Sarah Jakes Roberts
Appearances
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
Instead of seeking a sense of belonging, a sense of okayness from other people, maybe I can just embrace myself. If I could find a way to be okay with myself, then I can wrap my arms around who I am. And for me, I had to sit with myself until I no longer cringed. I had to sit with myself until I no longer felt shame.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
I had to sit with myself until I could experience compassion where I once felt guilt. From that place of compassion, I learned to love who I am. Yes, this is my story. No, it may not be perfect, but I'm going to stick beside me.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
It starts with intention. I sat with myself. I will say those 10 years I was sitting with myself, but I was sitting with myself punishing myself. How could you be so stupid? You made the biggest mistake. No one's ever going to want you. Sometimes we are sitting with ourselves, but how we are sitting with ourselves is why we can't heal. You can't want to heal and punish yourself at the same time.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
to repeat the words that other people have spoken over you that were negative, having it replay in your mind over and over again while you sit with yourself will never bring you to a place of healing. Sitting with yourself with the pursuit of compassion
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
with the pursuit of love and acceptance, that is when we start sitting with ourself and experience some discomfort and some dysregulation because sitting with myself and trying to be compassionate requires me to stretch, to love myself in a way that I don't think is possible. And as long as you don't think it's possible to sit with yourself and love yourself, every facet of who you are
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
It doesn't matter who you love. It doesn't matter what you achieve. Until you can really sit with yourself, none of those things are going to make you feel better either. But it is the greatest, absolute greatest gift that you can give yourself to allow love to flood the place where you once felt in emptiness.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
And we don't do ourselves any favors by committing to punishing ourselves over and over again for what we did, for what we allowed to happen. This is what we say though. We say to ourselves, I'm going to keep this from happening again by constantly living with it right in front of me.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
And if I can live with it right in front of me, if I can beat myself up, if I can punish myself, then I will keep this from happening again. I will prepare myself for further rejection from other people if I constantly remember how unworthy I am, how little value I possess. And so in many ways, we think this is me protecting myself by constantly keeping it in front of my face.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
But if we're honest, we do long for an existence where we want to believe that I am not just this one moment. But we will never be more than that one moment if we constantly replay that moment in our head. And so to invite into our atmosphere What other moments do I want to have? What other things do I want to define me?
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
I spent so long not wanting to be defined as a teen mom instead of saying I will be defined as being a teen mom, but also I'm going to be an incredible person, but also I'm going to love myself, but also I'm going to dream and I'm going to be an author and a teen mom. I'm not trying to disconnect from who I was. I'm trying to bring all of who I am into the fullness of where I am.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
addition to that, you know what I mean?
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
All of those things are true. All of these things are true. And I don't want to be all of my achievements. Gosh, can you imagine what that would be? The pressure and the arrogance connected to that? I want to be this beautiful mixture, this beautiful tapestry of a girl on a journey and a woman owning her power. And I can live in all of that. I can do all of that.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
There was a lot in that. I know. That's why I had to write the book. I was like, this feels worthy of unpacking. Writing 60,000 words is, you know.
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
I need a nap. I'm praying for you. Because it's not like you just write this. Can you please double down on the praying?
The Mel Robbins Podcast
8 Habits That Will Change Your Life: The Expert Advice You Need This Year
As long as I get a blanket and a nap. Girl, I will give you the best blanket you've ever had. It'll be down and have feathers in it. You'll be spitting feathers out of your mouth.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Yeah, I think so. Fear of not even necessarily controlling another person, but controlling, mitigating opportunities for hurt.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Yes, fear of being out of control. So the more that I can control myself or control them, try and control the way that this relationship works, the better off I'll be. So I have a lot of, I feel safe. Yeah, I think, yeah, at the end of the day, I think people are searching for safety and safety and control often feel like they go hand in hand.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
If you do not feel safe by yourself and on your own, it's going to be difficult for you to feel safe in the context of a relationship. Because at the end of the day, you have to get to a place of safety for yourself. Emotional safety, spiritual safety, like you have to know where is your home plate.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And if you don't know your home plate and you just meet someone while you're out in the field running bases, then nobody knows where home is. So I have to know where my home plate is. What makes me feel safe is consistency, stability, rest makes me feel like I'm not an out being out on the town kind of person. Like I like to be at home. It makes me feel safe.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so I know how to get myself to a space of safety. I know how to communicate to my husband because I know what is safe for me. what I need from him as well. And he knows what safety looks like for him as well. But when you don't know what it looks like, and there are times even in a marriage where you're just on autopilot, things are just going crazy.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Fear is powerful. Shame is powerful. Our doubt is powerful. It's powerful enough to keep you stuck in relationships. It's powerful enough to keep you alone, to keep you from pursuing your purpose and a business deal, whatever. It's got power too. And if you're going to have power, you got to have the right target.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And now you're trying to like control everyone else's movement. I think you have to know I am out of my safety. And because I am out of my safety, I am now in survival mode. And because I am in survival mode, I have a different set of expectations than when I'm functioning from a place of safety. When I'm in survival mode, if you have a bad day, I think you're about to break up with me.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Are you rejecting me? Did something go wrong? Because I don't feel safe by myself. But if we can get to a place of safety for ourselves, we can invite other people into the intimacy of our safety. We can visit the intimacy of their safety. And we can also give one each other space when that other person needs to get back to their place of safety.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I saw a very encouraging article that the divorce rates are actually going down because people have done a lot of work in therapy and understanding triggers and communicating, so marriage is becoming more safe than it once was. But I think that we also have a generation of women who...
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
feel like they saw a previous generation of women lose themselves in relationship lose their voice lose their ability to explore their creativity and their power to become subservient to whoever their partner was and i think there's a legitimate fear in that for women who feel like hey i do want to create a life with someone i do want to experience love
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But I also want to be the fullness of who I am. And I'm not sure that the two can coexist. And they are so committed to preserving who they are that they don't want to take a chance on relationships. And I think that that is a fair perspective based off of what we can see.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But I do think that when we are in relationships with our partners, that we have to be willing to make space for the reality that Just because what we saw didn't seem healthy, it doesn't mean that we can't create something healthy.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And in wanting to create something healthy, you have to make sure that you and whoever you're going to build with want the same things. That you're willing to create your own definition of what love and marriage and partnership looks like. And that whatever that definition is, that you will commit to protecting your definition. Because it may not be the world's definition.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
It may not be your parents definition or the church's definition or whatever. But you got to be willing to protect your definition so that you can have a bond that lasts throughout time. My husband and I like there are certain things we want for our family. There are certain things we want for our marriage. And we're often in worlds and cultures that don't always support that. Really?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And instead of trying to target something that's going to make you feel better about those things, we have to face off with the fear. We have to face off with the doubt and with the shame. We've got to look that thing in the eye and say, at the end of the day, I no longer want to be controlled by you any longer. You've had my name for far too long. You've dictated my destiny for far too long.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
For sure. Because it's going to take the strength of both of us to maintain the marriage that we want. It can't just be a one sided strength.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Well, my husband and I have a shared expression of faith. So I think making sure that you have a shared... expression of faith, not even just a shared faith, but what does this expression look like for you? How does it show up in your world? Because everybody who believes in God isn't trying to live a life of light, love and goodness and conviction and humility.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so making sure you have a shared expression.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Exactly. How does how does your faith show up in your actions?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And I will say that this isn't a question that you would have a shared answer to. But I think it's a question worth asking the person. And that is, what is the most traumatic experience you've had in your life? And how does the residue of that experience show up in your presence?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
What is the most traumatic experience of your life? And how does the residue of that experience show up in your present?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And we're all a little crazy. And if you have normalized something that was traumatic... then you have become comfortable sleeping with the enemy. Wow. I need to know that you know what hurt you, what wounded you, what changed the way that you see the world. Because I want to help you clear your lens. I'm not asking you to not have the lens.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I just want you to understand how it shows up in who you are right now And what do I need to do in order to help you see beyond what happened to you?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And I would say the last one is. What brings you joy?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
This world is tough. And I want to know the secret to putting a smile on your face when the world's trying to wipe it off.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I want to be better now. than who fear says I am. I wanna be better than what shame says that I am. And in order to direct our power in the right direction, we gotta know who our opponent is. And so I would say to anyone who believes that I don't have what it takes or I don't have enough worth, that as long as you believe that, it is true.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I do not know. It feels like it. And there are plenty of reasons why I think it feels like that. But I also think social media has put it more in our face than ever.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But there were still wars. I mean, people were still going through a lot of pain. There were ups and downs in the economy. And so I want to believe that there was, you know, the same or similar amount of pain.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Yeah, but it does feel very magnified.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I think that every person has to be willing to ask themselves, God, what is it that I need to see? And who is it that I need to be to address what I see? I think it's too big of a thing to ask. What is the prayer that the world needs? But if I can get people to understand that who you are in your world matters is significant that you are a power player in your circle of influence.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
then they can take ownership over their corner of the world. And it may just be the four walls of their home. It doesn't have to. I want to believe that there's something in me that will address every single problem in the world. I want to believe that. All I have is this story, this platform, this gift to take the Bible and make it relatable. And it doesn't always feel like enough. It doesn't.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But I release it anyway. And I believe that if we can all combine in releasing whatever we have anyway, that maybe we can make a difference in one person for one day or for a lifetime. But I think we have to be willing to take ownership because we've got devastation. And then we have people who are apathetic in many ways because they're so overwhelmed in what they can't do to solve what they see.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But if we can engage in what we can control, I believe that we can see a difference. I have to believe that.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
What we need to be saying instead is that I need enough power to finally get out of this pattern of thinking that has kept me stuck that has kept me feeling defeated, and that is a stronger belief. And I believe that anyone who's going to introduce a stronger belief has to be able to say, I am this and that. Like I may be a teen mom, but I'm still a girl who has dreams.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I do think that there are some people who are literally called to focus on what's happening outside of maybe their immediate circle of influence. Like that immediate circle of influence may not be their target audience, right? Sure, sure.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
It just is. I mean... We all know people who would like give the best advice that they don't take. You know what I mean? It doesn't mean that the advice itself is broken, but it is just really hard to do the heavy lifting for yourself.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Most of the people who are like the strong friend for other people are showing up for them, but they need strength themselves because there is a vulnerability that comes when it's your life on the line, your relationship on the life where the outcomes directly impact you. Yes.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so it can be very liberating to say, I'm going to tell you what to do and then I will figure out my stuff later or not at all. But I do think that you can only effectively
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
impart what you know to be true right everything else is guesswork but I can tell you that I found out power moves because I saw power on the platform and I saw power in the car line and I saw power when I was creating a business plan like I know this for myself and when you know something for yourself you're able to have a more convincing argument for other people but it just requires a lot of vulnerability that many people aren't willing to step into wow
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I may have come from a broken home, but I still want to pursue this. I do not want these statistics to end up defining who I am for the rest of my life. And so just because I'm this doesn't mean that I won't be that either. And so being able to live in this duality so that fear doesn't convince us that who we were yesterday defines who we're going to be tomorrow.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
This thing has real power. It has enough power to keep me from moving, enough power to keep me from growing. Now that I have identified that it actually has power, I want to talk about how I want to extract the power, reclaim the power that fear has, that shame has and pointed in a direction that will allow me to experience wholeness and joy and peace and confidence.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Power Moves is all about really reclaiming power from fear, from our shame, from our past and recognizing that power moves. Just because it had enough power to stop you in your past doesn't mean that it gets to keep that power. When you reclaim it, you can begin moving in the direction of transformation
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
from the inside out, not just because I want to get a new job or I want to build something on the outside. When power moves in you, then power can move through you.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I love that you asked this because then we need to study how does this show up in my life? So I on in my intimate relationships, I would never speak up. So if someone projected something onto me and said, oh, you know, Sarah doesn't want to do this or hey, we're going to do this. I would never use my voice, even if I disagreed. I would just go with the flow. I didn't want to be a disruptor.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I didn't want to detract from anyone, even if it was a major decision. And so I recognized that the power of fear was showing up in keeping me from actually using my voice. And so I have identified it. Now I've seen how it shows up in my life to go to the end of the day and to reconcile. How did the power of fear, the power of shame show up? It didn't. determine what I put on.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
It determined whether or not I spoke up in the meeting. It made me shut down. I got angry. Like, how did this show up in my life? And what do I wish I would have done instead? What would have been the power move that I did instead? And the beautiful thing about this is when you're reconciling it within yourself, you can say whatever you want to say to yourself.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Like, you may not, this may not be what I would have said in the meeting. Like, I wish I'd have told her to shut up. It's like, that may not be what you say in the meeting, but start practicing
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
what it feels like to use your voice, to show up in power, to do the opposite of what fear and anxiety and doubt, do the opposite of that, even if you're only doing it within yourself, because you have to exercise using your own power within, because the next time there's a moment like this, you get to capture and say, wait a minute, this is a moment where I get to choose to have faith or I get to choose to have fear.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And because I've already practiced how I want to show up in this space, this may be the moment where I dip my toe in the water and begin to show up.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Yeah, let me think about that. Yeah.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
So at the end of each chapter, we literally have this like marinate, activate prayer. So it's like these three sections was like, let's marinate on how you would have wanted to do something differently. And then let's activate it. The next time you're doing X, Y, and Z, try and show up in a way that allows power to move through you. And then a prayer to help you in those moments.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Because it does create... Change is not always easy, even when we know it needs to be implemented.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I am still probably really, you know, because we are on a podcast where people hear things. I am needing to be more intentional about owning my voice as an entrepreneur.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
It's hard to say that I'm not being authentic because I don't fully... I don't know that I have fully owned the fact that there are a lot of things that I have like stumbled into. And then there are many things that I had to really be strategic about, you know, making specific hiring choices, making sure that our brand has a certain feel, touch and consistency. And I've done that with intention.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
But because I act like everything just happened by accident, it's keeping me from really understanding how to serve other people and giving these tools away and to really empower my team to like own what they know as well.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And I know that my fear in working on that, the reason why I haven't is because I don't want to come off as an expert when I am still learning. And so I would rather just be like, I'm still learning than to own what I know thus far and allow that to be used for whoever needs it.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
You're called to this. You're called to do this as you are. to just keep it pure. I think that the hard thing about success, which feels like a very cringy word, is that people begin to impose their strategies onto you. And when those strategies and ideas about who you could be and what you could do and this could happen for you,
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
It can make you hungry for something that you never even had an appetite for. And so protecting my appetite so that I can continue to just focus on what God has put in my heart is my greatest responsibility. Wow.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
So I've spent almost as much time feeling like I was powerless than I have flowing in this level of power.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I think the line is so thin. that the only way you learn it is by trial and error, unfortunately. But I think some of the qualifying questions I ask myself is what's driving your desire to do this? And being real enough to know when it's ego, being real enough to know when it's wanting to seek approval from certain industries or certain people versus even with this book launch.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Like you've written a book before. So everybody's like, you got to hit the list. You got to hit the list. You need X amount of numbers to hit the list, hit the list, hit the list. But like when I wrote this book, I wasn't thinking about how do I write a New York Times bestselling book.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
Yeah. And I will say that part of the reason why so many of us end up feeling powerless is because we have not fully sized up our opponent.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I wrote this book because I was completely consumed with this idea of what it means to have power and who holds it and who doesn't. And why do we believe that it's only reserved for a few? Like I wanted to explore that. this idea of power. And I did that, which means that this book has already been successful in the way that it was meant to be successful for me.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so for me to get to this point and then for it to become about, okay, but if you don't hit the list, it wasn't successful is robbing me of the obedience that started the book in the first place. And so I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that people hear about the message. But I'm not going to put the success of the book on whether or not it makes it into a list.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And numbers matter and all of that matters. I think defining what success is for yourself first, because if you don't have a definition of what success is, that's part of even in the book. Like I have to define what power is for me as a person, because if I do not have my own definition, I will be stretching and reaching for someone else's definition of power.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so I've got to know what it is for myself.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
and then i also need to know what is everyone else's definition of success or power in my world whether it is what it like my husband and i perfect example my definition of what it meant to be a good wife was like dinner's on the table at six you know the house is completely clean like you wake up and the house is clean you make sure that before you go to bed you look a certain way like i had all of these different ideas of what it meant to be a good wife
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
so if you have fear if you have shame if you have doubt and you have worry we say these words so casually and so frequently that they have become normalized the only problem with normalizing our insecurities our fears the abandonment the rejection issues is that they don't really have the same level of power that they need to have in order for us to overcome it and by that i mean
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
I never stopped to ask the person I'm actually marrying, like, what is your definition of a good wife? Not societies, not what I've seen on sitcoms. What does it mean to be Trey's wife? Because I want to be successful and powerful at being your wife.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
He doesn't care about dinner being on the table at 6. He's not nearly as obsessed with cleaning. He wants honesty. He wants communication. He wants loyalty. He wants joy. He wants peace. I would be up making sure the room was clean before we went to bed so that, like, if you wake up, the room is still clean. And he's like, I want you to get in the bed so I can put my head in your lap.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And even for someone who internalizes for my husband to value communication and honesty, sometimes I'll have like a whole dialogue going in within me and he has no idea what's happening and he wants me to speak up. So I know that part of what it means to be a powerful wife to him is me being able to verbalize what I'm thinking and what's going on in my world.
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
And so we are so consumed by living up to other people's expectations and other people's definition that we're robbing the people who we are in the closest proximity to of us being powerful in the roles that we play for them. Wow. What is power as a spouse? What is power as an adult child? What's power as a parent specific to the people who you are called to serve?
The School of Greatness
How To Cultivate Inner Peace In Uncertain Times
You're able to incubate what really matters and push away that which would try to make you perform into someone you're not.