Episode 116: Sandra Stanley

Sandra Stanley joins me again around my kitchen table. She was on the show awhile back—Episode 23—and it has since been one of my most popular conversations with listeners. Sandra is a mother to grown kids, wife to megachurch pastor, Andy Stanley, author, communicator and a woman who is passionate about foster care and coming alongside young mothers.

Sandra recently released a devotional called Breathing Room. Do you ever feel like you can’t enjoy anything because you are doing everything? Do you sometimes feel like your pace in life is causing exhaustion? Well, you aren’t alone. In this episode, we talk about what steals our breathing room, how we trade our peace for progress and what role fear plays in it all along with some practical ways to create breathing room in your life today.

Links:

Sponsors:

  • Hello Fresh - For $30 off your first week of HelloFresh, visit hellofresh.com and enter SURVIVING30

Sandra's Survival Kit:

(Amazon affiliate links used when possible--purchasing through these links is an easy way to support the show. Or shop using www.SurvivingSarah.com/amazon and a portion of the what you buy will go back to the show.)

Connect with Sandra:  Website //Instagram // twitter  // Facebook // Breathing Room Website

Takeaways From Our Conversation:

  • Have you traded your peace for progress? I know that I am completely guilty of that in different seasons of life. And I feel like I’m in a season right now where I choose progress often over peace. I look at my schedule at the end of the week and wonder where the time went. I wonder why I’m so tired or feel like the most important things didn’t happen. Determining breathing room happens by asking who are the people and the activities that are the most important and are those the things and people that are actually on my calendar. That’s a good task for each of this us—to sit down, look at the calendar and see what its filled with.

  • No for now is not a no for always. We often don’t know why God says no, but in hindsight we can see why that no made sense. How often do we act like our children when God says no or not now? We don’t let God finish the sentence.

  • Are the people who mean the most to you getting your leftovers?

  • In families, there are certain things that come up that there are problems to solve and you come up with a solution. But there are also things that come up that are tensions to manage.

  • God didn’t create us to operate at 100% all the time. We can undermine our ability to be effective.

  • The Sabbath was created so that you will be refreshed. We need to have some space so that we can find refreshment. God doesn’t have rules for the sake of having rules. God has rules because it serves us well.

  • The way we define breathing room is that it is the space between our current pace and our limits.

  • The things that I fear reveals a connection to my lack of breathing room. What is the core of why you say yes to everything?

  • 4 fears that affect our breathing room:

    • fear of missing out

    • fear of falling behind

    • fear of not mattering

    • fear of disappointing other people

    • The larger question in this is: Do I trust God? Do I trust God that I matter? That I'm not falling behind or missing out? Do I trust God if people are disappointed?

    • Where do we start in creating breathing room? Have a conversation with your spouse and maybe with your kids. Maybe there’s a whole category of things to pull back from. Scale down or cut back. Evaluate your calendar and how you are spending your time.

What did you enjoy about this episode? What was your takeaway. Let's continue the conversation  on Instagram or Twitter or you can send me an email here. 

Thank you for following along life with me. I love being apart of your day. And as always, I hope this show helps you survive a little easier.

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