Personal Growth | Grit and Grace Life

Finding Purpose When Another Door Closes

It was a Friday afternoon, long after the rest of the staff had left. The celebration was over and the building was still and quiet. I walked to my office and leaned against the doorway, cardboard box in hand. I thought about the years spent within these four walls, the conversations, the accomplishments, and the many challenges. A career ended far too soon. I spent the next few minutes packing years’ worth of memories into the box, glanced fondly out the window, walked out the office, down the hallway, and out the building—the front door closing behind me. I can vividly remember the feeling of cold air hitting my face as I stepped off the sidewalk. It was November, a fitting month […]

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All the Ways Gratitude Is the Game Changer You Need

By Rachel Hagstrom / Faith

Potentially, summer can be a time to recalibrate after a full school year or seize opportunities for a mid-year inventory on the goals set at the first of the year. For some of us, the slower daily rhythms can allow more space for processing and reflection. Others of us try to find ways to sift through the nuances and recent events of life despite barreling forward with busy schedules. As is typical of life, the harder moments have inched their way into all that’s good and pleasant, asserting their existence—making sure I won’t evade their ability to discourage. The past several years of my life have been a beautiful mess: a co-mingling of blessings and hardship that has often left me feeling

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What Is the Magic of the Snowball Effect?

By Rachel Hagstrom / Purpose

Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things. —Robert Brault Years ago, I was scheduled on a red eye from Hawaii to Houston. Shortly after I sat down in my seat, a middle-aged Japanese woman plopped down in the empty seat to my left. “Hello,” I smiled at her before sliding my headphones over my ears, the universal signal that I wasn’t up for conversing. It was close to midnight, after all. But the woman started engaging with me anyway. Not wanting to be rude, I took my headphones off and answered her questions while our plane barreled down the runway. Pretty soon, we were describing what our days consisted of and

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When You Go All in on the Life Hand You’ve Been Dealt

By Amber Koehn / Faith

“It’s not about the cards you’ve been dealt, but how you play the hand.” -Randy Pausch Hello. My name is Amber. I love God, my family, coffee, sports, and a great lip gloss. I have received accolades and awards for my academics, music, athletics, and writing. I have a wonderful husband and four beautiful girls who make me proud every day. My friends are some of the best, and I laugh daily. On the surface, I’ve been dealt all aces. But underneath the surface, the cards tell a different story. My name is Amber. I also battle depression and grief. I overreact in situations that upset me, and my mind races and imagines scenarios way beyond reality. I have struggled with my weight

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The 6 Qualities That Make a Female Leader Strong

By Jenni Catron / Work & Money, Life & Culture

It is no surprise that “strong” is a word we use to describe women who have risen to positions of leadership. Males and females alike recognize that women in positions of power must be strong in order to survive the pressure cooker, which results in only 6.4% of women in Fortune 500 CEO positions.1 A stat, by the way, is up over 50% from 2016 and has tripled since 2008. The number of women holding these upper-echelon positions of power is troubling, considering that nearly 40% of MBA students are female.2 We start strong, but where do we get squeezed out? I won’t begin to explain (or try to understand) all the reasons why the numbers thin so dramatically the closer we get

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Tired? Overwhelmed? 4 Guilt-Free Reasons to Say No

By Carey Melton / Life & Culture

Are you tired and overwhelmed? Distracted? Disappointed in yourself? Feeling used and used up? There is a good chance you’re saying “yes” to too many things and people. True, you have a part to play in life. False. You have to play every part in the play of life. It seems impossible to find guilt-free reasons to say no. Too many times, we try to do it all because somewhere along the way, we fell into the trap of believing if we’re not saying “yes,” then we’re selfish or lazy or replaceable or aren’t good enough. Author, Lysa TerKeurst, stated in her book, The Best Yes: “If I want things about my life to change, if I want to change the way

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When a Strong Woman is Quitting but not Failing

By Dr. Zoe / Purpose

You’re reading this because there is something in your life that you have an inkling you need to let go of. Whether it’s a job, a relationship, a dream, or a life path, you know you really shouldn’t be involved in it anymore. It just doesn’t feel right, but you aren’t sure what to do about it. You may be quitting but not failing. I don’t know about you, but I have a million “don’t quit” mantras in my head that make quitting feel the same as failing. They all say that if I choose to end something in my life, I am a failure. When you think of yourself as a strong woman, quitter doesn’t play into that description. Having perseverance

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How Do I Know What Defines Me?

By Darlene Brock / Purpose, Best Of

I am single. I am widowed. I am married. I am divorced. I am a mom. I have no children. I am a career woman. I stay at home. I am an artist. I am a cancer survivor. I have a doctorate. I finished high school. Are these really who we are? Or are they merely part of our journey, a title, or life experience that will demonstrate what we are made of? I, my friend, will passionately argue for the latter. In my 20s, I was a booking agent for musicians when I married my boss. No, it was not one of those torrid affairs in the workplace that you would read or hear about over your lunch break. He was

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This Is My New Exercise Regimen for My Faith

By Amy Saxby / Faith

I love new beginnings. I’m a girl who enjoys looking back, reflecting, evaluating, and dreaming for the future. For me, a new day, season or year means a new opportunity to clean out the old, purge clutter, refocus, slow down, set goals, and reflect on what God has done in my life. I’m the nerdy girl who loves to turn the calendar page to a new month. I love the newness and blank slate it brings, representing a fresh start. Recently, I felt a need to start a new exercise regime. Not a physical, let’s-get-fit exercise, but a new mental and spiritual regime I am trying to practice and embrace. I have noticed lately that I allow many of my emotions to

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5 Things You Need to Quit Right Now

By Ashley Johnson / Purpose, Health & Beauty

I was scrolling through Instagram the other day and came across a quote that said: 5 Things to Quit Right Now: 1. Trying to please everyone. 2. Fearing change. 3. Living in the past. 4. Putting yourself down. 5. Overthinking. That’s actually pretty good advice, I thought. So I took a screenshot of it and decided to take it to heart. Here’s why I think we should quit each thing on that list: 1. Trying to please everyone. It’s simply impossible, and if you live your life seriously trying to accomplish this goal, you’ll run yourself ragged… And probably feel like a failure, because it’s simply unachievable. Don’t do that to yourself. Be kind, respectful, and do your best to love your neighbor

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5 Ways I Learned to Love My Middle-Aged Body

By Meaghan Dawson / Life & Culture, Best Of

The other day, as I was participating in my daily scroll on social media, a Facebook memory popped up on my feed. It was a heartwarming throwback of me and my youngest when she was just a baby. I looked tired, yes, but also had that new-mom glow as I held my daughter in her “Baby’s First Christmas” outfit. She was three months old and this was, sadly, quite a few years ago. I remember that picture well. We were at my in-laws’ house after church, and it was the first time I had gotten “dressed up” since giving birth. And I remember being wildly insecure about my new, mom-of-three body. I felt frumpy, overweight, and gross. I didn’t want to go,

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Want to Change Your Life? Start Building Something New

By Rachel Hagstrom / Purpose

“The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”—Socrates (a character in Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives by Dan Millman) For the record, the words above weren’t penned by the philosopher Socrates, but rather by a character with the same name in a book I have not yet read. I stopped scrolling when I came across the quote on my Instagram, half-hoped it indeed was passed down by the Greek classic, but regardless, instantly liked it—yet with strings attached. The part of me that rebels against the meaning of the words is the same part of me that finds value in taking an honest inventory of

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I Found Freedom After Sharing My Painful Story

By Eve DeBardeleben Roebuck / Faith

What do you do when one of your best college friends moves to the beach? You round up the rest of the gang and head down to see her. This is just what we’ve done for the last several years, and it’s come in the nick of time for some whose lives are wearing thin. While we’re often in touch with updates and prayers, getting together yearly at Fernandina Beach as we’ve just done last week is the highlight. We spend evenings outside after supper, catching up as the sun goes down. One night, there was such an astonishing sunset, no one thought to snap a photo. We gaped instead. Later, when the moon rose and the clouds parted and the light

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Ask Dr. Zoe – How Can I Get a Promotion at Work?

By Dr. Zoe / Ask Dr. Zoe

‘Want a Promotion’ Asked: One of my goals for this year is to get a promotion. What’s the number one thing I can do to get noticed at work and prove to my boss he should promote me? I hate talking about myself but I know I’m good at my job and I’m valued in the workplace. Dr. Zoe Answered: I love working with women to help them get promotions! What better time than the new year to go after that promotion! There isn’t just one main thing that can lead to the promotion of your dreams. It’s a combination of things. So, I will give you the top ones: The most important thing to understand is that your value at work

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When Life Changes, Does Your Purpose Change, Too?

By Marlys Johnson Lawry / Purpose, Audio Articles

(Listen to the audio version of this article here.) An old, wooden door with a torn screen and chipped paint once graced our front porch. A birch basket of pinecones sat on a red chair in front of the door, and a “Welcome” sign hung from the top corner. The screen door that once slapped happily against the frame of a tired, old farmhouse had been repurposed into porch art. It received a few comments through the years, not all of them complimentary. One friend went so far as to offer to repair the screen door. (It seems that some people don’t appreciate good art when they see it.) What if you once knew what your purpose was? And what if you

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This Mama Is Getting Her Pink Back

By Kimberly Trigo / Motherhood, Best Of

Tomorrow, I return to the working world for the first time since I left J.P. Morgan Chase in 2014 to be a stay-at home mom to my twins. I have never regretted that decision, even in the moments where I could not afford a purchase or in the tantrum-riddled days where I could not seem to catch my breath until they were fast asleep. Looking back on these last 8 years, it all went so fast. A Helpful Flamingo Analogy My niece recently shared with me a little trivia about flamingos and how they lose their pink color while taking care of their young. As the flamingos start to get more independent, the mama starts to get her pink back. I am

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It Took Losing Everything to Find Me

By Dona Middleton / Purpose

It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are. -E.E. Cummings At 30, I was happily married, had a great career, many friends, and lots of money. During that time, I also became deeply depressed, was put on medication for anxiety and entered what would be a very long relationship with psychotherapy. It was a real struggle for me to understand why I wasn’t happy when I had everything that I thought was important in life. Was I selfish? Were my expectations too high? I honestly couldn’t understand what was missing and how to fill this huge void that gnawed at me endlessly. When I look back at my life, more than 20 years later, I realize that I

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