James 1:22 (NIV) “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”

**Transcription Below**

Renae Fieck is a wife, mom of 3, occupational therapist, and advocate for moms who desire more grace, space, and rest within their lives. She has found strength beyond her own to navigate life's struggles...multiple miscarriages, and a husband with a brain tumor who now has seizures. She now has a passion to connect with other amazing women and inspire women to uncover their own worth, live in the rawness of life, and yet let go of the constant chaos. She has hosted the More than Mom Summit 2 years in a row and is the host of the podcast The Charis Project: Grace and Intention For Every day life. She can be found at renaefieck.com

Renae Fieck’s Website

5 Steps to Break Free From Clutter

2 Minute Rule

Renae Fieck’s Podcast: The Charis Project

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Gospel Scripture: (all NIV)

Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”

Romans 3:24 “and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”

Romans 3:25 (a) “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.”

Hebrews 9:22 (b) “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”

Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

Romans 5:11 “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

Luke 15:10 says “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”

Ephesians 1:13–14 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession- to the praise of his glory.”

Ephesians 1:15–23 “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”

Ephesians 2:8–10 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God‘s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.“

Ephesians 2:13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.“

Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”

**Transcription**

[00:00:00] <music>

Laura Dugger: Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, where we have practical chats for intentional living. I'm your host Laura Dugger, and I'm so glad you're here.

[00:00:17] <music>

Laura Dugger: Today's message is brought to you by Chick-fil-A East Peoria. Stay tuned for insider tips we're going to share during the episode.

Today's guest is Renae Fieck. We met through Flood Church in San Diego nearly a decade ago, and Renae has gone on to launch multiple projects online to help people manage their time and their lives better. Today we're going to talk about quick tips that you can implement daily to feel less overwhelmed with your schedule or your home clutter, and ideally to lead a happier and more fulfilling life.

Here's our chat.

Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, Renae.

Renae Fieck: Thank you for having me.

Laura Dugger: Well, for any listeners who have not met you yet, will you just start us off by telling us a bit about yourself?

Renae Fieck: My name is Renae, and I am a mom of three. My oldest is almost eight, and then my youngest is nearly three. I am a pediatric occupational therapist, and I know, in my core, I'm an entrepreneur. And so I'm always juggling and multitasking a hundred different things. [00:01:29]

Laura Dugger: I know that you're passionate about helping people create space in their life. So where did that passion originate?

Renae Fieck: Probably about three years ago, my husband and I were on vacation for our 10-year anniversary in Hawaii. At the time, my youngest was six months old, and my husband had been diagnosed with a brain tumor almost a year prior or had his surgery almost a year prior. So he had had a brain tumor, and so we had spent that year navigating brain tumor, brain tumor removal, seizures, new pregnancy, new job, and all of the things that went along with that.

There was a point in that year where I was driving him back and forth to work. I was taking care of all of the kids. And then, just as nature would have it, when you don't have somebody that can drive, all the responsibilities of all the other household stuff kind of fell on me. I felt so exhausted and wiped out that when I was on vacation in Hawaii, I literally wanted to walk away from all of it. [00:02:32]

I wanted to walk away from motherhood, from my spouse. I wanted to set up camp in Hawaii and stay in Hawaii for the rest of my life. So I broke down in this place where I felt like I should have been the happiest ever, being married with three kids and healthy family at that point, but I wasn't. And so I realized that there was something I needed to do differently in my life in order to get that joy back.

Laura Dugger: Wow, huge change. Your husband gets diagnosed with a brain tumor, when that occurred in your life, you intentionally created space in your own schedule. Is that right?

Renae Fieck: Yeah. I knew that whatever I was doing wasn't working, and me managing all of it wasn't working, and that just going by the day-to-day wasn't actually bringing me joy. I knew that I wanted to be a mom, I knew I wanted to be married, and yet it wasn't making me happy.

So what was it? Was there something I had to do different in order to feel happy and to make that? [00:03:34] I had to start with my internal workings and how I was delegating my time and how I was creating my space in my home and what my priorities in life really were and how I was being intentional. That's how it kind of all got started.

Laura Dugger: If you don't mind sharing, what were a few of those practical tips? Maybe something someone could replicate today, things that really helped you.

Renae Fieck: I think the biggest thing for me has been really checking in with my mindset and being really aware of kind of that mental chatter that's going on inside and those voices that maybe we're not really recognizing or we're not really aware that they're there.

I have a friend of mine. Her name is Leeana Tankersley. She wrote an amazing book, and she calls them soul bullies. And I really like that word for soul bullies because they're those voices that are inside just kind of telling us that we're not good enough, we can't hold it together, that we're not managing it well enough, we're not the amazing mom that we want to be. [00:04:34]

Kind of tuning into those soul bullies and really being aware of them has been one of the biggest things that has been life-changing for me. Because when you start to expose them and recognize them, then you can create truths that combat them and you can start to rewrite that story.

So all of those times when you feel like you are failing or those times when you feel like you don't have enough or you feel like your kids are stressing you out or you're ungrateful for where you're at, if you start to recognize those thoughts, then you can replace them with the actual truths and the statements that you want to have as truths in your life. And that's when I feel like you can really unleash that internal working and changing your life.

That would probably be one of my biggest ones. I think that that has been one of the biggest ways to help me let go of the mom guilt and recognize that I can't manage it all. I have so much going on.

Just as a quick little story, I totally spaced bringing snack to my daughter's preschool last week. [00:05:38] At the end of the day when I realized it, at the end of the day, and so I couldn't rectify it that day, I felt kind of miserable. And I listened to all of those thoughts that were going on inside like, Oh my gosh, you've got way too much on your plate. You can't manage it. Like you need to let go of something else. How are you not a good mom? Like you can't even remember snack at school."

When I started to recognize that those thoughts were going through my head, I was able to stop them and replace them with, You know what? It's just snack. The kids are fine. They had snack probably leftover from a previous snack or the school had snack and that's okay. My priority is my children and loving my children and worrying about snack and letting it define who I am as a mom is not okay.

I think that that's been one of the biggest things for me is kind of recognizing that internal chatter, replacing it with truths and using it as a way to kind of let go of mom guilt, let go of the expectations other people have on you. It's really simple to do is just like quick little check-ins throughout the day. [00:06:48]

Laura Dugger: I love that because it's emphasizing more talking to yourself rather than listening to those soul bullies. You mentioned that that was your internal change. And then externally, I'm very curious. You mentioned even… was it decluttering your house? Or what were some of the other external life changes you made?

Renae Fieck: Yeah. So I wouldn't call myself a minimalist, but I'm definitely moving in that direction. I think a lot of it is because I realized so much of my time was being spent taking care of the things in my space. I was doing laundry. I was doing dishes. I was shuffling people back and forth. I was constantly stepping on Legos and feeling like I was nagging at my kids nonstop to pick up their stuff.

There was this turning point when my dad was watching my kids when I was on a trip with my husband, our first trip away ever without our kids. And my dad had made a comment about the fact that when I got back, I was going to find a lot of my stuff in the trash. [00:07:50] I think it was his way of kind of inclining that we just had too much stuff. A lot of it was stuff that I didn't need.

I was really attached at that point to a lot of the stuff and thought, no, no, no, you can't get rid of this stuff because these are toys. These are things that my kids enjoy. This is stuff that we use. And it really helped me realize that it is all just stuff. And that stuff is clogging up my time with the things that really matter to me. And it's taking away my time with my priorities, which are my children and my family. At the end of the day, I would much rather be hanging out at the park or the beach or playing with my kids than worrying about laundry and dishes and cleaning up my house.

So we have spent the last couple of years really offloading and getting rid of stuff. I wouldn't call myself... is it Marie Kondo? I think that's her name. I'm not to that point of like, does each item in my house bring me joy? [00:08:49] But I definitely go through the day... when I'm picking things up and putting things away, I ask myself, do I really need this item? And I'm letting throwing it away or donating it be kind of my default rather than just putting it away.

Laura Dugger: Are there any specific items that have been the most freeing to let go of?

Renae Fieck: I don't know if it's items in particular. I think it's just the accumulation of stuff and recognizing that I don't need stuff to make me happy. I don't need stuff to enjoy time with my kids. My kids actually don't need it either. We actually spend more time together and have more fun together when we're not picking all the stuff up.

So it's helped me embrace no and being able to tell no to people and respecting my time because I'm also being really respectful of the things that come into my house and being really intentional about those things that are in my house and in my calendar, not just in one space. So I think it really comes to simplification and decluttering your whole life, your time, and your space and being really mindful of what you allow to infiltrate your life. [00:09:58]

Laura Dugger: That definitely makes sense. For you as a multitasker, it's now opened up these opportunities. You've launched various projects like the Motherhood Summit and now a new podcast. I would love to know through all of your interviews, if you had to narrow it down to your top three favorite takeaways, what would you say they are?

Renae Fieck: My top three takeaways I think out of everything is that less is really more. I think in our society it's so easy to add so much to our calendars where we can do anything from our phones. Sometimes we look at that as being simple and easy and it's actually giving us more time. But I think it's actually taking away time from our life. I think less is more.

Looking at where you can cut things from your life and where you can actually be really intentional is a big thing that I've learned over the last couple of years. I think also that internal dialogue, that mental piece that I talked about and how you can actually really change your life when you start to think about what you're telling yourself and those thoughts that you're putting in your head and that you're speaking and how you can use those as kind of self-fulfilling prophecies. [00:11:18]

Those are the two biggest pieces is that you don't always have to add more to your life in order to achieve what you want or to be happy. That less is actually where you find that. And then being really aware of those thoughts that you're telling yourself.

Laura Dugger: It seems like you've been on a health journey as well. When you're saying less is more, is health one of those things that you're now focusing on more than you used to?

Renae Fieck: Completely. I hated anything health-related when I was a kid. I can remember my mom doing like buns of steel and abs of steel workout videos in our garage when I was a kid. And I was like, "Oh, that is not something I will ever do."

And even into college and things. I remember we'd go for a walk and my mom would say, "Oh, let's do some lunges." And I'd say, "No, thank you. It was never a big priority to me." And I've learned that taking care of my body and taking care of my mind and taking care of my family, it all goes together. We can't trade one thing for the other. [00:12:18]

If you want to be the best mom or the best wife or the best friend or anything like that, you have to take care of yourself first. You have to have the energy. You have to have the stamina. You have to have the clarity. You have to have it all.

So taking care of my body has been a huge piece of that. It's not just one or the other, I think, is the big piece. You have to take care of your home, your space that isn't around you. You have to take care of your calendar. You have to take care of your body in order for you to actually be able to take care of anything else in your life.

Laura Dugger: Well, and now after you've put these resources out on the internet, a lot of people come to you for coaching tips. Are you hearing any recurring frustrations from people?

Renae Fieck: Time. People always tell me that's the number one thing I hear is I don't have enough time. I think that it partly comes down to our mindset and the way we look at time. Because we all have the same 24 hours in a day. [00:13:20]

Sometimes I know we wish we had 48 hours but at the end of it, we all have the same 24 but yet somehow it seems like some people manage their time better. Or maybe it's just the perception. And that could be part of that internal dialogue, you know, that we're saying when we're like, how does that person manage to get it all done? And I can't. I'm sitting over here floundering.

So I would really challenge anybody that maybe is listening, and that would be their number one excuse for anything that they want in their life. Whether it be taking care of their house or their health or a date night or whatever it may be that they want. I can almost guarantee that time is going to be that number one hurdle that people bring up is that I don't have enough time. [00:14:03]

So my challenge would be that instead of letting busy be your default word, you know, 90% of the time if somebody asks you how you're doing, you're going to reply with busy. So my challenge would be to kind of reframe that and rethink that.

Instead of letting busy be your default response, what other response could you say instead? If you try this, it's really hard. Because we've gotten so used to saying busy. My life is busy. I have so much to do.

I think you can really turn around that, number one, by the language that you use around it and not allowing yourself to believe you're busy. And setting, you know, words around "I can get this done. I can make it happen. I can figure it out. Yes, I have a lot of stuff on my to-do list today, but at the end of the day, I'm going to make it happen. It's going to work. I'm going to figure it out." I think just that intention shifts it big time.

Then the second thing that I would recommend is blocking your time. Oftentimes we waste so much time in our day. We spend it scrolling social media. We waste it just daydreaming. We waste it shuffling between different tasks. [00:15:12] We try to multitask and we're not actually getting anything accomplished.

I think setting really blocks of time can be really powerful to help create more time. So instead of trying to clean your house all day long, if you set what I call like a power hour where you spend one hour, maybe a half an hour, whatever works for you, and you turn off any sort of distractions, you turn off your phone, you turn off the TV, you turn off anything you can and you spend really intentional time in that one-hour cleaning.

Then outside of that time, you don't worry about cleaning. You don't worry about the laundry. You don't worry about whatever. I think that oftentimes that's where we get caught up is the multitasking and the switching between tasks. We're less efficient. We get less done with that.

So many times as moms, that's what our life looks like, right? We're constantly juggling and we're constantly multitasking. So it's no wonder that we feel like we never have enough time. So being really aware of that upfront, creating those spaces in your time where maybe before you do your cleaning power hour, maybe you sit down on the floor and you spend 30 minutes totally playing with your kids, like engaged, no cell phone, no cleaning, no nothing. [00:16:29] Like you play with your kids for 30 minutes.

Oftentimes when you spend that really intentional time, they're going to want less of your time and that will give you 30 more minutes to do your cleaning power hour. So I think setting up real specific, real blocked times where you know I'm going to spend 30 minutes doing this and then I'm going to move on can be really powerful to help unleash that time. And then watching your language around it.

Laura Dugger: It just reminds me of a quote — I don't want to botch it — from Dave Ramsey. But he said something like this. "If you want to do well with your finances, don't take advice from broke people." Take advice from rich people.

I think it's that same mentality. You're saying we all have the same 24 hours in a day. So if you're wanting a mentor in this or this is an area of life that you want to improve your time management, maybe seek out someone who's a little bit further along and they do a great job managing their time. [00:17:22] And you want to talk to those people and see what they're doing.

Let's take a quick break to hear a message from our sponsor.

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Laura Dugger: You and I knew each other from church years ago. Do you feel like God has played a part in really grabbing your attention and making this big life change?

Renae Fieck: I do. I think that so much of what I've learned and the little principles that I've learned over the last couple of years have been things I think I've heard my entire life. They're meditate on my word and be still and know Me. And all of these little principles, like treat your body as a temple, these things that I feel like were so ingrained in my head as a growing up Christian in the church person that I started to not really take them to heart and I didn't actually put them into practice. [00:19:20]

Now that I'm actually putting them into practice and I'm helping people, it's kind of brought it full circle in the sense of these are truths and principles that have been there from biblical days. They're foundational. I do feel like so much of what I've learned has been stuff I've heard over and over and over again, but yet it took this meltdown moment in Hawaii for God to really open up and say, there are so many other people that have heard these truths too, but they're not actually implementing them and they don't understand them and they don't realize how powerful they can actually be in their life.

Or maybe we've heard it so many times that we've just let it be like, Oh yeah, that works, but we never actually put it into practice, if that makes sense.

Laura Dugger: My husband, Mark, always says, wisdom is knowledge applied. And you're saying you took this knowledge from the Bible and you're actually applying it to your life and it's creating a huge impact. So on this topic of time, practically speaking, now that you have three kids, how do you find time to do all these things that you love? Will you walk us through what your typical week looks like? [00:20:30]

Renae Fieck: Yeah. I do have a lot on my plate and I've gotten really good about not saying I'm really busy. But I do have a lot. I work part-time. I work two full 10-hour days at the hospital here. So I have two days of my week that are pretty much devoted to that. So in the morning, it's getting up and getting shuffled out the door and then working all day and coming home.

I get home after dinner and before the kids go to bed. So really on those days, most of my time when I'm home is spent just with the kids, like helping get bedtime together. And it can feel kind of chaotic. And so I really make that time that I'm putting them to bed.

I try to make it intentional. I try not to get distracted by my phone and know that like, Okay, I've got one hour with my kids right now and that's all I've got today, and so I'm going to make that meaningful for me.

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday are my days where I'm home most of the time. I've got kids or, you know, I'm shuffling between the typical errands of dental appointments and oil changes and all of that, like getting all of that done. [00:21:39]

When I think back at my schedule, it's really those power-blocked times that I have found that have enabled me to get through it all. I know that on Tuesday mornings is when I do all my cleaning and Tuesday afternoons is when we go to Costco or the grocery store and we get all of our shopping done. Wednesday nights is Girl Scouts.

I'm just really intentional about what gets put on my time and where my time goes. And then it's those extraneous things like the kids snack that I told you about that weren't on my calendar, that I didn't get on there, that those are the things where my ball gets dropped is if it's not a priority on my schedule.

But I think that overall, like when I look at my days and I look at my time, it's really those power hour scheduled times. And if you looked at my Google calendar, I have everything blocked in there. I have time for my workout. I have time for journaling. I have time for playing with my kids. I have time for cooking. I have it all on my calendar so that I know where my time is being spent, [00:22:43] and it's not getting wasted in random things, if that makes sense.

But it also has blank space. It has space where there is room for things to pop up or room for us to go play and have fun. I really make having play time and fun time and blank space-time, I make it a priority to be on my schedule. It's not just the extra, if that makes sense.

Laura Dugger: It does. And I think equally as important, what do you find that you're saying no to in this season?

Renae Fieck: To be completely honest, my no time has been really in the area of friends. I have a lot of friends that I connect with digitally and on the phone and things like that. But actually, one-on-one in-person time with other people outside of my family is probably the biggest space that I've had to say no to.

Each of my kids get one extra thing outside of school and that's it. Like we're not adding in multiple things for them each day of the week. Or even when it comes down to like baby showers or bridal showers or things like that. Those are oftentimes the things that I say no to. [00:23:53]

In this season, I've just acknowledged that that's okay for me and I'm okay with that. But I would say that overall, that's the biggest one is, like you said, learning to say no. I say no a lot and I say it no easily because I know what my priorities are and my intentions are. And I'm focused solely on those.

So if it doesn't align with something that supports one of my priorities right now, I let go of it. And I say no gracefully and understand that they don't know my life. And if they're upset about that, that's okay.

Laura Dugger: I think that's a great point, though, that you do start with a vision casting and you start with, what are my priorities? And then that helps inform where your time and budget is going to go and where you're going to say no.

Our team would love to know, has The Savvy Sauce benefited you in any way? Our hope is that your life is enriched just a little bit more after listening and applying lessons from each episode. If you have enjoyed the podcast, would you show us your support by pledging $5 per month to become a patron? You will receive some awesome perks and your contribution will help us offset the production costs for The Savvy Sauce, so we can still make the majority of our content free to the public. [00:25:10]

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So as you're being so intentional with these blocks of time, when do you actually sit down and draw out your calendar?

Renae Fieck: Well, I've tried doing a paper calendar and it never worked for me because I felt like I didn't have the time to actually sit down and do the calendar so precisely. So I love Google. I've created different calendars in my one Google calendar. So each one has a different color. So it auto imports all of those routine tasks, those things that are on my schedule on a week-to-week basis.

So it makes it easy that I'm not adding in, you know, the same things over and over and over again every week. I can just quickly look at my week ahead and know what's coming up for that week that maybe is out of the ordinary or something that's different or of that nature. [00:26:13]

So it makes the calendar planning pretty easy because I can kind of quickly get a glance. You know, Sunday night. I can look forward to the week that's coming and just know, Oh, on Thursday we have a dentist appointment that's not usually there or something of that nature. But those routine tasks and those things that are there ongoing, they're just on my calendar without even thinking about it.

Laura Dugger: Oh, I think that's huge having those reoccurring routines or habits. So breaking it down then like cooking or working out or cleaning. You're not saying you do all of those things every day, but you have a time designated at least once, maybe multiple times per week. Is that right?

Renae Fieck: Yeah. There's a few little habits that I consistently do. I just ran a decluttering challenge, like kind of sharing a lot of those. But I do have some habits like my two-minute rule, where if there's something I can accomplish in two minutes, I try to do it right then rather than procrastinating it.

So that might be when you come in from your house and you take your shoes off rather than just leaving them by the door. Can you go hang them up right away? Or when you get done with your dishes or dinner and you're putting the dishes in the sink, can you rinse them and put them in the dishwasher right away? [00:27:24]

And so if you can do those things in two minutes or less, I recommend doing them right away so that they don't pile up. Because oftentimes what happens is it's not so much the managing all of our household stuff that gets burdensome. It's the fact that we're doing it all the time and that we have so much piled up that we feel like we never make progress. So it's kind of this ongoing thing.

So I have my two-minute rule and then I do a 10-minute sweep every night. So every night the kids and I all go through and clean up as much as we possibly can. I want everything in the floor or on my flat surfaces in my living room and kitchen space to be put away almost every night. And when you do that, it makes it much more manageable to keep up with on an ongoing basis.

The only way that it really makes it super manageable is when you get rid of stuff and you have left stuff. So it makes putting it away so much simpler every night. I do try to go to bed every night with my kitchen clean, my living room clean and the kids' bedrooms clean. But I think it's because we've created this habit of taking 10 or 15 minutes every night and doing it. [00:28:27]

I can tell you that my floor is not clean. I don't know when the last time it's been mopped or the last time I've cleaned the toilets in the bathrooms. But as far as the clutter and the stuff, I try to make it a habit of getting it taken care of every day.

Laura Dugger: After hearing this message, some people may want to dive a little deeper. So do you have any resources or podcasts or scripture references, anything that you would like to direct listeners towards?

Renae Fieck: Yeah. I have two free downloads you can do on my website. One of them is in regards to the clutter. It's like my five steps to declutter. So if you're looking for more practical tips like my two-minute rule or my 10-minute sweep or things like that, you can download that.

It also goes into how you manage to do it with grace. Like how do you give yourself the space to let some of that stuff rest so that you can actually enjoy and not focus on like your house has to be clean all the time.

Then the other one is my five essentials to creating a life you love. [00:29:30] So this goes into more of that mindset and kind of surrounding yourself with people that are going to bring you up and those critical pieces that I feel like have helped me get to the place that I am today.

Laura Dugger: That's awesome. We'll definitely link to those in our show notes. Where can listeners specifically find you online?

Renae Fieck: My website is the best place to find me. I have kind of a weird spelling. It's just my first and last name dot com. I'm assuming, Laura, you can just link that. But it's just RenaeFieck.com. That's the best place. That's where I'm putting all of it.

Laura Dugger: Perfect. Well, I love to close with the one question that I ask every guest. And that's because we're called The Savvy Sauce because "savvy" is synonymous with practical knowledge. And as my final question today, Renae, what is your savvy sauce?

Renae Fieck: I think that my No. 1 thing would be to check in with that mental chatter and watch how you're talking to yourself. [00:30:30] It's so easy to see other people doing it really well on the internet and compare... I had a person, her name is Jill Savage, she had told me like, that you're comparing your inside reality to somebody's outside reality. So it's that idea of looking at somebody else's outside perception of what's going on in their world, and then you're comparing your inner workings to that.

So putting that on hold and kind of really just checking in with that mental chatter that's going on inside, speaking truth over that and watching how that language is really dictating and steering your life and what it's allowing you to accept opportunities and what opportunities it's having you decline and all of that based on just that internal dialogue.

I think that that would be my biggest thing. And like really learning to retrain that thought process and retrain

that mental chatter and letting go of those soul bullies so that you can create kind of the life that you really want. [00:31:33]

Laura Dugger: It sounds like you've done exactly that. This was really fun to get to connect today and actually document one of our conversations. So thanks for being my guest, Renae

Renae Fieck: Of course, thank you so much for having me.

Laura Dugger: One more thing before you go. Have you heard the term "gospel" before? It simply means good news. And I want to share the best news with you. But it starts with the bad news. Every single one of us were born sinners and God is perfect and holy, so He cannot be in the presence of sin. Therefore, we're separated from Him.

This means there's absolutely no chance we can make it to heaven on our own. So for you and for me, it means we deserve death and we can never pay back the sacrifice we owe to be saved. We need a savior. But God loved us so much, He made a way for His only Son to willingly die in our place as the perfect substitute. [00:32:32]

This gives us hope of life forever in right relationship with Him. That is good news. Jesus lived the perfect life we could never live and died in our place for our sin. This was God's plan to make a way to reconcile with us so that God can look at us and see Jesus.

We can be covered and justified through the work Jesus finished if we choose to receive what He has done for us. Romans 10:9 says that if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

So would you pray with me now? Heavenly, Father, thank You for sending Jesus to take our place. I pray someone today right now is touched and chooses to turn their life over to You. Will You clearly guide them and help them take their next step in faith to declare You as Lord of their life? We trust You to work and change their lives now for eternity. In Jesus name, we pray, amen. [00:33:36]

If you prayed that prayer, you are declaring Him for me, so me for Him, you get the opportunity to live your life for Him.

At this podcast, we are called Savvy for a reason. We want to give you practical tools to implement the knowledge you have learned. So you're ready to get started?

First, tell someone. Say it out loud. Get a Bible. The first day I made this decision my parents took me to Barnes and Noble to get the Quest NIV Bible and I love it. Start by reading the book of John.

Get connected locally, which basically means just tell someone who is part of the church in your community that you made a decision to follow Christ. I'm assuming they will be thrilled to talk with you about further steps such as going to church and getting connected to other believers to encourage you.

We want to celebrate with you too. So feel free to leave a comment for us if you made a decision for Christ. We also have show notes included where you can read Scripture that describes this process. [00:34:36]

Finally, be encouraged. Luke 15:10 says, "In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." The heavens are praising with you for your decision today.

If you've already received this good news, I pray that you have someone else to share it with today. You are loved and I look forward to meeting you here next time.

Welcome to The Savvy Sauce

Practical chats for intentional living

A faith-based podcast and resources to help you grow closer to Jesus and others. Expect encouragement, surprises, and hope here. Each episode offers lively interviews with fascinating guests such as therapists, authors, non-profit founders, and business leaders.

They share their best practices and savvy tips we can replicate to make our daily life and relationships more enjoyable!