The Habit of Reflection with Ann Voskamp
Jessica Honegger [00:00:03] Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Going Scared podcast. Join me here every week for conversations that encourage you to live a life of purpose by leaving comfort and going scared. I am excited at how much you all have been loving this habit series and honestly, as the world begins to return to pre-COVID normalcy, I can't think of a better topic to get us back into healthy rhythms in our lives. This has been a really, really fun podcast series for me. I've become really aware of what helps me to keep habits, what are some bad habits worth breaking? And I've said this a lot at this point, but I mean, the fact that I'm washing my face at night is really blowing my mind. I also bought floss and it is in my shower and I'm now flossing my teeth and I even started running a little bit again after our talk about movement. It's been good. Now it is our very last show in this series. So, to finish off, we are joined by my close dear friend Ann Voskamp. Ann is a speaker, wife, mother to seven and author of four New York Times bestsellers. Most recently, she wrote Waymaker Finding the Way to Live the Life You've Always Dreamed Of. Waymaker really does create a way for us to become reflective people and Ann lives this out. She like it is. I'll mention one book to her and she will have read it the very next week. She is so well read, so well spoken, and most of all, she's not afraid to sit and take notice of her interior mapping. She really lives out today's topic through and through. So, it works out that she just wrote a book about this because I was going to have her talk about this anyway. We're finishing off our habit series with the final topic: reflection. I know you're wondering, is a reflection a habit? In fact, I think we're ending the series with the cornerstone habit that can absolutely change your life. Join me as we dive in with Ann Voskamp. I am here with Ann Voskamp. Welcome to Going Scared.
Ann Voskamp [00:02:56] Oh, I just love you, Jessica Honegger, because you actually live the message.
Jessica Honegger [00:03:02] So what some of you might not know is that Anne and I have known each other for a long time, but we've gotten to be really close friends over the last two years. And I would say we both could easily admit that fear is something that comes to find us.
Ann Voskamp [00:03:18] And in the midst of that, we keep coming to find each other and loan each other courage.
Jessica Honegger [00:03:23] Exactly. That's what we do. And, you know, that really is when I think of this podcast going scared, you know, the biggest way to find courage is to lend it to borrow it from someone else. And that's what Ann and I have been able to do for each other, is imagine a future that maybe we can't see for ourselves and we just imagine it for one another. Yeah, and it's been such a courageous bolstering act for me. So, thank you.
Ann Voskamp [00:03:52] Know, I'm the one who's so in your debt, Jessica. I mean, I'm just so grateful that you actually embody this message everywhere you go, it is like you live, breathe, exude this, Jessica and I really believe we've just come through such two hard years. And hopelessness is a poverty of imagination where we can't imagine the goodness of God on our horizon. And when I've been in places where I, I have been poor, I don't I have a poverty of imagination for the ways God can move. You have loaned me courage, giving me your vision in eyes of how you see the movement of God coming towards us. There's always grace and hope and goodness coming towards us. Just thank you for giving me eyes when I can't see Jessica.
Jessica Honegger [00:04:39] Well, so a couple weeks ago Ann and I had one of these moments where this time it was her. She was feeling afraid. And I got on the phone with her in the mid-day.
Ann Voskamp [00:04:47] Oh, it's so good. Oh, my goodness. I said, I need you here today, Jessica. I need you every day.
Jessica Honegger [00:04:53] Any day, any time. Oh, and I had not received her book yet, so her new book that is out that is so beautiful, because everything you write is so beautiful. And it's a memoir which I just love from you. It's just feels so approachable and beautiful at the same time, which I think is a hard thing to grasp Waymaker. And so, I hadn't received the book yet, so I didn't know the context and it's so good. This is so funny. But what I said was, Yeah, I've had a couple guests come on the Going Scared podcast, and they would get through a couple of questions, and they would say, is this podcast called Going Sacred or Going Scared? And I'm like, no, no, it's going scared. If you're wondering why I'm not asking you any spiritual questions of any kind, you know, and so on this call with Ann I said, did you know that going sacred, the words sacred, have the same letters in it as the words going scared? I said, I feel like you're just supposed to go sacred right now. So that's when you said, the whole book was built on the acronym for Sacred, though.
Ann Voskamp [00:05:59] I mean, I had such goosebumps. It was like, Oh my gosh, what? What has just come out of your mouth? It felt prophetic and you had absolutely no idea that the spine, the scaffolding, the whole thing, the whole essence of way maker is the idea of what does it look like to have a sacred way of like the acronym, an acronym sacred. So, I think. Okay, going scared or going sacred? I have a choice.
Jessica Honegger [00:06:21] That's right. So, we're going sacred today, guys. So, this is not the Going Scared podcast today. We're moving away from going scared and we're going to go sacred. And that's where I wanted to start. If you could share your journey of learning to move from fear towards sacred, and why sacred? Why that word in particular?
Ann Voskamp [00:06:42] Yeah, I think in 1000 Gifts, my first book opens with a scene, which is really my very first memory as a child. I was four years old. I was standing at the kitchen sink helping wash dishes with my mom, and we're looking out the sink window across our front yard. And a service truck came in the yard and did not see my 18-month-old baby sister walking across the yard and drove over and crushed and killed my baby sister in front of my mama and I. So, my first memory made me a very, very terrified little child. I was petrified. Terrified. I couldn't sleep at night. So scared of a world where people you love could be killed in front of you. So, 1000 Gifts really is talking about my journey from that four-year-old little girl. By the time I was seven years old, in grade two, I had ulcers and was hospitalized. By my teen years, I was cutting. By the time I was 18, 19 in university, I was having full blown panic attacks. [00:07:46] I was terrified of a world where horrific things could happen at any turn. And 1000 Gifts really is about me picking up a pen and starting to write down the things I was grateful for and using that pen like a sword, like my way to fight for joy. The joy of the Lord is my strength. And if I let something steal my joy, let something steal my strength and joy is ultimately a function of gratitude. And gratitude is ultimately a function of perspective. So, if I can change my perspective, there is always, always, always something that I can be grateful for. [35.4s] So I think, Jessica, maybe the whole story of my life has been on this journey out of going scared everywhere towards what does it look like to live a life that is a life of abundance, a life of that is deeply fulfilling, a life that is set apart in a way that I could walk on the way with Jesus. [00:08:44] I have been on this journey of moving out of bondage from fear and anxiousness and worries and exodus out of that bondage into bonding with the Waymaker himself, bonding with God, bonding with the one who always makes the way through because he is the way. Sacred is really an acronym that comes out of Exodus 14. And there the Exodus story of the Israelites leaving the bondage of Egypt, crossing the Red Sea, God parting the sea and into we think we want a promised land, take me out of bondage and take me into the Promised Land. And ultimately, it's about God parting the waves, parting the sea, and taking us into a covenant relationship with himself. Peace is not a place. Peace is a person. So do I have a way of life, a habit of life, a rhythm of life that is sacred, that sets me apart from bondage to bonding. [62.2s] So that acronym Sacred, which is stillness to hear God, attentiveness to seek God, cruciformity to reach out to God, revelation to see God, examine to examine my own heart before God, and D doxology thanksgiving to God. That sacred way of life is really Jessica over the last two years, three years, four years been what? When you have a way of life, it is what holds back the waves that keep pounding in. You need that spirit, those spiritual practices, spiritual disciplines, the cadence of your life so that you can walk on waves.
Jessica Honegger [00:10:23] Well, and this is really why I wanted to have Ann on the show. It's because this is all about the habit of reflection today. And I have not met anyone. I mean, and here's the thing, guys. I just don't want y'all to be intimidated because and really, she.
Ann Voskamp [00:10:40] Struggles.
Jessica Honegger [00:10:42] I was going to say she can really reflect well. I mean, listen. You send pictures when you're spending time with God, you've got like the photos out and the beauty and you journal really.
Ann Voskamp [00:10:54] But you know what? That's because I am fighting my way through Jessica. We make a really tells the story of how I got all the turns wrong. It is wildly, terrifyingly vulnerable about how I didn't get the way right. So, if you see me now journaling, if you see me now being very, very intentional, it's because I know that I got I mean, I'm telling the story of how I got all the turns wrong and ended up where I never thought I would be. I mean, I tell the story from James Clear's analogy from Atomic Habits that if you plane leaves, it leaves L.A.X. and its nose is pointed only a degree or two off across the United States of America. The plane isn't going to land in New York City. The plane's going to land south of Washington, DC, DC, somewhere. So, the everything is forming us and shaping us, whether we turn to our screens to escape pain, whether we go to the fridge to escape pain, retail, whatever we're doing, we are. It's all forming us and shaping us and creating habits. So do you have a way through that allows you to you mean you know what everything is about location, location, location. [00:12:04] Do you have a way of life that can locate your soul in relation to where God is, so that you actually have a genuine relationship with the one who is the way through? So, if I if you see me on Instagram with my stories of your I am journaling with my scripture, open it. I am holding on to that because there was a period in my life, Jessica, where I thought, well, I'll just grab a bit of scripture here, whether it's a devotional at the end of my bed or a verse on some kind of flip calendar, and I'm just grabbing it on the run. And I did not take time to locate my soul and ended up far, far, far away from where I wanted to be. [37.4s]
Jessica Honegger [00:12:42] So tell us a little bit about I know the journey of sort of realizing, oh, I'm not going to land in the right place if I just keep this up. But was there a certain moment, like the rock bottom, where you thought, okay, I'm going to start crawling my way back? Tell us about that.
Ann Voskamp [00:13:00] Yeah. Yeah. Waymaker's a story about how I got the turns all wrong to the point I ended. Not only have we gone through two open heart surgeries with our youngest daughter, I had broken my husband's heart in a thousand ways, and I ended up in the hospital myself in our little country hospital's version of ICU, where they couldn't figure out why I couldn't breathe. I went in with a fever, an infection somewhere after I had had a uterine ablation. 48 hours later, I had an infection. I went back in, and they started putting me on I.V. antibiotics. By the next morning, I every breath hurt so badly, like a vise was on my chest. Took me back down. Was like, your lungs are filling up with fluid. You have double pneumonia. And they trying to figure out what was going on. And then they realized, oh, you are in the literal heart failure. Your heart is not able to pump through the fluids that we are giving you. So not only was I in literal heart failure, my whole life was literally failing those nights in hooked up to heart monitors and trying to breathe through the pain. Sort of like your life flashes before you. I was at rock bottom and looking at the turns I had made in my own life that had led me so far away from not only the Lord, but also in my relationships. It's the place I called my husband at four in the morning and said, I really need you to come. And it was my come to Jesus moment where I was like, [00:14:31] Okay, here is where I am, and I've got to start to speak these things out loud. The devil calling plays in dark places, and you need to start to say the things out loud that you're the narrative that you have in your own head. So that was my rock bottom moment where I'm like, okay, but, you know, Jessica I had a narrative in my head that if you're going to make I really believe that all of life turns on the turn every moment you have a decision to make. Where am I going to turn right now? And I thought if we were taught all the time, repentance is about turning and heading back. So, I thought we need I needed to make some big U-turn. And repentance is going all the way back when in actual fact, your turn, your come to Jesus, where you hit rock bottom. You don't have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps to get out of the pit. The turn that we make only all Jesus comes the whole long way. He does all of it. And He's the one who cups our face and lifts our chins. And all we have to do is turn our eyes upon him, and he does the rest. So, do you have a way of life that allows you to keep locating your soul and turning your eyes towards Jesus, who is the way through it? [72.0s] So I had my come to Jesus, which always is about intense vulnerability, Jessica, where you say, this is where I'm really at and I'm not going to have shame just because these words out loud.
Jessica Honegger [00:15:55] You know, you probably would not remember this, but there was an IF gathering. It was the year post, like the year of you being at the hospital. And we were all gathering in a hotel room late one night. And you shared that you had been really sick and no one in the room knew. And I thought, how come no one here knew.
Ann Voskamp [00:16:17] I didn't tell anybody? And I remember Jennie Allen texting me probably day four or day five that I was in the hospital. And she said, why are we finding out through other people? And you didn't you didn't pick up a phone and text anybody that you're like at rock bottom in heart failure, Ann, and I deep trauma happens in community and deep healing also happens in community. And I did not have a habit towards turning towards community at all, Jessica.
Jessica Honegger [00:16:48] How would you say your habit is now? How has that habit changed over the last couple of years?
Ann Voskamp [00:16:53] Maybe it's the most obvious habit I have now. I really believe the C of sacred. So, stillness, attentiveness, C is cruciformity. How do you. Because I really believe that transformation only can happen when you have the same posture as Jesus, which is cruise information, which means how do I live? Not with my arms in front of my chest self-preserving, self-protecting, guarding myself, not living in a posture of intimacy. How do I move from that lack of vulnerability and intimacy to Chris deformity where my hands are outstretched towards God and people? That's right at the heart of living a sacred way of life. And that looks like now, not only does it look like reaching out with vulnerability towards God in my journaling every single morning, but it also looks like reaching out towards people with vulnerability every day. And that looks like now we have a confessional community that is in a tech thread and on Fox, or where we show up with the things that we're ashamed to say out loud, the things we it's a safe place to be deeply vulnerable and honest about the narratives we have in our own head. So not only can we preach the gospel back to each other, but somebody else can take their heel and crush the lie that's hissing in our ear. And it's. It's hard. I don't know. You and I Jessica are part of the same confessional community. You find it hard to show up with that kind of vulnerability? Yes. Yes. One more. Yes, I really, really do. And it takes courage to show up, to have a habit of life, to say, I'm not going to turn and run towards withdrawal. [00:18:35] Because what I really realized in that hospital bed, Jessica, was like, it's even hard now to say it out loud because, oh, it was the pain in my chest so hard with every breath. But just that the decisions that I had made had led me to such a painful place. I was wildernessing myself. I was wildernessing myself by not living, cruciform, and reaching out to community. And all, all desolation happens through isolation. And I did not have a rhythm of life that kept me reaching out towards people. So, you know, we wonder, like, why am I in this wilderness? Why am I in this desert? Why I'm in this no way place? What is your habit of life that's going to say? I'm going to take the pathway of vulnerability, which like I mean, the subtitle of Waymaker is Finding the Way to the Life You Always Dreamed Of. The life we always dreamed up is a life of deeply connected intimacy, because ultimately the only real reality in the world is relationship, relationship with God and relationship with people. And you can't get to the life you always dreamed up without the vulnerability of cruciformity that leads to intimacy. The life we dream of happens in community. [69.3s]
Jessica Honegger [00:19:45] Okay, let's so we cover. We're covering community. We've covered that. We'll cover that a million times more. I'm convinced we all need to write about confessional community together.
Ann Voskamp [00:19:55] The seven of us. Wow. There is a thought. Boom.
Jessica Honegger [00:19:58] There's a thought.
Ann Voskamp [00:19:59] There's a thought.
Jessica Honegger [00:20:00] Wow. Yeah, that'll be fun. That is so fun. Be an excuse to spend more time together.
Ann Voskamp [00:20:07] Well, I think. I think Jennie with Find Your People is right there already. And I think we all move into it because there are layers of community. Well, I mean, us in our confessional community, we are we are being more honest about even our own interactions with each other and how that feels. But there's real healing in showing up at deeper levels of vulnerability.
Jessica Honegger [00:20:28] Yes, there is. Okay. Let's talk about relationship with God. I know some of our listeners that's kind of a new concept, and that's where I wanted us to sort of go and close us out with especially, you know, really concrete people. My daughter's, one of them you've gotten to know Amelie a bit.
Ann Voskamp [00:20:48] And I saw my she's amazing.
Jessica Honegger [00:20:50] She lets me talk about this part of herself, but it can feel so abstract, right? Like, what do you mean relationship with God can't see God? And we talk a lot about mindfulness and reflection on this podcast. So how did you find your way back to that part of your life? And how can sacred help us structure that practice of stillness?
Ann Voskamp [00:21:15] Well, you just stepped right into it. The S of sacred is stillness. [00:21:21] I think we live in a cultural moment where everything is about hustle. Everything is about how fast can I keep moving, not only to get ahead, but to keep ahead of all kinds of things that maybe we're trying to outrun. For me, every day it's morning again. I think sometimes the moment we open our eyes, the pounding surf starts crashing in and the waves of all that we have to do, all of it has to get done to keep moving forward can actually kind of wash us out into an ocean of lack of intentionality. So, it's starting is starting every morning with the intentionality that as the waves crash in, I am going to choose stillness. My strength is found in stillness. [51.8s] Can I pause for 2 minutes in the morning and just breathe in and breathe out? The Hebrew people believe that God's name Yahweh sounds like actually breathing, so that even without saying his name, our deep breathing is calling upon him. [00:22:33] So I really believe that to live a sacred way of life, we all need a way of life because there's going to be things that come up in the way, obstacles in the way. And the only way to move through that is to have a way of life. It starts with stillness to be still. Now that I don't have to fight the battle, God will go before me to fight the battles in a posture of stillness. I'm not striving, but I'm open handed to. It's an open-handed receptivity and accepting what God gives. And there's profound strength in that, because we are not in a posture of reactivity, but receptivity. [40.2s] And then the a of sacred is attentiveness, which you and I, Jessica, I've had so many conversations about in the last two years. What am I paying attention to? What we pay attention to is that will turn us on the way and if all of life turns on the turn. I have to be paying attention to what I'm paying attention to. It's a tender concept to think about what you know, what does it look like to have a relationship with God? I think it begins first with stillness so we can start to locate our own soul. And then what does it look like to attend to where we are? [00:23:53] And in Scripture, God actually asks us some questions. Who do you say that I am? That's the first question that I attend to every day, because you can't find your way through life if you've got the wrong map. And part of having the right map to find your way through is who do I say that God actually is so that I understand the landscape of the world? If I say that actually, God, I believe that you are my Abba father, and you are sitting on the throne over the whole universe. What do I actually have to be afraid of when my father is the king of the universe and he's for me. So, determining that first being attending to who God is. [35.4s] Another question the Lord asked in Scripture is Yes, Hagar, a woman in Genesis where you're coming from and where are you going to? Can you be still long enough every morning and really attend to Where am I coming from here? So that's looking at like what is happening in my life, what's driving me, what fears are motivating me, what am I paying attention to? Where am I coming from and where am I going to? And when you answer where you're going to, you're actually setting your intentions for the day. You're setting your intentions. What am I going to pay attention to? This is the trajectory I'm headed toward. You and I work a lot with Curt Thompson, speaks so often of how Jesus asks in the New Testament. Mark, he says, What Jesus is asking, what do you want? So that's my third question I ask every morning when I'm paying attention. That's Who do I say God is? Where am I coming from? Where am I going to? And thirdly, what do I want? And writing that down every day so that we're not just blithely going through the motions every day. A life that lacks intentionality, lacks direction. So, no wonder we find ourselves in no way situations. So, for me to go ahead and write down every day, I tend to what do I actually want? And when I see it right there in ink in my journal, I get to see am I actually aligned with my own mission? Am I aligned to what my core values are? Am I what I want? Is it aligned to who God is and who I say God is? [00:25:57] So for me, every morning starts with that stillness. First the attention of those three questions, then cruciformity. How am I reaching out towards God and people? What is my going to be my intention around living a cruciform life today? Cruciform it always means surrender and vulnerability then R is revelation to have a fresh revelation from the word who says he is the way. So, I can't walk out into my life today unless I have a fresh revelation from the way himself. So, I'll write down that verse. E Is examine what am I afraid of? I just find Jessica. If I'm going to move from going scared to going sacred, my examine always means What am I afraid of today? [39.8s] So I have to actually stop.
Jessica Honegger [00:26:39] Powerful.
Ann Voskamp [00:26:39] Yes. Examine.
Jessica Honegger [00:26:40] That's really powerful to ask ourselves. Not every day.
Ann Voskamp [00:26:43] Every day what? And so many times I am desperately afraid of failure. Jessica, I write too. I am afraid of failing. The Lord is so tender to say Ann you've already failed and I'm already holding you. I'm already holding you. The worst has already happened and I'm carrying you through. But I just found so much of my life I was driven by fears. And if you're driven by fears, you are never headed in the right direction at all. So, writing that down every day I examine is What am I afraid of? And then the D of Sacred is doxology. So, I don't I step out into the day making sure I've written down ten to 15 to 25 if it's a hard day. Things that I am grateful for, because the only way into joy is through that door of gratitude. So that is my sacred way of life that is holding back the waves. So, there is a way through, no matter what is in the way and believing. If I, [00:27:42] picking up that sacred way of life every day has brought me to the place of realizing the obstacle in the way is the miracle, the obstacle? Is the miracle. What seems like it's in the way is actually making me turn another way that the Lord will ultimately use as a better way. [16.1s]
Jessica Honegger [00:27:59] Oh, it's so good. I remember when I was first beginning Noonday Collection and was praying through Am I going to partner with Travis, my business partner, who had said, Let's partner up, I'm going to live off my life savings for the next couple of years. Young kids, one with Down syndrome. Well, I so his wife was not able to work. She was really taking care of their son with special needs. And I was scared to death. I'm like, okay, it's one thing to take a chance on me, which I had been doing. But then it's another thing when someone says, Let's partner and I'm going to take a chance on you, right? And I'll remember the thing that was holding me back was, well, there was a lot holding me back, but it was all fear, and it was like, What if I'm successful? I was so afraid of success that somehow following God and being successful couldn't go hand in hand. Wow, wow, wow, wow. I was so afraid of failing and especially failing Travis. Like, okay, he's going to live off his savings account. And I remember God, really, thankfully, he spoke into me that day and it was from Galatians. You are God's poem. Your God's workmanship created God to do good works, which God has done for you in advance. And for me, there was just this sense too, that God says, this is the work I prepared for you. It's time to walk in it. But also, there is this sense of like, Yeah, of course you're going to fail. Yeah, you know what? This is going to be successful and you're going to feel pride about that. Yeah, like it was like everything. I was like, what if this but what if I and he's like, Yeah, you're going to do all those things. All of it.
Ann Voskamp [00:29:38] All of it.
Jessica Honegger [00:29:39] And I'm still inviting you in to be my co-creator in this business that is going to impact a lot of people's lives. And that is the freedom there. The freedom is not that we're going to sit and our reflection times and pray ourselves into some sinless, perfect, you know, place where then we can go. It's all about just entering in and going sacred and a little scared.
Ann Voskamp [00:30:06] And a little, you know, and it's where am I coming from and where am I going to that reflection time becomes your fuel to move forward in the right trajectory. Mm hmm. And. Oh, good. This is so good. Well, I just. We need to think about be really cognizant of the things that we are scared of and not be afraid that, yes, I am afraid of this, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to still keep moving forward. We just have to be really intentional about what direction am I moving forward.
Jessica Honegger [00:30:36] Toward, right.
Ann Voskamp [00:30:37] And I write about in Waymaker, I always set forward, forward, forward what you want. It's more than forward. It's what are you moving toward? So yes, it's forward, but you better be really intentional about and know. Take the time to think through what am I moving toward? Forward does it matter if it's in the wrong direction?
Jessica Honegger [00:30:55] So good Waymaker. Waymaker. I am so excited for all of you to get it into your hands. Thank you so much.
Ann Voskamp [00:31:02] And I will never forget I am moving from going scared to going sacred, Jessica Honegger.
Jessica Honegger [00:31:15] Thanks again for joining me on this journey. We're going to take a little break, but next month, we are coming back with a three-part enneagram series where we interviewed a panel with nine different numbers at the same time. And we are going to launch that series just in time for your, you know, summer lazing by the pool days. And after that, we will be back for a brand-new series that will kick off in August. To keep up with Ann, you can find at AnnVoskamp.com and also, I love it following her on Instagram. Her new book, Waymaker, is available wherever books are sold. Again, we're closing it out. So, hey, take a little time to review this podcast. Wherever you review podcasts, it does help with how we shape future shows, and I just really appreciate hearing from listeners, so thanks for tuning in. Our music for today's show is by my friend Ellie Holcomb. And I'm Jessica Honegger. Until next time, let's take each other by the hand and keep going scared.