5/10/23
Hi! First let me say, thank you for letting me share my life with you. This whole journey of healing – being played out in this podcast – is obviously not just for myself. I’ve heard from many of you that God is using the episodes to bring healing to your own brokenness and a renewed sense of purpose in your life. These are the stories I’ve been inundated with just of late. And it reminded me of an interview I did on Life Repurposed Podcast with host Michelle Rayburn. Now, I’ve had the privilege of being interviewed on several hand-fulls of podcasts, and this one is in the top 2 or 3 for me. Michelle asks good questions. And I just loved her from the get-go because she’s a re-purposer of things, just like me. Which is exactly what God has done in my life, repurposed it. Please do go follow her podcast. She brings many beautiful stories of God’s redemptive grace. I’ll link her podcast in the show notes.
So, with that said, I do hope you are blessed and encouraged by this episode in your own journey. Here’s the interview with Michelle.
Michelle Rayburn 00:02 This week my guest and I have a heartfelt chat about how God showed her that when her dreams and plans crumbled, he gave her hope and a message that she could have another beautiful life after the heartbreak. I want you to know that this episode includes a topic that may be triggering. Although we do not talk about suicide in a graphic or detailed way. Please use discretion if suicide is a sensitive topic for you. More than anything, this episode is about hope and renewal, about transforming our minds and breaking old patterns of thinking. I got chills a few times while recording. Maybe you're wondering if God has another beautiful life for you after something has caused everything to fall apart. Hope is very much alive in Tricia's story, and I hope you enjoy our conversation today.
Michelle Rayburn 01:07 You're listening to Life Repurposed, where you'll find practical biblical wisdom for everyday living, creative inspiration, and helpful resources. Grow your faith, improve your relationships, discover your purpose, and reach your goals with topics to encourage you to find hope amid the trashy stuff of life. Thanks for joining me today. I'm your host Michelle Rayburn.
Michelle Rayburn 01:31 Before we jump into the conversation, I'd like to introduce you to my guest today. Tricia Zody. After the tragic death of her husband, Tricia is learning to put the pieces of her life back together by leaning on the love and hope of Christ one day at a time. His promise to her of another beautiful life is evidence of his gracious mercy and tender care for the brokenhearted. Hers is a story of loss, broken dreams, and complicated grief. But it is also one of redemption and great hope that is full of evidence of God's loving presence that is proving to be beautiful and good. Tricia Zody is a speaker, a life coach for Christian women, and a podcast host of Another Beautiful Life. Tricia lives in the Houston area and is the mother of three beautiful adult children who are scattered all over the globe. Let's jump into the conversation with Tricia.
Michelle Rayburn 02:24 I'm gonna give you a scenario, and I want to find out something about your personality here. So you have a random free afternoon, which I have a feeling is pretty rare for you.
Tricia Zody 02:33 Yes, yes.
Michelle Rayburn 02:34 So do you spend it at home reading a book and lounging on the patio? Or do you call a friend and go out?
Tricia Zody 02:41 Oh, it's so hard because it's both and. I am an outside on my patio person, girl. I love to be outside any— In fact, before we got together, I went out and stood out in the sun on my back patio just to soak it up for a minute. That does something for me. I love being outside. But there is something about the necessity of connection for me as well. And so it's not just anybody. I have very specific friends, right. I have my little close-knit friends that I will call and see if I can get together. And listen, if they can't, I am so happy on my patio. So, it's all good.
Michelle Rayburn 03:22 Oh, I'm so jealous of the sunshine because you're in the south and I'm in northern Wisconsin and I went for a walk this morning. It's late May when we're recording this. It was 46 degrees and raining. So I want the sunshine so badly.
Tricia Zody 03:39 Oh my goodness. Let me tell you it is. It's gonna tell me right here. It's 81 degrees here completely sunny all day, not a cloud in the sky.
Michelle Rayburn 03:47 All right. Well, I'll be on a plane in—I'm two hours from the airport. So I'm on the way.
Tricia Zody 03:53 Come on.
Michelle Rayburn 03:53 Actually, I was in Houston for a podcasters conference in 2020. Right before everything closed down. It was February. It was like maybe 55 degrees. And I went outside on the patio at the conference center. And there was one other person sitting out there with me. It was a woman from Michigan. And both of us were enjoying the fact that in February, 55 felt like heaven.
Tricia Zody 04:16 Yes, exactly. Exactly. I love it.
Michelle Rayburn 04:19 Tricia you've self identified as a huge repurposer. So I want to know a little bit more about that.
Tricia Zody 04:26 Oh, wow. Well, my husband and I used to go to antique markets. There's a huge antique market that comes out twice a year. And we're real junk finders so it was me were we'd go to the junk. We go to the old furniture, not the new you know the swanky lookin' antiques. We'd go to the old stuff. And anything that we could find whether that be antique chairs or furniture or just anything. My house is filled with it and it is we've brought it in. And, and you know, put a little bit of love on it, maybe some paint, you know and which, and crackle paint it, which anybody who is an antique dealer is freaking out, right?
Michelle Rayburn 05:12 I like chalk paint. So I get you.
Tricia Zody 05:16 Yeah, so my house is completely covered with repurposed things. We've got—One of my favorite things is, we found some Egyptian gates that were outside of a mansion in Egypt, and they were brought to this antique market. And so we snatched up several of them. And they are 12 feet tall. They're, they're about four and a half feet wide. So I have two by two of them sitting next to each other as my headboard. They are and they're old and the paint chipping off and it is just, it's gorgeous. And then we got another one and we had someone cut it up and make a base of a side table for us, and then put a piece of soapstone on the top. So we're all about that. So yes, when I heard about you, oh, yeah.
Michelle Rayburn 06:12 As you're talking, like, you're a girl after my own heart. Because I like the rusty. I like the chipped up things. And I am not afraid of painting wood, even though people do not like me for that.
Tricia Zody 06:23 Yeah, yeah. So we took a—so you'll love this. So we found some old whitewashed pine, which is kind of rare to find, but it was in an old dance hall where I think like LBJ danced one time. So like, it has some history, right? So we commissioned this guy to make a dining table for us. It's 10 and a half feet long, it's quite large. Or maybe I'm sorry, 12 and a half feet long. And, and he also kind of put farm table kind of look base on it. And we didn't really like that. So I had my husband take the farm table based off, and we bought old antique columns, and put them side by side. And those are the base to the dining table. But the then the, the pine was just not really my color. And my style. So I painted it. And then did a crackle finish on top of it. I mean, let me tell you, it is the and then and then went in with a rub on top of it. It is the coolest table. But if I tell anybody that I have this, this, this product, right? And then what's under that all that pain, they just about freak out. But you know, like I told him—my husband—"I was like, I'm not going to appreciate this as much as I would if it were ours. I know we commissioned it. But it didn't turn out the way we wanted it to, or I wanted to, so he was all in. We did it. It's my favorite piece. When I moved, I had to make sure that that dining table went with me, like, I'm never getting rid of that dining dining table. So anyway, it's so much fun.
Michelle Rayburn 08:01 This leads perfectly into why I think that repurposing is a metaphor for life. So my show here started from originally a blog about decorating before and after things. And the beauty is really in what we find in it. It isn't in what somebody else finds in it, because somebody else might love my chandelier with the original brass, which I changed to oil rubbed bronze, but somebody else might think that's too rustic for them. And that's how life is too, like the repurposing that God does in our circumstances are really about the beauty that he helps us pull from those situations. And I know that you've gone through some really tough times in your life and, and the toughest part has been most recently. So could you tell us a little bit about your story?
Tricia Zody 08:53 Sure. So just to give a little bit of of back history I have. I've been married 30 years, had three beautiful children with my husband, Brian, and we grew up. We kind of grew up together because we were young and when we had children. We weren't... we didn't really know what we were doing, and we just figured it out together. But he was definitely my best friend and like I said, when we'd go antique shop, we just did things together. We loved being together. So he was a very smart man and just very kind, loved the Lord, followed Jesus, read his Bible every day. He was just a he was just a man that was you know, he was the man that my parents prayed for me to have, right? I've had the privilege...he owned his own business, and I've had the privilege to just stay home with my kids raise our three children. And I spent most of my life in women's ministry teaching Bible study, mentoring women, and also leading worship, and then volunteering wherever I wanted to. So that was such a privilege for me. So that that is, that's kind of who I've been.
Tricia Zody 10:12 But most recently, I am a widow. So my husband passed away in 2017. And so I'm just going to give you a real concise version of the background and the backstory. And if you want to stop me at anytime you're welcome to and ask any questions. But basically, in 2012, my husband began experiencing debilitating back pain in his lower back. And then he had five major surgeries in five years. And that included a laminectomy at first, and then fusion with cages. And then we had to go in and take out the cage and put in new cages, and then several more fusions, anyway, all the way down to the sacrum. And then every surgery seemed to have left him worse off than before. And then in 2017, the neurosurgeon finally told him that there was nothing more that they could do for him, and that he'd be on pain management for the rest of his life.
Tricia Zody 11:09 So at this point, he was and, as you can imagine, the despondency that comes from you know, you have a major surgery that tell you, it takes about six months for that inflammation to go down to see if that surgery "took" right? [quote, unquote] I'm doing air quotes, if it "took," so we'd wait, we'd hold our breath, six months, and then to find out that that surgery didn't, didn't take, he was still in pain. And then we did spend the next six months trying to figure out going to physical therapy and acupuncture and doing all that the stretching and do all the things that he needed to do and figuring out what was next for him. And then you know, and then we'd have another surgery. So we do this for five years, five major surgeries. So at this point, he is so he's so ... just done. He's like, he can't sit for very long in a chair. It's very, very painful for him, standing up gets extremely tiring. So he found himself laying on the couch quite a bit. He owned his own business. Fortunately, you can work from home. And so he did his work from from the couch, basically. But here he was. And like I mentioned at the beginning, he was a very strong man, very smart man. He was strong physically, he's strong spiritually. But this chronic pain, literally did a number on him. And he had lost a significant amount of weight, and was unable to do most of the things that he loved doing. And in somewhere in there, he lost himself. And he became hopeless.
Tricia Zody 12:43 And then in August of 2017, he ended up taking his life. So that is that's kind of my history that brought is kind of brought me to where I am today. Because after his suicide, I found myself in despair and overwhelm, and a desperation like I never had before. Right? I've had a very vibrant, robust relationship with the Lord for many, many years. Those last five years were filled with desperate cries and begging the Lord to heal him. But, and alongside that, a faith and a belief that he would. And Brian had the same. Brian believed that by medicine or by miracle, God could heal him. And he asked that he would every single night. In fact, there were many times that we would go to bed together, praying in tears, asking the Lord to heal him. So we had great faith that the Lord could do that.
Tricia Zody 13:48 So it was very interesting that at that point, it was overwhelming for him, to the degree that he no longer had hope. He was hopeless. So I had to, at that point, kind of reconcile, how did that all happen? Like, how did that even? How did that even happen to him? Right? And then, you know, like I said, I was a stay-at-home mom for all those years, and I did women's ministry. And so now all of a sudden, I no longer have my best friend and my husband, but I also no longer have my financial provisions. So I had no idea how I was gonna go on. I hadn't I had not been in corporate and over 25 years, you know, you know, what do I how do I how do I do that? And you know, how do I jump back in? And so I was at a point where I really didn't know how I was gonna go on. If even if I want it to go on, right? I just felt like my life was over everything that I knew all the dreams that we had planned together. You know, we were at the time, we were—we've had some property at the edge of the hill country. And we had been mapping out clearing the land mapping out where our house would be, talking to an architect about what that would look like, talking about, you know, oh, we'll do a little bunk house for the kids, the grandkids over here, you know, we'll do a playground over there. So we had so many things to look forward to in our future. And then all of a sudden, it was just gone in an instant. So I was in a really, really dark place. And I, it was probably the first time in all of my years of being a Christian, that I've ever questioned God, and honestly felt like I had a crisis of faith. There were a lot of things that I didn't understand that I believed about God, that didn't come to fruition didn't happen, and made me question everything.
Michelle Rayburn 15:58 I'm thinking about how you had five years of watching your husband, struggling, and I can hardly imagine the discouragement of having been through that process. And now suddenly finding yourself with this immense loss on top of that emotion... I've been married over 30 years as well. And so I it's hard for me to imagine what it would be like to watch my husband suffering, like your husband was with the pain. So you talked about this crisis of faith that you came to What questions did you wrestle with then with God?
Tricia Zody 16:35 Well, you know, it's, it's really interesting, if you had asked me, Michelle, "Hey, Tricia, do you treat God like a genie in a bottle?" You know, I would have argued with you until I was blue in the face, because I loved him, I honored him, I had reverence for him, and I trusted him and I knew who he was. And I knew his goodness. But I didn't realize that until that moment, that I really was expecting something out of him. "Look, God, I've been serving you. For all these years, I've, I've sacrificed my life for you. We've, we've given over our not just our family and our children to you. We've dedicated everything, our lives to you, our business is yours. We have dedicated, we've done all this for you. We are live it. Couldn't you have just done this one thing? For me?" Right? And it really was—it exposed a lot about how I felt our relationship was transactionally. I would never have I agreed, I would have never admitted that before, I would never have even believed that. That's what I was believing. But my very question asking him, "Couldn't you have just done this one thing for me? I've done all these things for you."
Michelle Rayburn 17:52 I think there's probably a listener that can relate to that, who maybe has been waiting for a loved one to be healed from cancer. And then that was not answered in the way that they had hoped for. So I interrupted you there. But how did you process that then when you realize that?
Tricia Zody 18:14 Right. Well, I had to realize that then what I was really saying was my life, my comfortable life here, was was about me. I mean, life on Earth for me was about me and me being happy, and me getting the things that I wanted. And so through a process, and I do say process, because it was not over overnight, was literally wrestling with the Lord, over and again. But I came to understanding that I really was living a me centric theology...that everything that I believed was about me and my happiness and my life here. And what the Lord allowed me to see by His mercy and His grace, He showed me that this world living here is really all about him. It's about his plan, his overarching plan, and it's something that I don't even, I can't even know or understand fully, I can know a little bit. But I can't fully understand because my because of my small, feeble brain. We can't know God that that way. We can't really understand him. And thank goodness because if I could understand him, me if I could understand him, he must be a very small, shallow God. So I came to understand His sovereignty a bit better here on this earth and my place in it. So I know now, who he is, and who I am in Him and what I'm here on earth for, and that is to give him glory and to enjoy him forever. And those two things can go and do go hand in hand. So I literally am my life, even in my husband's death, and in the way that I'm healing now, and in this healing journey is for His glory.
Tricia Zody 20:10 Now in my grieving, do I still have grief and sorrow? Absolutely. But I also have hope. And I have hope in that I have eternal life with Jesus after this life. And also I know my husband does as well, so and so he's been resurrected, I will at some point be rejoined with Him in heaven. So that's my hope. And if and if that's where my perspective is, if I have an eternal perspective, if that's where my focus is not here on this earth, in this world in this life right now, but if I'm looking to the, to the future, which is forever future, if I'm looking at that. And that's my focus that eternal perspective, then everything changes here, everything is just like, Okay, well, this is just—we are just a breath here. This is just a blip of my of my soul and my existence, because forever an attorney of eternity is in heaven, with Jesus and with my husband, and with my parents who have also gone to be with them. So, you know, it just it—when you have a crisis of faith, it's not a problem. It's really not. It's usually that's where God says, you know, I can work with this now. Because now you're getting really honest with yourself, you're really understanding that you don't know what you thought you knew. Let me tell you, let me educate you. And it comes with so much the revelation of it comes with so much peace, even in the the not understanding even in the parts where we can't understand we have no capacity to understand, and we have no answers for and you're just able to sit in it, and say, "Yes, Lord," and be settled in the peace. And it's like, I don't understand this. Yes, I still have grief. But I know that I can continue on and my life will give you glory.
Tricia Zody 22:01 And that's why I'm here. That's why I'm here on your podcast today, is to give that hope to other people that you, your journey may look different. You may have gone through different things. But listen, we're all on a journey. We don't none of us get out on this from this earth unscathed. None of us get out of here alive. Unless Jesus comes, yes, come Lord Jesus quickly. But you know, we're all going to face hardship. And some of it's going to be harder than others. Some of it's going to include the death of a spouse or a death of a child, it's going to be excruciating ly difficult. But God, but God.
Michelle Rayburn 22:40 I love that you've made it very clear that hope is not the absence of grief. Because sometimes we think that we can't have hope until the grief is gone. And as long as we're on earth, there's going to be a source of grief.
Michelle Rayburn 22:58 This episode is brought to buy the book and Bible study called The Repurposed and Upcycled Life: When God Turns Trash to Treasure. Are their experiences you'd rather toss in the dumpster? Discover the repurposed and upcycled life. This Christian living and humor book and accompanying Bible study will help you see how some of your greatest disappointments, mistakes, and hurts can be beautiful treasures from God. Move forward with new purpose even in the midst of the trashy stuff of life. The workbook includes small group discussion Bible study, doodles to color, and optional at-home applications each week. This is a study for busy women with easy prep for leaders and very little homework for participants. This simple format is welcome for busy women who are looking for deeper relationships with one another without the burden of extra homework. You'll find more about the best selling book The Repurposed and Upcycled Life: When God Turns Trash to Treasure at MichelleRayburn.com.
Michelle Rayburn 24:07 Tricia, could you tell us a little bit more about how God spoke to you?
Tricia Zody 24:12 Yeah. So right after my husband's service. I remember vividly sitting standing in my kitchen with my youngest son, and I said, "My life is over." You know, I really thought that I was waiting for something. I thought in my prayer time, I thought I heard the Lord telling me to wait, which I took and put my bias on it thinking oh, he's saying just wait. He's going to heal him any minute. Just wait, just wait. And you know, and I was telling my son, I don't even I don't even know I don't even understand God anymore. I don't even know if I can hear him correctly. I don't even know what he means. If he says something to me, how can I trust what he means? I'm putting my own bias honest on him. I know what wait means. Of course, my son in his wisdom, he said, "Mom, you don't really even know what you were waiting for or what to be waiting for. You may not have not seen it yet. It may be something that's coming in the future."
Tricia Zody 25:14 And that just blew— that just me blew my mind. I'm like, wait a minute, son, okay, here's my—he at the time, he was 22. I'm like, you know, the Lord is speaking right through you to me like you are, too. You're too smart for your 22-year-old age. But it opened up an awareness for me that the way that I'm thinking is so narrow and me-centric, righ? And so, coming back to that, and so it started this process of me considering that I, when God said, "I work all things together for good for those who love me, according to the purpose," I am thinking, well, this isn't good. I know, this doesn't feel good. It doesn't look good. So maybe I don't even know what good means. Right? If I it, maybe I don't understand what God means by good. What does he mean by good? Because I know that what I think is good. And according to my definitions, he's not caring for me or loving me, like a good father should. He's not actually being a good good father. That's because that's my interpretation of it. So it opened up my awareness that perhaps, I'm just not thinking right, perhaps my theology is not correct. Maybe I've got some things that are, you know, that are just off and more again, me-centric.
Tricia Zody 26:35 And so there I was wrestling, and it took so much time. And, but And yet, it was so fast as well. But the Lord really met me in that darkness in the midst of that deep, dark place, and that despair and the questioning, and he literally whispered to me, "Tricia, you can have another beautiful life. And it may not look like the life you'd hoped for or dreamed about, it may not look like the 30 years that you've had with your husband, but it can be beautiful, and it can be good." And that's when I knew Michelle, that there was hope on the other side of it.
Michelle Rayburn 27:15 That gave me chills. So you took that, and you turned it into a ministry for others. You have a podcast called Another Beautiful Life, but you also became a life coach for people. So what have you seen God doing now in this new beautiful life that you're in?
Tricia Zody 27:33 Yes, it is amazing. And it's funny. Now, you just said that to me and I've go chills on my arms. So one of the things that I had to the way that happened was, one of the things I needed to do was have an understanding of how again, this strong man, spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally is just a smart man, how this man could have been taken down so easily. And so I started studying the cognitive relationship of the brain and the body in order to understand that that piece, and I came across something that blew me away. And that was that chronic pain quite literally changes the makeup of the brain. And as I got more curious about it, I found out how and that's neuroplasticity. And neuroplasticity just means that our brains are able to wire and rewire itself, constantly. So it's a structural remodeling of the brain. So where there has been dysfunction, or trauma or stress in the background and our past in our history, people get stuck in neural ruts of negative thinking and feeling and behaving. And then these negative thoughts become as if they were fact to the brain. And so the words that we hear, or entertain, and say to ourselves, literally change the way we think permanently if they are a recurring pattern in our life. And so as I was trying to, you know, figure out how this would actually happen with chronic pain. The message that we hear, you would hear in pain is, "I'm never getting out of this. This is all-consuming. It's taking over my life. I will never be anything but the pain." And, you your identity becomes the pain. Right?
Michelle Rayburn 29:20 Romans 12:2 just came to my mind.
Tricia Zody 29:20 So if you say something like that long enough, your brain will accept it as indisputable fact, and it will automatically act out of that belief. So it's possible then that it'll also manifest in your body. So words are power to the brain. And so that's exciting news in that if we know that the brain can be rewired and rewired and rewired. It's exciting news, because that means that we can actually unwire and rewire you know we can disrupt those patterns of thinking with new mindsets and mindsets and reframing the stories of with new understandings and new perceptions and perspectives and then we and undo and rewire for positive neural patterns. So if we do that long enough, then we've got whole new neural ruts with helpful and healthy ways of thinking. Because when the Bible tells us to, to be transformed by the renewal of your mind.
Tricia Zody 29:30 That's right. Romans 12:2. And he tells us this because we're likely to need our minds transformed, amen? But he also tells us this because our minds can be transformed. Okay? So I came to understand the power of the brain and how these things that we create, and how we think create how we experience our life, right? It's not a law of attraction or a manifestation of something. It's literally a how I'm not changing. My my circumstances have not changed, my husband has not come back, right? It's the way that I experience this life today, that has changed. Right? So I can literally be in the same circumstances, whether that be financial or physical or mental, emotional, it doesn't matter, that it's how I experience my life that can change. So with, as I'm working this out for myself, and realizing that I could have another beautiful life, it started with saying, yes, it started by choosing to have another beautiful life. It's a choice. And by that choice, and saying yes to that opened up my mind to what could that possibly look like? What would that possibly be? Yes, it's not going to look like I used to. That's okay, I understand that. What could it look like?
Tricia Zody 31:43 And with that, my brain started getting busy, providing evidence that it actually could be beautiful, and it could be good, it's gonna be different. But it could be beautiful. And it could be good. So as I started transforming my life, one day at a time, and then I started the podcast. The podcast started out more as a therapy for me, but, you know, I had people asking me to write about it. So I started, like, grabbing all my journals from the years prior to his death, and then in that time, and so it was a slow rollout, basically, of the story, and then how the healing was coming along. And so it became not just hope for me, but for many people that had come across it. And I started getting messages from people and emails, and you know, saying, "Oh, you said this on this topic, and I'm dealing with that, could you help me with this?" And so after having 20 years, two decades of mentoring women, I knew how to help people, right. But I also knew this brain science part of it.
Tricia Zody 32:52 So I knew the faith part with mentoring, mentoring through faith, Biblical faith. But now I've got all this new brain science information. And I know how that transforms the mind. And if I could integrate the two, I could help so many people. Right? So that's what I do right now with my life coaching is I integrate Biblical faith and brain science. And I bring it together, because here's the thing, you and I, all the believers, all of your listeners, who are believers have the Holy Spirit in you, to convict to teach, right to comfort to guide. The problem is, is that we have got so many things in our past and probably past wounds that have not been healed. And then these negative neural ruts, these patterns in our brain that have got our brain stuck into negative thinking. And if we can't get past that we can open ourselves up and appropriate all the things that have been given to us through the Holy Spirit. And that's including the purpose that we have been created for on this earth.
Tricia Zody 33:58 So my—I, in particular, coach Christian women, exclusively, because I believe God has given the his daughters a purpose. Every one of us have a particular purpose. We're wired and created a specific way, all differently for a particular for purpose for his kingdom's sake. But if one of his daughters is filled with anxiety and fear, and she's hiding in the corner, she cannot go out and fill her God-given purpose. So if she if we can get her free of that anxiety, free of that fear, based on neuroscience, right, based on the transforming of the mind by giving new thoughts, right, he says, we think about what you're thinking about. Think about higher things. Don't think about the world. Don't worry about the world, don't be of the world, right? These are the things that and you know. Listen, when my husband passed away, the first thing well, one of the first things that I was worried about is like what do I do now with my finances? How am I going to live? How am I going to survive? And I'm freaking out, right? Instead of remembering that I have the God of all resources, all finances that can do all things.
Tricia Zody 35:12 And he can get money to me in all kinds of ways, which I've watched him do when I stepped out in obedience and said yes to him. It's like that. But those, you know, when you're stuck in neural ruts, negative patterns of thinking, your brain is just not open up to the other possibilities. And again, when we open our brain up to possibilities, we're able to consider other things with new perspectives, and it changes everything. It changes everything. Yeah, so I get excited.
Michelle Rayburn 35:43 Oh, Tricia, I love hearing you explain this, because I know I'm excited too because I'm thinking about like, people who are stuck with the negative voices of bullying and abuse, or people who are stuck in addictions and believing that this is just my story. This is, I mean, I even when it comes to relationship with food, have asked myself, Why do I keep going back to this habit? You know, like, there's so many patterns that we go, I've gotten stuck in even. So I imagine that your clients then that you're coaching have a million—well not a million. I like hyperbole—a lot of stories of freedom, and what it feels like to be set free.
Tricia Zody 36:25 Yes, absolutely. And one of my favorites, I talk about her all the time, but she had she literally was that beautiful daughter of Christ that was stuck in the corner because of anxiety. She literally could not live leave her house, to go to Bible study, or go to lunch with her girlfriends, or even to the grocery store without having a panic attack. So she literally would stay home. Her husband could come and take her but even still, when her husband would take her somewhere, there was, it was panic all the way. And so we work together. And now I'm telling you, Michelle, she is out doing everything she wants to do. She's doing the thing that God's called her to do. And that's apartment ministry, doing events for refugees. I mean, she's just she's out there doing what God has called her to do, because she has no more anxiety and panic attacks. And now we're no longer working together. But she sent me a message the other day, and she said, "Tricia, I'm just in tears, I'm giving glory to God." She said, "I just drove into," you know, "into town, 35 miles all by myself and drove all the way back." She said, "I absolutely enjoyed myself, no panic attacks, and God is so good."
Tricia Zody 37:39 And so here's what I love about this work is it is it's not just for the problems that you have, like right now. And today, it literally is transformative. Like we are literally creating new neural ruts in your brain ... new patterns and new ways of thinking. If you quit taking the old pattern, the negative pattern, if you quit going down that road, the brain literally snips that off, its snips off that pattern or those ruts. Because it doesn't want anything that's inefficient in its in its mind. So it's just going to at some point, it's going to snip it off, which is you know, it's such a great thing and keeps us from going back into our old old habits. But we've got to get to a point where we have practiced the new thought enough that we're creating those new neural ruts. And it is possible and it's lasting and it's cumulative. So watching her, it's been several months since I've worked worked with her, but watching her life continue to unfold before her and the freedom that she finds every single day is the 1 million freedoms that she's finding. It is not hyperbole. It is the truth. It is the truth. Yeah. So exciting. I love w—. And I literally I'm sitting on the other side of this the screen because we do it by zoom. And I'm literally like looking up to the heavens going "Are you kidding? like "I get to do this. This is what I get to do." Like I get to sit and have the privilege of watching this transformation right before my eyes. Look at that show.
Michelle Rayburn 39:15 That is a life repurposed. So you, listener, who is—who's in on this conversation with us, Tricia has resources for you. So I encourage you to check out Another Beautiful Life podcast. That's Tricia's podcast. It's on all the podcast platforms out there. It's also on Tricia's website. Tricia Zody, that's Zody like Cody, but with a Z. So it's on her website. And then Tricia, tell us a little bit about the guides that you've created that listeners can get.
Tricia Zody 39:47 Yeah, so right away, I started creating these. These guides that were kind of like you would take that topic for that week that episode. And I just tried to make it. So for the person who was sitting in front of that piece of paper, and just like how can you take what you've just heard on my podcast and make it personal and apply it to your life, just just gives you some prompts. They're usually maybe five or six questions for each guide, and just literally gives you some prompts to explore that particular topic for yourself. So I've got those. And I've got for the first section, I've got number, episode number 1 through 21 done, and I and then it just started picked back up and started doing 80, 81 and 82. That's the last three weeks that I've put out. So those are all done, but the library is growing. So it's I'm continuing, I'm picking back up where we where I left off, and I'm creating more guides.
Tricia Zody 40:50 So each week, each topic has something that you can literally dive into on your own. So if you have, for example, if you are having your own crisis of faith, and that's the episode that you wanted a guide for, you can download printable, and just work on through that with those prompts. Yeah.
Michelle Rayburn 41:09 And where can people grab that?
Tricia Zody 41:11 Yeah, so that you can get that off my website, you would sign up to access the entire library at TriciaZody.com/guide And that will give you access, lifetime access, to that library. So as I'm continuing to add to it, you can always go back and get whatever you need whenever you need it.
Michelle Rayburn 41:33 That's so great. That's an awesome resource. So I'll link to that in the show notes for listeners to get that. As we wrap up our conversation here, Tricia, I can actually talk to you a lot longer because this is really exciting. I love what you're doing. But what do you want the listener to know who is reinventing herself right now for some reason?
Tricia Zody 41:54 You know, I mean, if I could just put it in one sentence, you too can have another beautiful life. And I say that because it again, it is a choice. We all have to step out and you may need to be reinventing your life because you've got a divorce. Or perhaps even you are an empty nester, right and now, you're no longer mom, and you can't figure out what to do with your time because you spent all your time on your kids, right, and you've got to repurpose your life there. Or here's a thing, Michelle, we get to just because we want to, we get to, we could repurpose or reinvent our life just because we choose to. And, and the beautiful thing is, is you can, and the world is your oyster. If you have the Lord Jesus by your side, and he's leading and guiding you, and you've got the Holy Spirit's just showing you the way he wants this for you. He's got a purpose for you, and he wants to use you. And if you're walking hand in hand with you, it is an absolute guarantee that is coming to fruition. It's coming in front of you, the steps are being laid out before you to have another beautiful life. There is hope on the other side of whatever it is that you feel like you're facing right now that's too daunting, or that you even feel like maybe you felt, like me, I can't go on. I can't do this. I just can't do it. I want to just tell you it is a choice just by saying yes, that yes, I will choose to have another beautiful life.
Michelle Rayburn 43:26 Amen. Thank you so much, Tricia, for sharing what God has done in your life and how he has transformed tragedy into something beautiful. So thank you for being obedient to what he has called you to do.
Tricia Zody 43:39 I so appreciate you allowing me here to share my message and to speak to your listeners. I do hope it's an encouragement for them. Yeah.
Michelle Rayburn 43:49 Listener I hope you were as encouraged by listening to Tricia's message today as I was. You will find the show notes for this episode at MichelleRayburn.com/ 143. And I will link up to her website there and also to those guides. Thanks for being with me today. I hope you have a great week and I'll see you next time.
Michelle Rayburn 44:13 You've been listening to Life Repurposed with Michelle Rayburn. Checkout tips, resources, and inspiration at MichelleRayburn.com And to get the show notes for this episode. Each week I share links to everything mentioned in the episode, graphics you can share, and guest quotes. I also invite you to join the Life Repurpose Facebook community for weekly conversation with others on the journey of discovering the repurposed life. Before you go: Which friend needs to hear this episode? Share a link with a note to invite them to listen, and thank you for listening too.
SHOW NOTES:
Please join me this week for this powerful interview with Michelle Rayburn of the Life Repurposed Podcast recorded with the desire to assist others going through unbearable circumstances in order to give them hope that they can have a beautiful life once again.
This is my personal story of loss, broken dreams, and complicated grief. But it’s also a story of hope and redemption of a life that is proving to be beautiful and good. This interview is all about renewal through the transforming of our hearts and minds and believing in God’s promises of hope and healing.
Please note: The content of this episode speaks of suicide. Though there is no detailed discussion of suicide, please use discretion if suicide is a sensitive topic for you.
Listen to the Life Repurposed Podcast here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/life-repurposed/id1437734728
Go to Michelle Rayburn's website: https://michellerayburn.com/
Are you wondering how Life Coaching works? Would you like a free, 30-minute session? Click this link to set up a Consult Call: https://calendly.com/triciazodylifecoach/30min
