeah, I feel like that would definitely help.
Oh, good.
Because I know like, when you're live,
you can only hear certain things.
You can only take in so much.
And I feel like that would be very beneficial
for me to be able to go back
and see what else I get out of it.
Good, yeah.
Especially if you go through a time
where you get discouraged
and you're trying to remember.
You can also say,
could you tell me a few days like this?
Why don't you tell me a few days like this?
And again, also for me, I'll watch something,
and sometimes I think, oh, I understand it.
And then I give myself a few weeks or a few months,
and I re-watch it,
and all of a sudden new things come to the surface.
It's like reading a Bible, layer upon layer.
It's like, okay, so once I got a foundation,
then I re-watched the same thing,
and all of a sudden more comes to understanding.
Like, oh my word, I didn't realize.
I thought that I maxed it out.
I thought that I understood everything
and everything's good.
But as you actually make what you understood
reality in your life,
then if you add in,
then if you re-watch it through a new paradigm,
you understand more.
And now you've got more than that to like give back.
Do you have a Dropbox?
Because what I can do is I can put the,
or Google Drive.
I have, let me ask Josh.
Do I have Google Drive or Dropbox?
Okay, I have Google Drive.
Yeah, put it on Google Drive and if what you will do is if you'll let me know when you have, when you've moved it over to your, your drive because it you know it'll appear in the shared folder.
Yeah, I'll have to ask you.
You, it's not it's not downloading it but in other words, will allow me to remove it, that would be beneficial for me.
Once you transfer the file over I give you access to the file then transfer it over to your own.
Because I only have so much room on my drive right are pretty large. So, a lot of space to remove it so that my next client I can, you know, the next person right.
They can do it.
Am I my drive because we're not in that room.
So do you want me to let you know then or will you be able to see when it's over on my drive.
No, I won't be able to see. Okay, I'll let you know.
I don't remember. Google tells me that someone has saved it or forwarded it.
I don't remember, but just in case.
If you want to just tell me.
Okay.
My email is v i l m i t 96 at gmail.com.
Okay, thank you so much for this. It was so good.
With you too.
We'll talk to you later, Ashley.
Bye.