Ep. 179: Growing Pains

Kourtney Cromwell:
Welcome to the indoubt Podcast, where we explore the challenging topics that young adults often face. Each week we talk with guests who help answer questions of faith, life, and culture. Connecting them to our daily experiences and God’s word. For more information on indoubt, visit indoubt.ca, or indoubt.com.
Hey everyone, thanks for joining us today on this episode of indoubt, my name is Kourtney and I’m so happy to have you listening today. On this week’s episode Ryan is joined by Angela Herrington, a Christian mentor, life coach, author, and speaker based out of Indiana. Angela shares her fresh, personal experiences of what it’s like to be stuck, and how she found her way to where she is now. A big part of the episode included the discussion of our identity, which can often be clouded by shame and fear. No matter what or where we think our identity is found in, our identity is ultimately anchored in God. Even when we don’t realize it, or don’t know him. Angela encourages each of us to embrace the season we’re in, whether we feel stuck or not. And asks the question, why wouldn’t you recognize the identity that you were actually given by God? I hope you’ll be encouraged by this episode, so take a listen and let us know what you think.

Ryan McCurdy:
So today I have with me Angela Herrington, and Angela is a life coach, Christian mentor and speaker. Angela, thanks so much for being here with us today.

Angela Herrington:
Yeah, I’m excited to be here.

Ryan McCurdy:
So am I, I’m excited to have you with me today. And one of the questions I want to start with, and just I want to get to know you a little bit.

Angela Herrington:
Okay.

Ryan McCurdy:
Who are you, kind of, and what got you to where you are now in your life, in your walk with God?

Angela Herrington:
Yeah, so the who am I question kind of asks and answers that question at the same time. I have a traditional bio on my website, all that kind of stuff, but the fun messy part that I don’t get to share a lot is just this idea that I am constantly in a conversation with God about who I am. And I started, I have a healthcare background, I started as a nurse. I worked in an early intervention program for years, loved it. And God very sneakily, but very certainly said, “Hey, go into ministry.” I’m like, are you kidding, what does that mean? So I started a blog, and that was what God said, no don’t go into the church, start this online thing. And it was pretty hilarious, I’m sure people out there right now are like, oh how do I start a blog? Or, how do I do this thing God is calling me to? Just – spoiler, my writing, at the time that God called me to write a blog, my writing was limited to the grocery list. And I don’t even kid about that, like dead serious. Chore list, packing list, like I was a list maker, but I didn’t consider myself a writer. So kind of started on this journey with God about writing and starting this ministry. And I really just felt like social media was a place that Christians were not doing well. Little did I know that it would be even more of a case today, but I really think we weren’t doing it well several years ago when I started. And so I just knew that was my arena. And so I took a bunch of classes and I figured it out, and started getting some really good traffic and the attention of other bloggers and other pastors and ministry people. And they started saying, tell me how to do this. I was like, okay cool. I can teach.
So I started teaching people how to do it. And time, time and time again what I was running up into, like the obstacles we were running into had nothing to do with what buttons to push, and everything to do with fear, self doubt, uncertainty, – imposter syndrome, guys. Imposter syndrome is huge in all of us, I don’t care how big or how famous or how confident you are, this idea of who am I to do this, stops so many of us in our tracks. And so that’s why I went into the life coaching. And the whole time I’m doing this I had gone back to school, got a bachelor’s degree in Biblical studies. And then had about a year, a break, and then God called me back to seminary. So I also went back and got a master’s in leadership from Wesley Seminary. Woo woo Wesley Seminary, put the plug in there. Loved it, formative stuff, hard work, it was all hard work formative. But then I kind of got to the end of my master’s career and I was like, wait a minute, I just did this project on women in the church and do they have leadership abilities? Are they welcomed, are they mentored? That kind of thing. But I actually don’t work in a church. So I had this life coaching degree, but I’m not fully a life coach. Like I have this blog, but I’m not fully a blogger. And so the last two years have really been … I almost feel like I’ve been in this spin cycle in a washing machine. Just like God saying,”Okay it’s all in here, it’s all in here. Let’s get it, let’s get it, let’s get it.” And I’m so excited about this season that I’m in right now because I feel like over the last few months God has really helped me see that all of those things are things that I do.
However, they’re not my identity. My identity is in Him, and my number one calling above all else is to sit as his feet every day. And because of that, because all of his love and grace and wisdom flows through me, I get to pour it out in these seemingly disconnected ways. But they’re not disconnected because they’re all coming from the overflow of sitting at the feet of Jesus every day. So that’s the long and winding road to who I am. I am a life coach, I am a business coach. My husband and I run a social media agency full-time. I have my hands in a lot of things, but it’s really cool to see how God has, like I said, put me in that spin cycle and has just poured into me over the last eight years. I think we’re going on eight years in ministry to get to this point, and now it’s all like, oh those things all do fit this work that you want me to do. It just shows up a little differently every day.

Ryan McCurdy:
Yeah, wow. That’s incredible. I think when you say the word identity there.

Angela Herrington:
Yeah.

Ryan McCurdy:
I really appreciate how you mentioned it. Right? I do all these things, but I am not a sum of the things that I do. That’s part of who I am, sure. But that’s not the core of who I am.

Angela Herrington:
Yeah.

Ryan McCurdy:
Could you just speak to that a little bit more? I’m curious about that. And I think there’s a lot of-

Angela Herrington:
Absolutely.

Ryan McCurdy:
-people who wrestle with those questions of, who am I?

Angela Herrington:
Yeah, and I think that one of the myths of the western world, Christians in the western world, is that there is a certain level of achievement that we can reach if our faith is strong enough. And guys, that’s toxic. That’s like nuclear waste dump, don’t go anywhere near that. Because what is actually the truth, the big T Truths from God, the biggest truth is that your identity is connected to Him. We are anchored in God, even when we don’t know God. So yeah, your friend who’s an atheist, your friend who’s denying Christ, your friend who’s never even come across religion, their identity is anchored in God. Because when God breathed into us, when he exhaled, he literally put some of him into us. And so we’re never going to feel whole and complete until we’re standing close enough to him that we’re maintaining that connection. The world disrupts it, the enemy disrupts it, there’s a lot of disruption that goes out there. But the most disruptive thing is that I can be enough to fill that whole. I can do enough to fill that whole, to fill that yearning inside of me. And we really have to just take a step back from all of that and say, “Okay, if I’m not sitting at the feet of Jesus every day, who am I? Who am I? If I was created in his image, yet I’m not connecting with him, who am I? If he’s not the one instructing every step, who am I?”
Because we just can’t, like we can’t create something out of nothing. So the identity is something that’s given to us. Now we get a lot of say. Like honestly, if I’m God I’m probably not giving us as much say, because we tend to mess it up, but that’s just the mom in me, right? Yeah, that’s the list maker in me. But we do get a lot of say in it. But the thing is, God is never going to give us an identity that isn’t going to resonate with our soul on the deepest level. So if you’re a creative person, and I believe we’re all creative. If you’re a creative as in like creative arts, if you’re a musician, if you’re a graphic designer, God’s never going to give you an identity that shuts all of those things down because he gave you that. He created that within you to bloom and to blossom and to be cultivated. Where we get a little tangled up is when we pick something, we see something off in the distance and we say, that’s who I want to be. Or, that’s who I am. Or, this is really painful, that’s what will make me enough. If I can achieve that, then I will be good enough. And we go chase that. And then God comes to us and says, “Hey you’re still discontented because I’m what’s missing.” And then we have to unravel it all, and that gets really painful.
You know, sometimes it’s really hard to say no to things that you think are central to your identity, but actually you were just chasing them, trying to fill that empty spot because God is what you were missing.

Ryan McCurdy:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Angela Herrington:
Even as a Christian, even as a kiddo who grows up in VBS and Sunday school and did the church trips, and the mission trip … like you could do all the things, and still be disconnected from God. And I’ll just be really real with you guys for a moment, I didn’t grow up in church, I grew up around church. Which just means I knew just enough to know that God probably wasn’t happy with me. Like that’s my story. I was the VBS kid, the Easter kid. Like grandma’s church once in a while, like that’s who I was. I started a ministry kind of even in that posture of getting to know God and getting close to him. And so every day I have to choose, do I want to chase the ministry things? Do I want to chase that old narrative, that identity of, oh God’s probably upset with me, I need to go do more? Or do I want to sit at his feet and then see what he says we’re doing today?
So if you can get that at a younger age, it’s so much easier because we’re all creatures of habit, and patterns, and constant conditioning and all of those things. The habits that we take into a life with God are harder to undo if we start doing it when we’re 40. So yeah, things that I’ve been doing for 20 years and not even realizing that they were about pulling away from God, or filling that space. Those still creep in a little bit. So I know your audience is a little younger, and that’s what I would say is if you can really check all the pressures, all the external pressures to fill that space yourself. You know, the spirit of self sufficiency is really really slippery, you got to watch out for those things. If you can do that at a younger age it’s going to be a little bit easier, it’s not going to be easy, but it’s going to be a little bit easier than doing it when you’re 30 or 40 or 50. You know, doing it after you’re married, and you have half a dozen kids, and you have friends that have known you for 30 years. Like all those things that are amazing and supporting and beautiful, are all tied to this identity that you’ve created. So why not create the identity that you are actually given? The one that you were born for?

Ryan McCurdy:
Right. And I hear this idea of like, weaning yourself off of one way of thinking and living and believing who you are, and taking yourself and kind of like John 15. Like Jesus says, I am the vine, you are the branches. And taking root in Him, and saying, I’m going to be connected to the source of life and ultimately my identity. I’m going to connect to Jesus. And he says, apart from me you can do no good thing.

Angela Herrington:
Right.

Ryan McCurdy:
But when we’re in Him. I like this idea that you said, you bloom, you blossom, and that’s where you’re cultivated. And that’s where you grow up into. And I think that’s a huge challenge to get to that point. So I guess my question, Angela, is for a lot of young people who find themselves stuck, how would you encourage them to say maybe take a step of faith?

Angela Herrington:
Yeah. So I think the first thing I’d like to say is, don’t be afraid of the stuck. Like, stuck does not equate sinful. Okay? Stuck does not equate being cast out from God. Stuck is actually a good thing, stick with me I know this sounds crazy. Stuck is actually a good thing because we are really good at running from things that are hard, especially if it means that we may have to give up some things that we think are part of our identity. So stuck means you’ve stopped running. It’s caught you. Whatever the conflict is, whatever the uncertainty is, whatever the thing that you’re staring in the face. Stuck means you’re in it and you’ve stopped running. Or at least you’ve slowed down enough that you’re starting to look around, and you feel stuck because there’s not as many options as you want there to be. Or maybe there’s a ton of options, but the one that you want seems like it’s not on the table.
And in that stuckness, that’s where the wrestling happens. And I think that we look at wrestling and stuckness as a sign of, oh we’ve done something wrong. Instead of, oh wait, God’s revealing something here. And sometimes we walk away with a limp, when God reveals something and it gets messy and it gets hard, it hurts. And we think that pain is because God is mad at us and he’s punishing us, and he’s hurting us, and like rah. It’s like very Old Testament, like shoot I got to get moving or somebody’s going to hit me with a lightning bolt. Like, Jesus has a lot of grace, but I feel like he’s probably going to pick up the lightning bolt and throw it at me this time, because I’ve been here for a minute. And all of those things are driven by this … they’re driven by the enemy trying to separate us from God, that’s really all it is. Right? Even if you go all the way back to the Garden of Eden, it was not a forceful separation. You know? The enemy didn’t steal Adam and Eve and kidnap them, and then lie to them. He lied to them so that they kidnap themselves. He lied to them so that they took a step back from God and hid from him. So if you’re in a place of stuckness and wrestling, stay in it. Like, please today is not your day to give up. Stay in it. And while you are in it, recognize that God was there before you, he’s in it with you, and he’ll be with you afterwards.

Ryan McCurdy:
Yeah.

Angela Herrington:
And just stay in it and don’t be afraid of the messiness. I mean, don’t be afraid to get help. An isolated Christian is the most at risk Christian there ever could be. Ever. Doesn’t matter who you are. You know? We saw the kind of temptations that Jesus faced when he was isolated in the wilderness. What makes you think the enemy is not going to come after you ten times as hard? Because, you know, just because. Like that’s a part of Jesus’s humanity was that when he was isolated he was really really vulnerable to attack. And he was attacked and he was pressured and all these things. So if you’re in the stuckness and the wrestling, do not isolate yourself. I would say, stay in it and pick a very small limited number of people to bring into that space with you. Not everybody can come with you into your stuckness, because your stuckness in this space you’re very vulnerable.
So I have some friends who I love dearly, I have extended family members, I have people that I know through work, people that I know from Facebook. I’m not bringing them into my stuckness. I have an inner circle of a handful of people who are intercessors, who will call it out in me when I get lost in the weeds and I say, “Hey I’d rather just go the easy route rather than … Like I just want out of the stuckness, tell me the fastest way.” And they’ll be like, “No I don’t think I like that for you.”
I have coaches. I have pastors. I have people who are further down this road than me to say, I see you. I know you feel stuck, you’re okay, stay in it. Oh, and by the way, God sees you. And sometimes that’s all you need. Sometimes you need professional help, like counseling, or coaching, or pastoral care, or all those other things. Just be really really selective.
So for those of you guys that aren’t stuck, you’re not wrestling and you’re not stuck yet, go find those people now.

Ryan McCurdy:
Right?

Angela Herrington:
Go find them now because you’re going to need them. I promise, you’re going to need them. And it’s so much easier to make decisions now when you’re not stuck than it is to try to go out in crisis and just hope and pray that you find the right people. Because sometimes the people who are attracted to you when you’re in crisis, aren’t the right people.

Ryan McCurdy:
Totally.

Angela Herrington:
And that’s a hard lesson.

Ryan McCurdy:
Totally. That is a tricky one. And I think this idea of it sounds like the idea of boundaries. Right? Letting the right people in at the right time, and not at the wrong time. But I appreciate that mentality of, to wrestle is not to be … To be stuck is not necessarily to be in sin. As a Christian we look back to the Old Testament we’re like, oh yeah look at those people wrestling with God. And for some reason we think that we, as Christians, won’t have those similar wrestlings of the Israelites in the wilderness, or in their own time of wandering around. And by nature of our relationship with God we’re going to wrestle, because he has something for us. He has a plan for us that maybe we’re like, “Oh, I want to take the easy way out. And he’s like, “No, I got something better for you.” And that’s where the tension comes. And so I hear you saying, that’s a good thing. That’s a good thing that if you can identify that you’re stuck, and you realize that God has something for you but you’re just being stubborn. Oh that’s a great step forward to be able to say, I’m being stubborn. Or, I’m being stuck.
And so I appreciate that. I think that’s a great word for a lot of young people who are feeling just like, what’s next? And, where am I going? And so yeah, even as you said, some people aren’t stuck. Maybe they’re not stuck now, but they’ve been stuck in the past. How would you encourage somebody who maybe doesn’t feel stuck now, but feels the burden of the past? How would you encourage them to look at failure in God’s eye view?

Angela Herrington:
Yeah, so if you’re still feeling the weight of a prodigal season, or mistakes that you’ve made, if you’re still feeling the weight of that I would probably say, you still need to be stuck a little bit. And that’s really convicting to say. That’s coming from very fresh, personal experiences. If you’re feeling the weight of mistakes and it’s hitting a place of shame, which most of the time that’s what we’re talking about, right? It’s not just, “Oh I messed up, I can fix it, I can move on, I can make apologies, I’m good.” It’s, there’s almost this fear, like the shame creeps in and there is this fear of that’s going to happen again. Or maybe not that thing is going to happen again, but my life will never be a good as it could have if I didn’t do that. And I’m telling you, if there’s any super power that Christians have, it’s shame. And that’s highly sarcastic, right? We use God to justify our shame. And, oh it’s just my cross to bear. We use all these Christianese things to give the enemy control over us. Like forever.
So what we have to stop and look at is, have I actually released myself? God’s willing to forgive me, but have I actually accepted that? Have I actually forgiven myself? And a lot of time the answer is mostly. But we’re keeping our guard up so that we don’t do that again. Or, we don’t hurt … Especially if our mistake hurt other people really badly. The more you love someone, the less you want to keep repeating those mistakes that hurt over and over again. And that’s a good thing, but when it goes to shame, and it becomes motivated by avoiding shame, you’re starting the conversation by saying all I am capable of is this shameful thing, so I have to protect people from it. And that’s a really skewed view of who you are, right? With that, rather than saying this is who God made me to be, I got a little lost there, but now I’m sitting at his feet again and we’re going to be okay. We’re just saying, yeah, I screwed up and so I have to just trudge through this. And this is probably the best it’ll ever be.
That’s not what God has for us. Sometimes I think having to deal with the repercussions of our mistakes convinces us that the shame is true. But it’s not. I mean, I made a mistake last week, it took me a little bit of time to recover from that. I had to fix some stuff. I broke something online, I had to go in and fix it. You know just because I forgive myself and God forgives me, doesn’t mean that the mistake goes away. It just means I don’t have to live in bondage to it. And I think that, at least in the American church, I don’t know if it’s the same where you guys are at. But in the American church we’re really good at beating ourselves up. And there’s this boot strapping self-sufficiency, if I just live a good enough life and like, that’s a cultural thing, that’s not a God thing. The other piece that I think is really interesting that just came up in me as you were talking is, I think that this whole fully divine fully human thing confuses the snot out of us. So we know that when Jesus was here he was both, at the same time. And I think it boggles our little human mind, so just to be really honest. But that’s something that we wrestle with. And so I feel like the tendency is when we see something good, we assume that that’s the God side of Jesus. When we see something that’s not so good, we see it wrestling and struggling, we assume that’s the human side. And so when we hear God say, this is my beloved. We think, oh he’s talking about the divine part.

Ryan McCurdy:
Right.

Angela Herrington:
Not the messy human part. Like, “Ah, we have to stop.” We have to stop segmenting who God is based on our own shame and our own fears. And I think we have to be really careful about saying, “Oh yeah, that’s true for that person. Oh that person has peace, that person had a really prodigal season. They had a really nasty two years where they did everything under the sun, but look, they found some peace. But, my sin is worse.” But this idea of freedom we tend to say, my stuff is so bad I’m never going to be free from it. And that’s why I think stuckness and wrestling is such a good thing. Because when we feel stuck, when we start to wrestle we’ve already said, “Hey wait, maybe there’s something here. And that’s where God shapes our identity.”

Ryan McCurdy:
Yeah, and as you’re saying that, my question is this. If you could talk to 21 year old Angela.

Angela Herrington:
Oh my goodness. Oh I should’ve known we were going there.

Ryan McCurdy:
You know we were coming here. What would you say? Or I kind of want to spin that question, I’ll give you an out. If you want to-

Angela Herrington:
Don’t give me an out. I can hack it.

Ryan McCurdy:
Well, it’s kind of like you can pick one or the two.

Angela Herrington:
Okay.

Ryan McCurdy:
Either 21 year old Angela, because the times are a little bit different now. Or, 21 year old Sally from today’s age.

Angela Herrington:
Gotcha.

Ryan McCurdy:
What would be your one thing that you would say?

Angela Herrington:
So just for context, 21 year old Angela was pregnant with her second child, in a marriage that had already fallen apart. So 21 year old Angela was in a rough spot. I think I would say … It’s interesting, not to be quirky or anything, but I think I would say, don’t be afraid of the stuck. Don’t be afraid of the wrestling. I had no idea what it actually meant to sit at the feet of Jesus. I thought that I was kind of in that place of self-sufficiency. Like you have to go out and live …

So there’s this statement, living right. You know? That’s pretty popular here in the Midwest, especially in some of the more conservative denominations. You have to get right with God. You have to live right. You have to do these things so that you can experience the glory and the presence of God. That’s why. That is an outright lie. Where else should broken, scared, afraid people go if it’s not in the feet of Jesus? And I think that’s what I would say to your listeners today. That’s what I say to my listeners all the time. It’s like, your number one calling is to sit at the feet of Jesus every day. Everything else that you do comes from the overflow of that. Don’t be afraid to go to the feet of Jesus, because there is literally a place with your name on it. Like it’s not just like your kind of hanging out in the corner hoping to get a glimpse of him. There’s literally a reserved seat with … I’m thinking about like when you go to movies or clubs or premieres or whatever, there’s these little ropes around it and there’s like a prayer mat with your name on it. And everything that you need to be healed and to be nourished, and to be loved on is right there. Don’t be afraid to go there as you are today, right this moment.

Ryan McCurdy:
Yeah. Angela, thanks so much for being with us today. It’s been a joy to hear how God has been working in your life and how you’re using that experience and that knowledge to help other people find freedom. So, thanks so much for being with us today.

Angela Herrington:
Thanks for having me, it was a blast.

Kourtney Cromwell:
I hope that in hearing Angela share that you were encouraged in some way, being stuck is not a bad thing, it’s how you react and handle the stuckness that makes all the difference. You can follow Angela on Instagram and Facebook @angelajherrington. You can also checkout her website www.angelajherrington.com. All of this information is featured under episode links on our website for this episode. And you can check that out too.
I’d like to encourage you to reach out to us and let us know what you think. Your feedback is valuable, and if we get your input we’ll send a quick shout out on an upcoming episode. Recently we had Cameron from Melbourne, Australia let us know that listening to indoubt has helped him massively to keep thinking and start great conversations with his friends about the different things that we’ve brought up. He also added that his favorite episode is episode 151, with Jeremy King, Feeling Or Living.
If you’d like to send us an email, it’s info@indoubt.ca. Or you can shoot us a DM on social media. Thanks again for joining us for this episode of indoubt with Ryan and Angela. And we want to thank her for joining us too. Check back next week as we have guest Julie Kraft with us one more time as she shares encouragement for those who have just received what might seem like a life-ending diagnosis.
Thanks so much for listening. If you want to hear more, subscribe on iTunes and Spotify. Or, visit us online at indoubt.ca, or indoubt.com. We’re also on social media, so make sure to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.