Season 3, Episode 20: Here's Your Sign

Join our conversation about staying mindful how we are presenting ourselves to others. 

Transcript

0:00:00 - Announcer

We go together like Peas and Carrots. The Peas and Carrots Podcast, sharing life from our piece of the vegetable patch, Brian and Kayla Sanders. 

0:00:11 - Kayla

Welcome to the peas and carrots podcast. I'm Brian and I'm Kayla. 

0:00:16 - Brian

Here we are, here we are. You are so excited. She is bouncing off the walls. Yeah, her smile is from ear to ear. Her eyes are even smiling. 

0:00:27 - Kayla

This is my last official. 

0:00:29 - Brian

Full day. 

0:00:31 - Kayla

Well, I was going to say project oh, on my task list. 

0:00:35 - Brian

Oh. 

0:00:36 - Kayla

Before vacation. I mean, it is our last official full day before vacation, but yeah, so spoiler, we are recording ahead yes but yeah, we're getting ready to leave in a few days on vacation but flying out of here, so we will have stories. You are a crazy magnet, so if anything crazy is going to happen, you attract it, so stay. That's hurtful. It's truthful, okay. Well, there's just gravity. Tell me someone who would say that's wrong. B you come back with the best stories from vacations. 

0:01:14 - Brian

I think I have, because I'm such a large body, I have gravity and it attracts people to me, so I think that's what's going on. I need to make a confession. 

0:01:26 - Kayla

Okay. 

0:01:26 - Brian

Okay, and this is a big deal for me. I want everybody, okay, to sit down. Okay, I'm addicted to Mexican food. Okay, you thought? 

0:01:38 - Kayla

I was going to do something. I wasn't sure where we were going there, fajitas, and how is that a problem I'm trying to understand. 

0:01:46 - Brian

Enchiladas. What is that thing we get when we go Fajitas? 

0:01:49 - Kayla

We do fajitas for two Chicken. 

0:01:53 - Brian

But I could eat. How often per week could you eat Mexican food? 

0:01:57 - Kayla

Oh, probably three times a week, but it's not the greatest for us, I mean, if we skip the chips, and Well, where's the fun in that? That's what I was going to say. 

0:02:08 - Brian

I read the other day if you eat four baskets of chips, or you eat two baskets of chips, it's like eating 30 tortillas, holy cow. I don't know if that's accurate or not. 

0:02:18 - Kayla

Well, aren't they fried tortillas? Isn't that what the chips are? 

0:02:22 - Brian

Maybe, but I think so. Yeah, no, but it ain't 30 of them. I don't think so, anyway, so anyway. Is anybody else addicted to like the Mexican food? 

0:02:37 - Kayla

I think most of America Okay. 

0:02:39 - Brian

Yeah. 

0:02:40 - Kayla

So you've had an interesting experience lately. We needed some parts for our grill and we needed some parts for some other things around the house. You are running into one. It's the same issue over and over. You cannot get the part and you're having to order it. 

0:02:58 - Brian

I'm having to order, and what? 

0:03:00 - Kayla

did you declare that you would like to be able to do? 

0:03:02 - Brian

To go back in the store and buy things To find what you need in the store. I'm tired of waiting five, six, seven, ten days. 

0:03:13 - Kayla

And then it gets lost in the mail and it gets lost in the mail. 

0:03:19 - Brian

I have to contact the people who sold it and I've heard that from a few friends and I'm wondering if in a few years now this might take a few years, not going to happen overnight if there might slowly be a desire for a return to like in-person retail. 

0:03:33 - Kayla

I actually read not long ago that retailers are making clear their demands that they want to go back to store. 

0:03:42 - Brian

Really Mm-hmm. You mean shoppers have made that clear that they want to go back to the store. Yeah, well, I would do that. I would like that, because now I do like the option to see before I go to the store if they have what I'm looking for. 

0:03:58 - Kayla

Yeah, but what I'm saying is the retailers are finding out that consumers are they're you. They are disgruntled with the online experience. They want to be able to go in the store, to have it immediately, to have more options, to experience the whole experience again, not just sitting at their keyboard and ordering something and hoping it works. It was almost like it was a revelation to those that run the stores. 

0:04:30 - Brian

We've got to rethink our inventory and our and a lot of times our stuff will go through like North Carolina. 

0:04:37 - Kayla

Oh, we'll go with God. 

0:04:39 - Brian

And if it goes through a certain place North Carolina, it'll sit there for five days. 

0:04:42 - Kayla

It'll sit there for five days. 

0:04:44 - Brian

I could drive down there and get that package and have it back by the time that they do. I'm not kidding, I mean, this is grumpy old man venting here, so you feel better Well. 

0:04:55 - Kayla

I want them to fix it Anyway stay tuned, some great stories coming soon. 

0:05:03 - Brian

Caution signs. You ever what does that mean? You ever been driving along the road and it says caution ahead. And then, and then you drive, you drive and there's a few things there that you know it could be a wreck. It could be that they're doing world road work, World road work, Spit it out. So there you go. So have you ever encountered someone that should have come with a caution sign? 

0:05:34 - Kayla

Oh ouch. 

0:05:36 - Brian

I wish people came with like warning labels, you know. 

0:05:40 - Kayla

I feel like some days maybe I need one. No, I mean, there are moments, but what do you mean by this? 

0:05:49 - Brian

give me an example people who are never wrong. Oh okay, yeah, now I need to say something here. 30 years ago, Brian Sanders was not wrong about anything life has a way of knocking that out of you doesn't it? 

I mean, I would argue like theology, I'd argue with, I mean, the finest points of it Today, oh, we agree on, like the Apostles' Creed and the gospel. You're good to go, bro, move along. People want to sit, you know, we believe in like infant baptism, because we are Presbyterian, yeah, and then we have other friends who don't. 

0:06:29 - Kayla

They believe in immersion and we have no issue with that. 

0:06:31 - Brian

I have no issue with that, but they're like well, you're sinning when you do that. Now listen, look of all the sins I could commit. If that's a sin, I'm going to be OK. 

0:06:42 - Kayla

So I've got one. Be okay, so I've got one. Those who refuse to listen to other people's viewpoints about anything, not just religion. But they have fixed their mind and they are not even willing to give audience to someone else's point of view. 

0:06:58 - Brian

That's why I am so nervous about being on social media as we enter this political season, because there's going to be so much back and forth and people not listening to each other. 

0:07:08 - Kayla

So a normal day on Facebook, a normal day, just a normal. 

0:07:13 - Brian

I remember one time I mean speaking of this people refuse to listen to other people's viewpoints. We were at one of our favorite restaurants about three or four years ago during the first election and you remember that family. They were sitting there and they had a knockdown drag out. 

0:07:28 - Kayla

I do remember that Yelling at each other. Yeah, it was very uncomfortable. 

0:07:32 - Brian

And they wouldn't listen to each other's viewpoints. Yeah, you don't have to agree to somebody, but you don't have to be a jerk about it, but show respect, just hear someone out. 

0:07:41 - Kayla

It doesn't mean that you have to buy into everything that they're saying. 

0:07:46 - Brian

But yeah, 100%, 100%. Here's another one People who think that they've learned all there is to learn. There's a famous quote I love that says be the dumbest person in the room and if you're not, go find a new room. 

0:08:02 - Kayla

I read a book recently and it's by Shauna Niequist and I think I actually referenced it here. It's called I Guess I Haven't Learned that Yet and it was a great book, and it just reminded me that we are all a work in progress. We're all realizing things about the world around us, about each other, about ourselves. All realizing things about the world around us, about each other, about ourselves, and hopefully it helps us to change and grow in the areas that we need to change and grow. But those people scare me. Yeah, I've got another one. This one, you know me. This one is like high on the list for me Drama magnets. 

I am not a fan of drama. If it's a legit like house on fire situation, I'm here for it, I'll be there. 

0:08:51 - Brian

But if it's like everything in your life is constantly chaotic and Let me say this there are people who think they have to create drama in order to get attention. 

0:09:01 - Kayla

Yes. 

0:09:02 - Brian

That drives me up a wall. Now let me say this I still try to be patient. Yeah, I'm not perfect. 

0:09:08 - Kayla

But I find something in my brain just flipping off from the situation. I just find myself just You're flipping off your brain. 

0:09:15 - Brian

You're not flipping off the people. 

0:09:17 - Kayla

Yes, okay. Because you were one word away there from Maybe we'll say switching off. 

0:09:25 - Brian

Sorry. 

0:09:25 - Kayla

Yeah, behave. I kind of zone out, I just I get to the point where I think it's a self-preservation thing that I just switch off. Better choice of words, sorry, and I can't deal now because I want to. I want to absorb what's going on, I want to fix what's, and I just can't always do that. It's too heavy. 

0:09:50 - Brian

I want to I want to fix what's happening, yeah, and resolve it, move on, yeah. And let me say this we're not saying that like we're perfect. 

0:09:59 - Kayla

We're far oh, we're coming to that, okay, we have. 

0:10:01 - Brian

Oh, we are. Yeah, I was just trying to do that one blank. I didn't know it was going to get all detailed. Now we're going to keyboard warriors, drive me up a wall. 

0:10:10 - Kayla

We've experienced some of those experience. 

0:10:13 - Brian

Uh, when I wrote my first book, leadership endurance, we met with a market each agency who actually walked us through this and said you need to be prepared, there's going to be keyboard warriors. And I thought it's a book about leadership, it's Lincoln and FDR and Grant and yet Churchill, there's not going to be anybody man. A lot of people got upset with me because I included FDR, I included Lincoln. I mean, people hate Lincoln, people hate FDR. Really, these people are dead. Yeah, they saved the nation and I'm just like wow. 

0:10:48 - Kayla

So I will actually share at this moment why I shut down my Facebook page. You know this Very few people know this. When you became an author and your book came out, I got some really nasty private messages, and you know that. Yeah, I got some really nasty private messages and you know that I got accused of being a joke of a wife that if I really loved you, I would take better care of you, I would cook healthy meals, I would make sure that you had a support system in place so that you would not be the size you were. I was accused of either oversharing about the book or undersharing about the book. It's like I could never find the right balance to please people and I just got to the place where it was not what was happening in the day to day, believe it or not. I could kind of step over all the political banter and all the other stuff. It was the toxic private message and I realized I'm not here for this. I didn't sign on for this and so I shut down. 

0:11:54 - Brian

Facebook. Do you miss it? I? 

0:11:55 - Kayla

don't, I don't even think about it, I really don't. So, yeah, which lends to another one for me, someone who is often I'm going to throw in that key word often rude or ill-mannered, because there are days when we all have an off day and we may come across as-, but some people have them every single day. But if you're constantly incapable of saying please and thank you, you or you're not able to show kindness and general respect to someone else, if it's just your nature to be just obnoxious, yeah yeah. 

0:12:37 - Brian

It, just it actually helped me with this. Now, I'm not trying to be rude, but like we'll be somewhere and I'll ask for like a refill of like a Coke Zero and it's my grandmother coming out, that's fine. But I try to say it kindly. 

0:12:52 - Kayla

You always say it kindly. 

0:12:53 - Brian

But as they walk away, you say say please, say please. And so I do, and so you would always. 

0:13:00 - Kayla

I was so proud of your tone and again, tone matters a lot. But you would say, could I have a refill or could I trouble you for? But I'm like say please, because my grandmother, she has refused meals to people before for a lack of please and thank you and tone's a topic we could, we could, we could spend a whole other subject. 

0:13:22 - Brian

You do that, and then my executive assistant, Adam Read. I'll be in meetings. 

0:13:27 - Kayla

What will he tell you to do? 

0:13:29 - Brian

I'll be in a meeting for like 20, 30 minutes with a group of people and he'll send me a text. It'll have one word. You know what that word is, don't you? 

0:13:36 - Kayla

Smile. 

0:13:37 - Brian

Smile, because you get so serious looking and I'm just, I mean, I don't think I'm sitting there scowling at people, you know, but there you go. 

0:13:46 - Kayla

What's another one for? 

0:13:47 - Brian

you Self-righteous people. Oh this is a big one for you. Huge Brian Sanders is who he is, at Walmart, Target and at church. If I'm flawed at Walmart and Target, I'm going to be flawed at church. If I say something inappropriate at Walmart and church, I'm going to say something inappropriate at church. That's why I don't want to be different people. I want to be the same person everywhere I go. I want to be authentic and I can't stand plastic Christianity. 

I can't stand plastic. Christianity Can't stand fakeness. And again, I've got my own sides to it. I mean there are parts of me like when I have to put on my best face and have to smile, and like when I'm done with. There's times when I'm done like, okay, I'm done with this, can we move this along? No, so I got to say I mean there's sides to me that I still have to work on. But I think that self-righteousness does more harm to the kingdom than it does grow it. 

0:14:51 - Kayla

This is a huge caution sign for me, and you know this Someone who's projecting their elitism, superiority or status on someone else. Something my daddy taught us from knee high is do not forget your roots, and what he meant by that was no matter how big your britches get, do not forget where you came from. 

And I am so challenged to engage people when they are just giving off this air of, well, I have more money, or I have more social status, or I'm more educated, or the list goes on. I'm not comfortable in environments where someone likes to project their status is better than everyone else. 

0:15:47 - Brian

Folks who are a wet blanket get on my nerves, like you. 

0:15:50 - Kayla

It wears you down, yours, and because I can't. 

0:15:54 - Brian

I have to have some positivity. 

0:15:56 - Kayla

Yeah. 

0:15:56 - Brian

I need somebody who's a little bit happy. Now let me say this I don't want to be around Tigger all day, but I wouldn't mind a little time when we poo bit happy. Now let me say this I don't want to be around Tigger all day either, but I wouldn't mind a little time of ween, poo and rabbit. Okay, but Al drives me up the wall. We talked about that last week, but Eeyore. 

0:16:10 - Kayla

Yeah. 

0:16:11 - Brian

Well, I'm going to go in the corner and die and I want to say you want to set an alarm clock? Oh, I, just that's my imperfection coming out. Yeah, but I can't. It just kills me, it just drives me up. 

0:16:27 - Kayla

No, I see that Well, it drains you. It's like it sucks the life out of your battery. 

0:16:32 - Brian

Energy vampires. 

0:16:33 - Kayla

Yeah, I have one more and I have to give a shout out to our friend Tara. I asked her. I said if you were to come up with one of these, what would you say? And for her it was people who overshare. Get right up in your face and they just they tell you their whole life and you may know them for like 10 minutes. And they tell you, or they're telling you intimate details of things. That it just makes it very uncomfortable. 

0:16:58 - Brian

When I was five, I actually burnt our house down. My parents still don't know it to this day. Really, I don't need to know that. I don't need that kind of guilt on my conscience. Okay, please don't tell me that. 

0:17:10 - Kayla

But let's bring this back though, because it may sound like we are really ragging on some people. We are these people, so let's just start here. 

0:17:20 - Brian

On any given day I can be prone to overshare and I and you can. You can say this I will get whenever we leave social functions, I'll get in the truck and sometimes what's? 

0:17:31 - Kayla

the first thing I say to you I said too much. 

0:17:32 - Brian

I said too much you. 

0:17:33 - Kayla

you are plagued by that. Oh, and we have actually learned a secret code with each other where there is a certain look that I will give you if I feel like you've hit that threshold. Not that one. 

0:17:45 - Brian

Not that look. 

0:17:46 - Kayla

This one is, I'm kind of reminding you OK, be kind of hit the brakes so that you feel comfortable when you leave that situation. There's a couple of key truths we want to say, first one being this All of sin will fall short of the glory of God. None of us are perfect, no. 

0:18:03 - Brian

I mean, I'm loud, I'm boisterous, I can overshare, I can be judgmental of people. I may not argue with you in person, but I may get in. I'll be honest. I can get in my truck and say Lord, have mercy, what an idiot. I'm just saying, I'm being real Maybe that's too honest. 

0:18:32 - Kayla

But to that point we're kind of in jest sharing these, because we all at some point wear these caution signs and let he who is without sin cast the first stone. And I mean there are days that I'm a number of these.

0:18:43 - Brian

I shouldn't get in the truck and call somebody Well probably not, but because that lends to. I need to ask myself a question Am I mindful in the ways in which I need to be sanctified? Am I mindful of my weak areas, where Christ still needs to do a lot of work on me? Yeah, not just a little bit of work, but a lot of work. 

0:19:06 - Kayla

Here's another question that I often ask myself Am I involved enough in this person's life that perhaps I should speak some truth and love? Should I help them to see their caution signs? If I'm going to do that, Iron sharpens iron. Again, this is. There's a key phrase Am I involved enough in this person's life? And then the spirit has to speak into whether it's mine to do this or not. 

0:19:33 - Brian

Now, unlike leadership issues with, like, those who report to me, yes, I will address certain issues. Yeah, personal issues. Yeah, personal issues. Yeah, there's probably three, four people in the world. I feel like I am close enough to that I can address certain issues. 

0:19:52 - Kayla

Yeah. 

0:19:53 - Brian

And one of them. I still want to be able to sleep in my own house. 

0:20:00 - Kayla

Fair enough. Oh, all right, then I'm guessing we're having a conversation. 

0:20:08 - Brian

Because I don't ever have to, because you are near perfect, oh, whatever. You're like Mary Poppins. 

0:20:13 - Kayla

Oh. 

0:20:14 - Brian

Practically perfect in every way. 

0:20:15 - Kayla

Here's another question I ask myself Am I comfortable with just embracing the flawed parts of other people? Because, back to my, I guess I haven't learned that yet. We are all hopefully growing and changing. Life has a way of when you were talking about 30 years ago, you felt like you knew everything. We all go through seasons that really humble us, take the wind out of our sails, teach us a different perspective, hopefully mature us and are we willing to let God be God sometimes and let him be the one that reveals those caution signs? So, yeah, may we not leave you thinking that we're sitting here, going well, we are perfect, and everyone else is going around with caution, because there are many, many days that when I'm doing my journaling at night, I'm realizing I've got a lot to repent for. 

0:21:15 - Brian

No, no, I think you're am got a lot to repent for. No, no, I think you're. Am I comfortable with embracing flawed parts of others? It's according to oh gosh, it's so. So y'all don't think less of me. It's according to what that flawed part is. That's horrible of me to admit. It's honest. If they're a little rough around the edges, I'll probably get along with them. If they're mopey and you're, I'm going to have to. I'm sorry. 

0:21:41 - Kayla

You're going to find a way to remove yourself from that? 

0:21:43 - Brian

Yes, that's awful, but at the same time I can't be everything to everybody. I'm not Jesus and I don't see how he does it. That's a little too honest. Not who does it, that's a little too honest. 

0:21:53 - Kayla

Not at all. Oversharing there it is right there, so anyway. But yeah. 

0:21:58 - Brian

There's our hearts on a platter today. We getting Mexican food later. I didn't know it was going to be all this kind of personal. Last week's podcast you had me crying. Now I'm all guts out on the page, okay, so there you go. 

0:22:22 - Kayla

So laughter is good for the soul and we have had a few things to laugh at recently. I love to laugh, so our friends Adam and Ronda they are with our WCQR station yep, they did some face swap videos. I and I have not laughed that hard in a very long time they put faces on, that look like Shrek and that Shrek’s wife and then they swapped faces and it was like that software where you can it's hilarious I mean my cheeks hurt from we may have to do this for our peace and care yeah, this is something you want to do, but we'll see. 

So you were going one Saturday morning. You went to get breakfast for us and what did you see? 

0:23:02 - Brian

in our town I was driving back and this truck full of stuff in the bed of the truck also had a trailer in the bed of the truck. There's these two huge. Now y'all. When I say huge, I mean 30-foot wide and 20-foot-long Frankenstein feet in the bed of the truck. 

And then in the trailer was like a 50-foot plastic snake, disassembled, five skeletons and what looked like a body wrapped up in a rug. Well, I took a picture of that and put it on our town Facebook page Everything Christiansburg and I said meanwhile in Christiansburg. That post went viral. There's like 300 people. 

0:23:49 - Kayla

And didn't the driver actually post, oh, so embarrassed. 

0:23:53 - Brian

The woman that it belonged to saw the post and commented that there were no bodies there were no bodies on the trailer oh, I wanted. 

0:24:04 - Kayla

We laughed so hard. 

0:24:06 - Brian

When I read her comment I wanted to crawl under the desk. 

0:24:10 - Kayla

We've also been able to laugh with friends lately. We've also been able to laugh with friends lately. We've been able to reminisce with some friends about their mom, who passed away several years ago, and stories about my grandma and there is some healing balm in being able to remember your people. 

If someone is grieving, share the story because it does something for their heart that you haven't forgotten their person. And watching this family as we were sitting there sharing stories about their mom, you could tell that it just was really blessing them that their mom had not been forgotten. And so, yeah, do that. 

0:24:55 - Brian

It was during the pandemic and it was near the end of it. We had not gone back to restaurants yet, yeah, but we had agreed we were going to order takeout from a particular restaurant here in town that does ribs and that kind of stuff. 

0:25:07 - Kayla

Well, we had learned that they had some very serious protocols in place for picking up meals, how the food was handled, all this kind of stuff. So you decided to surprise me with dinner one night. 

0:25:20 - Brian

And you are sitting at the table. I will never forget this image as long as I live. You're sitting at the table, in one hand you got a fork, in the other hand you got a knife. And I pull back and there's ribs in there and you start dancing. That little fork and knife start going up and down and your little body starts going left to right and I said, baby, are you excited? And you said was I dancing? I said yes, and you said yes, I'm excited about this. 

0:25:48 - Kayla

So it's become my thing now. So that I will do a little jig when I like a meal. 

0:25:52 - Brian

You said the first meal. In four months I haven't had to cook little jig when I like a meal. 

0:25:56 - Kayla

You said the first meal in four months I haven't had to cook. Yes, yes. 

0:26:01 - Brian

So yeah, you get tickled at me because now, if I'm excited about a meal, I will do this little jig as of this recording. I was in Lynchburg, Virginia, yesterday for some business meetings and two of my leaders were there. 

And you guys went to lunch together at a Mexican restaurant were there and you guys went to lunch together at a Mexican restaurant and the waiter asked us if we wanted the lunch portion or the regular portion or the dinner portion. And so Adam Reed, he always orders the smaller portion. So me and Doug just said regular because we thought that meant the dinner portion portion they bring out like a dog bowl of food. Let me just say this First of all they bring Adam Reed he got a chimichanga lunch. That chimichanga had to be three inches long and like a half inch wide. It was the most pitiful thing I've ever seen in my life. And then me and Doug we both got this steak over rice with cheese and it was like five bites. 

0:26:59 - Kayla

Is that why you were so hungry for dinner? 

0:27:01 - Brian

I was starving yesterday and so we all got done. We were done eating in, like you know, five minutes. And we're sitting there and Adam Reed says why didn't you order something else? You don't like pigs? Oh, if I'm at a Mexican restaurant, I don't you order something else. 

0:27:15 - Kayla

You don't look like pigs. Oh, if I'm at a Mexican restaurant I don't care, well bring it. 

0:27:20 - Brian

You're going to be eating 40 fajitas later. 40, call them things 40. What do you call them Fajitas? Is that what it's called? Tortillas, tortillas, tortillas 56 has been rough on me, so anyway. 

0:27:38 - Kayla

Hey, we've been having lots of winners. We are blown away, yes, and we are loving hearing from you. So, yes, we have a couple of new items. It is possible that you could receive a notepad, some pens, a mug, some cute little stickers, that’s the prize pack. That's our prize pack. If you go to our website and answer our question correctly, you could win. 

0:28:02 - Brian

You'll get a mug pen, notepad and a pack of stickers. This week's question is oh, I've got to think of one. Okay, so you go to our website, peasandcarrotspodcast.com. When you get there, click the trivia question and this is this week's question. 

0:28:21 - Kayla

What is your favorite restaurant of choice? 

0:28:25 - Brian

Oh, oh, that's a good question. 

0:28:28 - Kayla

Why? Thank you, that's good. So, yeah, go to peasandcarrotspodcast.com. Click the trivia button. Share with us what is your favorite restaurant of choice. You can give us that information and any other stories you'd like to share with us. If you've had a good laugh lately, share that with us Share it and we will send you a notepad, some stickers, a mug and some pens. 

0:28:52 - Brian

There you go. So yeah, hey, thanks for listening, and you can search the Peas and Carrots Podcast wherever you get your podcast or visit our website. 

0:29:02 - Kayla

Peasandcarrotspodcast.com. When you do, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast. 

0:29:05 - Brian

You can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Just search for the Peas and Carrots Podcast. 

0:29:10 - Announcer

For more about the Peas and Carrots Podcast and to reach out to Brian and Kayla, visit peasandcarrotspodcast.com. Life's not perfect. That's why God gave us friends like Melody and Candi. Check out QuirksBumpsandBruises.com, or search Quirks, Bumps, and Bruises wherever you listen to podcasts.