Jan 15, 2020
It’s hard to fight the false
narrative that working harder, making more money, and acquiring
more stuff will bring happiness and fulfillment. My guest today is
here to debunk that myth and help us discovery what’s truly most
important to us. Get ready, because Meredith McDaniel is going to
share her incredible wisdom about what we are truly searching for
as humans. Meredith is a licensed professional counselor and owner
of her own private practice, Milk and
Honey Counselling. She is a graduate of the Gordon Conwell
Theological Seminary and has served on staff with
Young Life and worked as the lead
counselor for Inheritance of Hope. She has a new book coming out
next week on January 21st, 2020 called In Want +
Plenty: Waking Up to God’s Provision In a Land of
Longing. I highly recommend you preorder it right away. I’ve already had the chance
to read it, and it is simply incredible. Meredith says that she
feels called to sit with and listen to the stories of women and
men, helping them discover who they are and experience life more
fully. She enjoys entering into the quiet places of people’s lives
in a safe setting to offer hope and help others taste of the Land
of Milk and Honey. It was so refreshing, encouraging, and
challenging to speak with Meredith today. Join me for this serene
moment with Meredith McDaniel.
3:07 – The Meredith 101
- Meredith is a licensed counselor
who also went to seminary. She completed her Master of Christian
Counseling program at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary. She
studied core bible classes, but her main focus was integrating
Christianity and Psychology.
- It’s so important for the Church
to care not only for people’s spiritual lives, but for people’s
mental health as well.
- About half of Meredith’s clients
in her private practice are walking with the Christian faith and
half of them are not. Her goal is to provide a safe space for
people to process their lives. She doesn’t approach sessions from
an evangelical mindset, but questions like “Who Am I?”, “Why Am I
Here?”, and “What Is My Purpose?” often come up naturally in
sessions with people who don’t identify as Christians.
- Meredith has been encouraged that
the stigma with mental health has started to wane. There are far
more organizations speaking about anxiety and depression, and more
conversations are happening on podcasts and social
media.
- In the near future, Meredith will
work with a local school to provide counseling onsite so that
students don’t have to worry about missing as much school to get to
appointments.
10:08 – A Universal Feeling: Purpose
& Meaning
- There’s a common story that brings
us all together: We all want meaning and purpose in our lives no
matter what our beliefs and backgrounds. Meredith calls it a
yearning. Some feel it deeper than others, but we all feel it to
some degree.
- Meredith began to notice a pattern
that no matter what season of life people are in, many different
people feel as if their lives are unraveling and they’ve lost sight
of their purpose. Many people feel stuck in that space and don’t
feel like they can pull themselves out of it.
- The key seems to be finding
movement and seeing our lives in a new way while being at peace
with knowing there are a lot of factors out of our control. This is
what gave Meredith the ideas for much what she wrote for In
Want & Plenty: In Want + Plenty: Waking Up to God's Provision in a
Land of Longing.
13:40 - The Exodus
Provision
- Meredith compares our modern lives
to biblical characters who wandered in the wilderness for years.
Our mouths are dry, and our stomachs are rumbling, and we are
wandering.
- Think about it this way: We wake
up, we scroll through our phones, our minds are running with to do
lists, we don’t stop to breathe, stretch or sweat, and we have
trouble connecting to each other in a real way. If you take a
closer look, we can relate to the people in the story of Exodus and
other parts of the bible.
- Meredith talks about the idea of
“manna” both in her book and often on social media. If you’re not
familiar with that term, the Hebrew translation is literally, “What
Is It?” The dictionary definition from biblical context is “the
substance miraculously supplied as food to the Israelites in the
wilderness (Exodus 16).” Meredith summarizes the feeling of a
“manna moment” to be a moment where God has provided for her in a
way that she was surprised by that she didn’t quite fully
understand.
- Sometimes “manna moments” come in
the form of things we may not like or prefer. We may not know why
certain things happen, but we can surrender and trust that God has
the big picture that we can’t see.
- We want what we want, and we want
it right now, but if we can unearth the manna that is in every
single corner of our lives, it completely changes our view and we
start recognizing it.
21:13 – How to Hunt for
Manna
- In her book, Meredith equips
readers to look for manna in their lives. The number one way to do
this is slowing down. Our world is too fast and we don’t have the
time or space to absorb what’s happening beneath the surface in our
lives.
- Slowing down could look different
from person to person. What does it look like to you to make space
and prioritize certain things in your life?
- For Meredith, one thing that helps
her slow down is music. To sit and listen to a song and absorb it
can help you recognize things in your own heart and soul before
going back into the world to do what you’re called to
do.
- Anything that helps calm our
systems will help us fight anxiety and/or depression. Movement,
exercise, and time in nature can also help our systems calm. Eating
well and being aware of what we put in our minds and bodies helps
greatly. All these things inspire us for the work we are meant to
do. We have to take care of our whole being – our mental well-being
as well as our physical well-being.
- Prayer, actively slowing down to
nourish our spiritual lives, and patience prepares us to recognize
manna moments when they’re fulfilled. If life is a marathon, how
are we fueling our bodies, minds, and souls?
- If we try to look at all the
things we need and want to do, we become overwhelmed. It’s
important for people to realize it’s ok if they can’t do it all. We
can rely on God, on others, on counseling. It’s important to
remember the long game. It’s a lifelong journey and it’s ok to slow
down and relinquish some control.
33:48 – It’s Not All on Our
Shoulders
- It can feel daunting to look back
at your life. Most of us don’t want to sit with feelings from the
past or even the present. We only want to look forward. It can be
painful to do the work of looking back. That’s when we can lean on
our communities, friends, and family members we trust.
- Sometimes that community includes
a therapist or spiritual director who is willing to make a space
for you to process your life.
- In the story of Exodus in the
Bible, the Israelites found their voice in desperation. There are
so many examples of them crying to God in desperation. God still
wants us to cry out to him.
- It’s easy in our modern lives to
think we have to pretend that we have it all together and hide our
feelings from others and even from God. That’s what keeps a lot of
us separated from God and from the people we’re blessed to have in
our lives.
- When we can’t manage things on our
own, it’s ok to ask for help and focus on healing. Both God and our
communities want us to ask for help. We can surrender and trust
God, even when it feels like our prayers and not being
answered.
21:43 - We’ve got to slow down. Our
world is so fast-paced and the content we have at our fingertips
and in our ears at any point is crowding out the space we have to
hear, see, and listen, and absorb what is happening beneath the
surface.”
22:30 “I think it’s really important
that we have time where we are just processing our story from the
beginning of our life to wherever we are now…”
32:30 - “It’s more of a mystery,
this whole life thing. It’s a case by case basis based on our own
personality and who and how we were made to be. If we’re
disconnected than the one who made us, it makes sense that we would
be walking around feeling a little bit disoriented…”
33:00 - “I am part of a greater
story. I get to play a role and it’s a gift and an honor to get to
play a small role in the grander, rescue narrative, but I am not
the main character and that is relieving and very freeing to me to
get to lean in to it from that perspective.”
42:30 – “My prayer is that
people would start to hunt for the manna: When they’re holding that
ache of both (what they) want and experiencing the abundance of the
plenty, that they would be able to see the manna in
both.”
Meredith’s book In Want +
Plenty: Waking Up to God’s Provision In a Land of
Longing comes out January
21st,
2020. You can find it at basically all the book places (Amazon,
Barnes & Noble, etc.) as well as Meredith’s website. You can preorder it now! There are even
extra goodies that come with preorder including a song with lyrics,
a beautiful print, and access to early chapters. All you have to do
is go HERE and enter your order number to claim your
extras. They will arrive to your inbox on January
21st.
44:41 - Getting to Know Our
Guest
Find out what rejuvenates Meredith
(she hasn’t shared this with many people!), her favorite TV to
watch growing up, what she’s reading, and something that’s really
important to her but she never gets a chance to talk about. Be sure
to stay tuned for Meredith’s answer to the question I ask all my
guests: “What Does it Mean to You to Run a Business with
Purpose?”
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