The Genesis of a Joyful Advocate for Women

Have you ever witnessed the transformative power of faith and unity in someone's life? This episode features Tamra Andress, a beacon of hope and faith, whose journey from disliking women to becoming their fervent advocate is nothing short of inspiring. As the entrepreneurial rabbi, she empowers us to embrace community, overcome shame, and pursue our God-given talents. Tamra's story is a testament to finding identity and purpose through faith, and she shares the tools that helped her build ecosystems of support and success in both life and business.

Navigating life's challenges requires spiritual awareness, a theme deeply explored in our conversation with Tamra. We uncover the importance of our choices, recognizing how they can either open the doors to light or invite darkness. The words we speak and the seemingly minor decisions we make have profound implications for our spiritual health. This episode emphasizes the need to protect our spiritual gates and align ourselves with divine guidance, cautioning against ideologies that might lead us astray from biblical truth and spiritual well-being.

Wrapping up with a discussion on divine purpose, we delve into how aligning personal initiatives with God's will can create movements of genuine impact. The 'Kingdom of God business plan' and the concept of the 'joyful entrepreneur' are introduced, encouraging listeners to prioritize their spiritual health and trust in God's timing. This episode is not just a testament to Tamra Andress's remarkable journey, but also a guide for listeners to navigate their own wilderness seasons with faith and purpose. Share your stories with us on social media and join us as we continue uncovering the path to our divine calling.

Connect with Tamra HERE

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Welcome to the Bite Size Podcast. I'm your host, Lorraine Michaels, former EMT and nursing assistant, now business owner and wild entrepreneur. I walked away from over 15 years in medicine to pursue my passion and my God-given talents. Now I get the honor of helping other women discover their passions and purpose. If you're feeling stuck in life, unsure where to go or what to do, welcome. If you're exactly where you want to be great, you're welcome here too. If you have faced any kind of hardship or setback, you have found a safe place here. In other words, no matter who you are or what you've been through or what you're going through, this is the space for you. On the Bite Size podcast, we'll discuss life, business and faith. There's something for everyone. So grab a cup of coffee and something to take notes with, because there will definitely be things you won't want to forget. Oh, friend, do I have a treat for you? I am so excited for you to hear this episode that I got to do with Tamara Andress.

Speaker 1: 1:14

If you have not heard of Tamara Andress, I would love to introduce her to you. She is a good, good friend of mine and she has been coined the entrepreneurial rabbi, and it couldn't be more fitting. But what I absolutely love about Tamara is she is the most authentic, Jesus loving, faith filled fireball that I know, and I just love her so much, probably because we are so similar and we have very similar backgrounds as well. But she is a Jesus lover, she is one of the top podcasters, she's an international speaker, a six times best-selling author speaker, a six times best selling author. She's a retreat and conference host and she's a marketplace minister. And what I absolutely love is that she wears Jesus on every bit of her everywhere she goes. She's filled with joy and she just loves to spread the gospel and she loves to equip people and encourage people.

Speaker 1: 2:30

And so, friend, without further ado, welcome to the podcast, Tamara Andrus, and I hope you love this episode. Welcome back to the Bite Size Podcast. This is Lorraine, and today I have with me my favorite, favorite, favorite person in the world, Tamara Andress, and I'm so excited for y'all to get to hear more about her, about her story, the wisdom that she has, and I'm just excited for the value that is going to come from this. Welcome to the Bite Size Podcast, Tamara.

Speaker 2: 3:03

Thank you so much. I'm so excited. I've been watching all the things come through my feed because I follow your show closely and the people you've had on have been brilliant. So I feel honored to follow some of those and know that there's more to come.

Speaker 1: 3:15

Thank you, thank you so much. I just I mean let's go, because you have just so much, I don't want to waste any time. So I would love for you to tell the audience what it is that you do. You do so much, but what is it that you are just so passionate about right now and what you're on fire for God for right now? What are you doing?

Speaker 2: 3:39

Oh my gosh, all the things right. So you'll hopefully have already heard a bio statement somewhere it's in the show notes because I don't really like this part of a show and I have to explain who I am. But actually I don't like to explain what I do.

Speaker 2: 3:50

I love to explain who I am because I am a daughter of the king and that is the best role ever. I'm a mama and a wife. I've got two kiddos and two puppies. One is like a real, real puppy, so I'm going through potty training right now. Pray for me.

Speaker 2: 4:03

I totally forgot about that season of being a dog mom, but it is my utmost pleasure and joy, and the thing that gets me out of bed every single day, every morning, is people, and I went through a season of literally not knowing that I even liked women, let alone people as a whole, and I had a maternity business. So that's really confusing and we can go down that rabbit hole maybe one day. But I was not a girl's girl, I was a guy's girl and I have since evolved so much, since coming into my understanding of what does sisterhood actually mean through the family of Christ. What does it mean to actually champion someone else's dreams? What does it mean to actually sit with people in the hardest seasons of their lives trauma-induced, and all of the backstories and all of the shame, and to catalyze them into a place of purpose and passion? And so I have a publishing house and that's one of the ways I get to do that, which then allows me to help build business ecosystems for leaders and visionaries and thought leaders.

Speaker 1: 5:01

Amazing. Oh my gosh, I love that I resonate so much with what you said about never being a girl's girl but, being a guy's girl and so much of my life previous was that and I never understood it and I kind of just accepted it for what it was. But the more that my relationship grew with Christ and the more that I realized it's not really honoring and 100% it's not honoring if you're married, right, that's right.

Speaker 1: 5:34

But what I loved is how, like God, transformed my heart and how I really became curious as to why and I really dove into the pain and the trauma, yes and where that happened and why I started gravitating the way I did. Something that I know that you love and you're passionate about talking about also, is pushing past shame, and I think some of that for me personally it rooted in that it was that shame. Tell me a little bit about that. How did you navigate pushing past shame?

Speaker 2: 6:07

Yeah, I'll actually start with a precursor story. That's just ironic and God's timing is always good, but I just finished writing a forward of a new book that's coming out through a publishing house around bullying. And the first time that I really faced bullying was in elementary school. But myword was all about this experience with girls, these two girls. I was like a cheerleader in the student government and, in my perspective, popular right. But they were like the cool kids who smoked at this bus stop. It was like two varying degrees of people and experiences.

Speaker 2: 6:43

I got bashed by them consistently, to the point I was scared to go to the bus stop, I was scared to get off at the bus. I would cry, they would chase me home, they would threaten to hit me and I got told something and I know it was just out of protection. But this concept of essentially they're just jealous of you, and that was rooted in me at a very young age Like they're just jealous, just turn your cheek, do the other thing, just be kind, just be. You, don't worry about them, you don't need to change a thing. And I know that that's like a generational thing, it's a societal thing. It's again that protection from my mama bear, my papa bear. But I know now as a mom and someone who has really gone down the chasms of self-development and getting mental health therapy and supporting like what is the trauma that all of these things are rooted in, that communication is really, really critical and that ego is something very unique and interesting to every single person. But ultimately, that statement is rooted in pride, right. That statement is rooted in a place that positions me as being better than and that is never the heart of the father, and I had to really like unpack that.

Speaker 2: 7:55

So for a really long time I didn't get along with girls because if they were mean to me, I was not the mean girl, they were the mean girl and they were just jealous, right. So guys don't carry a lot of drama. And so I hung out with guys all the time because this is so easy, like they just take you for what you are and sometimes they take you for what you perceive that you are and I had perceived through an MTV driven 17, magazine driven pornography even from an early, early age five years old, exposure to cyber sex and all these things that we are presented with as being millennials that people don't often talk about but we get troubleshooted for being this wild, crazy generation. Now they think Gen Z is crazier. Isn't it funny how that happens? And we're the ones pointing to the ones below us? But I don't, because I know what that is like. And they're not talking about some of the real raw trials that we walked through during those ages and that season of my life, and so I really presented myself as a guy's girl in all of the wrong ways, and that ended up really eliminating my opportunity to confide in safe places and safe places are generally women and so it was not until I was married, with two kids and working full time as a serial entrepreneur.

Speaker 2: 9:13

I developed nine different companies in my twenties and two of which really took amazing traction at this point in my life, and one was like a nine figure nursing bra company that I had brought to the United Kingdom, canadian and American markets, and one was like a nine figure nursing bra company that I had brought to the United Kingdom, canadian and American markets, and I reestablished the number one nursing bra in Australia to bring it here, in addition to having that maternity boutique I mentioned. And that was my identity. My identity at that point, if you asked me, was I'm a serial entrepreneur and I'm the youngest girl. Like I'm going to be a billionaire before I'm 30. It did not matter that I had two young babies. Though I loved them, I didn't really fully know what love was, didn't know what intimacy was, didn't know how to look at myself and love myself without my works and without my bio.

Speaker 2: 9:59

I came to this screeching halt one day and I refer to it as my tombstone moment, which is really the shame that you're asking me about. And I saw on this tombstone, after I had just experienced my little waddling nine month old go the other way towards daddy, when I had just come home after a 14 hour day. Like I wanted her right, like you want her to come to you, you want to be the end, all be all for that baby, who I also just got done weaning from nursing. So like my boobs even wanted her, like my body physically cried out for her and she went the other way. And that like moment had me in a choice and we all have choice, we have free will every single day Are you going to press into the thing that you actually know you need or are you going to go after the thing that the world presents that you want, and I chose to go after the want and not the need in that moment.

Speaker 2: 10:47

And when I did, that meant I didn't even go squeeze her and hug her. I didn't even talk to my husband at that point, who was standing out there watching the kiddos on their tricycles and waddling. I went inside and waited for the next dollar signs to come through my phone. And this is when this vision of this tombstone comes off and it says entrepreneur and I thought, oh my gosh, that's all that I am right now, if I was to die today.

Speaker 2: 11:09

They might, out of kind respect, gingerly put these titles, but I was not living a life worthy of them. I was not living a life integral of them at all. I was being unfaithful to my spouse at this time. I was being spiritually unfaithful to God, and so many things were happening internally that I just didn't know who I was. I was in a state of depression, without being able to claim it as depression. I craved sleeping, so I didn't have to have conversations with people that were hard, and I was thriving at work, and there I was just doted over constantly. And when you get in places like that, where your home does not feel like your haven, you need to take a pause. And so what did I want my tombstone to say? I wanted it to say child of God, I wanted it to say wife, I wanted it to say mom, and within a week's timeframe having that time, I was in fetal position on my floor. I had been clearly found out in all of these different ways that I was walking out of integrity in my life, and I had a choice. Another choice Is that going to be your tombstone forever? Because you could walk away from it all right now and I chose no.

Speaker 2: 12:20

So I literally shut down my whole life. I shut down family relationships. I lived 17 houses down from my mom, stopped going to Sunday dinners, stopped communicating with a lot of people. I stopped those contracts. I assigned them over to other people and it was really hard, really, really hard.

Speaker 2: 12:39

But I knew, even in my pit of despair, that I needed help, and I didn't even know how to define what that help was because I was not walking with the Lord at the time. But I had a radical encounter with Jesus and Jesus is the only answer to take away your shame. And I could keep going on and on and on and storytelling about that and like how do you get out of that pit of despair? And how do you turn suicidal ideation into an opportunity to live your life in abundance immediately? How do you turn suicidal ideation into an opportunity to live your life in abundance immediately? How do you get free fast?

Speaker 2: 13:08

Those are all things that I talk about in my book, always Becoming, and I talk about often through women's events and my podcast. But ultimately, as people are listening today, I just want them to know that there is a generally always a backstory to someone's forefront of what you would perceive as happy, joyful, perfect life. Everyone said I had a perfect life. Then they called me Barbie and Ken my husband and I and I held to that pedestal as best I could, but I was ultimately truly like Barbie, in the sense of I had nothing inside. I was totally void.

Speaker 1: 13:43

Yeah, oh man, that is so heavy. What an incredible gift that God gave you with that vision and the.

Speaker 1: 13:55

Just the obedience in your heart and the knowing in your spirit of I have two choices. That is so powerful and I don't want people to miss that. We always have those two choices to lean into the spirit or to lean into the world, and one is going to lead you down. One is going to be a wide, open, easy path, led down to destruction, right, and the other is going to be a narrow path and it's going to be hard, but it's going to be so beautiful and it makes me think of like the cartoons with the devil and the angel right.

Speaker 1: 14:29

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you should do this.

Speaker 2: 14:30

You should do this, you should do this. Last night, we were learning about spiritual warfare and the fact that we live in a very spiritual realm, which the spiritual realm is bigger, better, grandiose, more than what we live in the flesh. We just have to have the spiritual eyes and the awareness to see it, and that these thoughts that we're talking about, like the positive and the negative, or the light and the dark you're hearing the spiritual world talked about all the time in the woo-woo sense, but this is truly biblical understanding is that when you even speak words of life or words of death because we know the power of our tongue, we get to do both choose is that you are actually opening a portal, with the words that you are saying, to the lightness or to the darkness to consume you?

Speaker 2: 15:16

And so not only through my mouth gate, but through my eye gate, my ear gate, my hand gate, my sense gate. I had every realm of my being opened to demonic confusion, and so, of course, these things were going to be taunting, of course they were going to taint, of course my choices were going to be going to the dark all the time, because the dark is going to woo you like it's light right. The enemy knows how to disguise himself. He's the killer of all truth, he's the liar, he's a thief, he's a destroyer, and he wants you to have everything that you want in your flesh, while God is like, yeah, but if you give it all away, if you give up that life and you go after me, I'm going to give you more than you could ask, hope or imagine. I'm going to give you a love you've never known. I'm going to give you a friendship you could never find in the world, and it is going to literally catapult you into your calling that will change not only your life, but the life of everyone you're connected to.

Speaker 1: 16:12

Oh, my goodness. Yes, all of that yes.

Speaker 2: 16:16

So much.

Speaker 1: 16:19

And it is so true. We just had this conversation with my son because he's been struggling with making right choices. I mean, he's a nine-year-old boy.

Speaker 2: 16:28

Of course.

Speaker 1: 16:29

Of course, yes, but I literally had to give him that picture description of having the two choices. When I take him to school school I'm always telling him like make good choices, son. Like you, every time you go to make a decision, you're going to hear the right thing to do and the wrong thing to do, and that's the holy spirit and that is satan, and you get to choose. You do get to choose. I mean, he came home with a pretty demonic looking book and I'm like what? What happened? You?

Speaker 1: 16:59

know, what happened here and he's like I wanted a mystery book. And I'm like, okay, but this is not okay. And I tried to started explaining to him why. And just then the dog pushed open the door and went into the backyard and I said you see how that door's open. Are we going to leave that like that? Are we going to go to bed with that open? And he said well, no. And I said well, why not? And he said because a robber could come in. I said you're right, absolutely why. Because he's going to walk by and he's going to see that it's open and that he can get in.

Speaker 1: 17:30

And I said when you pick books like this, when you do things like this or you make the wrong decision you're leaving the door to your mind open to Satan and now he can come in and he can play and he can give you these thoughts and give you these dreams. You have to make sure that door is closed all the time. That's so good.

Speaker 2: 17:53

That's so good.

Speaker 1: 17:53

I mean, I pray that that just sticks in his mind. But it's so crazy we don't think about these things or the words that we speak. Well, you never taught that?

Speaker 2: 18:03

Right I have now having, literally. I went into a three-year hiatus that I mentioned and it was focused on the nucleus of my home, focused on the internal of my home and where the spirit dwells inside of me. I had literally destroyed my own temple in so many ways, I defiled it in so many ways and in that three-year timeframe I got my ordination and minister's licensing. I went to a year-long worship school and I started to dissect through multiple lenses of therapy, both marriage therapy and individual counseling both all Christian, by the way, because it can go a whole nother way if you learn about the roots of psychology and psychiatry. I just have to drop this because it's so interesting. It's only 150 years old the understanding of psychology and psychiatry is only 150.

Speaker 2: 18:46

Freudian Freud. Everyone knows Freud. He was a pedophilia, by the way.

Speaker 1: 18:50

I did not know that Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 18:52

So everything that he teaches you about your mind and your body and all of these things, freudian slip. A Freudian slip is like oh, let me just slip this in here Like it's all negative, right, crazy, demonic. Then the psychology literally was a Satan cult, a cult leader, a Satanist is the person who developed psychology. So we think, self-help, right. And we're like oh, self-help, yeah, self-help. Well, what does self-help focus on?

Speaker 2: 19:20

Self and what does God tell us to deny Self, our self, oh, my gosh and so I am like learning these things even to this day and I am processing wow, we have to have the word at the front of every single thing. The forefront, the foundation, everything we knew needs to be guarded. It's not to say that their knowledge isn't brilliant. There are some elements where I'm like man, that's really good, but what does the word say about that? Because that's where the truth of what can be good, but not God, exists. And so, yeah, we were processing that together and just thinking, golly, we have to be cognizant of where all of our time, invested, even in healing, goes. And so fast forward through that three-year timeframe to now be able to help other people, not necessarily personally.

Speaker 2: 20:10

I actually was really leaning into helping people thrive in their passions and develop their businesses, because entrepreneurship was my backstory, it was my passion, it was what I was really, really good at. It's an anointing that I know I have. And yet the Lord downloaded this specific model, which is the three. It's a trifecta, think of like a three tier Venn diagram of being brand and then business. And so many people come with the intention of getting building their business because they're looking to what Raise money, have money right, live this particular lifestyle. Sometimes it's to help people, which is super noble. I love that. That's the nonprofit spectrum, honestly, that I serve. They're like I want to start a ministry and it's okay if I don't make any money and I'm like why are you saying that?

Speaker 2: 20:50

Right, like there's a backstory to that money mindset to that poverty mentality we're going to bust through that too.

Speaker 2: 20:56

And then there will be the people who are like, okay, I have my business idea, but I need a better branding. I just need I need to show up like you show up on social media. I need like something that is a remember, memorable for me, and when I go into, like, yeah, maybe, sure, let's talk about you. So people have not gone through this deep work. If they have not taken the time to do that, they can't have an empathetic lens to anybody else that they're trying to serve, because they're not really seeing people. They're seeing people as a cell rather than seeing people as a soul.

Speaker 1: 21:26

Yeah, oh my gosh. Yes, and I have personally experienced that, having these interactions with people where my heart's desire is to learn, grow, be, do. And what do I need? I need a coach, and then I get one, and then it's like I'm just a dollar sign to you, like you're not even hearing my heart in this or what God downloaded in me, and I so feel that, and I think that's another reason why I'm so passionate about helping people and calling people up and you had mentioned championing people's dreams. Yeah, and I feel like I am everybody's biggest cheerleader. You know, which is something that you teach about is how to build, turning your message into a movement and how to build ministry into your business, and I want to get into that.

Speaker 2: 22:24

I know you can go forever for that. I can.

Speaker 1: 22:28

That is like where do you start with that? I mean, where do you start with that?

Speaker 2: 22:34

Yeah Well, and interestingly, it's always the hindsight 2020 where you're like, wow, god, I see what you're doing and I truly have a passion. I pray about it all the time. It's like God, give me the forethought right. Like that's being a visionary, that's having a prophetic gift, is to say, I want to see ahead of time what's going to happen. And so I'm in that prayer room and that prayer place often now. But when I first started my business, I didn't even have the knowledge or wisdom to be able to pray a prayer like that. I was just doing what God I thought was telling me at the time, and the first thing he told me to do was write a book, and I gave you some of the juicy. There's a lot more juicy to that story inside of that book.

Speaker 2: 23:13

But after the book, I was writing a book that took about three years because I was doing a lot of healing in the process. I started my podcast. So I was doing a podcast and it's now become the Messenger Movement Podcast, six years running now. And I also started a membership of women who I knew wanted to start something. They didn't even know really what that something was, but they wanted a social media presence because they wanted to get a movement going. They wanted to get community backing behind this particular thing that they loved and were passionate about. It could have been motherhood, it could have been finances as women, it could have been a gift shop, it could have been candles we had a candle maker at one point. It was a horse aquarium therapist who was with us for a while. We've got pastors, real estate agents, so many different genres of women, and it was such a beautiful season.

Speaker 2: 24:03

But I didn't really know what I was building until about two and a half years in. And at that two and a half year mark, I knew, because the Lord told me you're going to go national, because all of that stuff I had done locally, even my podcast, though it was touching different places around the world, because that's what podcasts do Thankfully, everyone should have one, by the way and I realized, okay, I need to start having conversations with people outside of my community. I need to think bigger, I need to engage bigger. And it was more so just because that's the heart of the father. It says to go and tell all nations. So, yeah, your microphone will go to nations.

Speaker 2: 24:39

But how can you, as the person, get infiltrated into these people's communities. It's by relationship, and so I started establishing relationships and through, specifically, an app that I don't know if people hang out on anymore because I haven't been there in a year or so. It was called Clubhouse. It's a social media networking but it's audio only and no one gets to see it. Scroll a feed, you have to be live in action there and all they hear is your voice with a flashing photo of you, and you can get into cool conversations and teach and train people up, and I got into a room right out the gate when that happened that had thousands of people in it every single day from 5 am to noon every single day, and Lorraine, for about two years you can ask my husband and my mom, who was currently living with us at the time.

Speaker 2: 25:29

I had an earbud in one ear and was living existing with the one exterior and that was while doing morning routine with my kids. That was working out, that was traveling, that was anywhere I was in present in these conversations. Now positive. It helped me gain national and global exposure really quickly and my podcast soared at that point and my business started to grow because I was getting people outside of this particular community, but it took me two years to realize the very thing that I preached about, which was the infiltration of the gates. Right, what are you listening to? I realized I was listening to everybody else's ideas of success and I finally found out, by going to an in-person experience with all of those online people, that it was a falsified reality and I think, with social media being what it is, regardless of what platform you're using, that is the power of getting in person with people, and you and I had an opportunity to experience a weekend together at one of my speaking retreats here recently, and we had been together before at a conference.

Speaker 2: 26:36

But even that isn't quite the same as like literally dwelling with someone in the same house and you get to see the heart of a human when you're spending multiple days with them and like your makeup's off and your tears are running and you know you're, you're living life together.

Speaker 2: 26:50

You got stuff in your teeth, you know who cares what's going on, but it's like that is the root that the Lord is trying to get in our lives, is he's like? I just want to be in relationship with you, but so often people are putting God as this like way, external thing, like pie in the sky. He's over there, but he's as close as your breath, as close as your breath. And so if you're trying to develop a message and you aren't as connected to your breath as that message, going back to the life or death, with your tongue, with your words, what are you catalyzing for other people to catch hold of? And that is where being brand and business come into play. Your identity must be secured in Christ before you start to provide information of a falsified identity, because you're going to walk around having to do what I did in my twenties I'm going to have to wear the mask that I projected to you the first time I met you.

Speaker 1: 27:50

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 27:51

I'm going to have to chase around the little white lies that I told you about who I am to make sure that she believes that this is who I am. Yeah Right, and when you get in person with someone, it's next to impossible to walk life out with someone and them not see between the lines if they're self-aware if they're connected to the Holy Spirit.

Speaker 2: 28:14

Right, and that's a thing of discernment. I have falsified God's peace in the past with a partnership simply by telling myself this is the person I need to be in the room with, this is the funds that are going to come in faster if I partner with this person. This is what I'm made to do, and so if I can get there faster to do that thing because they're releasing me from all of the other hard things that I have to do, this has got to be it.

Speaker 2: 28:41

And it was a falsified piece and I can assure you prosperity doesn't come from falsified peace.

Speaker 2: 28:47

It comes from trials and tribulations while abiding. And so, all of that to be said, how do you turn your message into a movement? You better first get with the messenger. The first messenger, whoever came, whoever was, whoever will be with the truth, and so that's literally being rooted in the word of God, so that, as you establish this thing that he has told you to do, he has commanded you to do, it's not a really. We talk about choices. We still have free will. God will always give you free will, but when you hear from God on what you're meant to do, you can't not think about it. It doesn't go away, it will constantly.

Speaker 2: 29:26

You talk about shame. It'll constantly be something that you are filled with shame about, and that's not who your father is. That's not God's will for your life. He doesn't want you to feel that shame. All he's asking you to do is to obey.

Speaker 2: 29:37

And so you're going to have this little inkling gosh, I should have written that book last year. Oh man, god told me that I should start that business. Oh Lord, I knew I was supposed to have another baby, but it just didn't seem convenient. So I'm just going to stick that one over there too. I mean, these are real conversations. I shouldn't have married this guy. I should have gone for the good guy, not the bad guy. There's so much weight that we can carry simply by free will, but if you look at hindsight, god probably already told you the right thing to do then, and so we build movements out of creating communities that are authentic and true and connected not only to you as the messenger, but connected to the ultimate messenger, who is Christ, because we're not here to build our numbers, we're not here to build our platforms, we're here to build his and the other thing. It's cool, it happens in the process, but that's cannot be the main prerogative or it will fail.

Speaker 1: 30:32

But that cannot be the main prerogative or it will fail. Yeah, absolutely yes, oh. That reminds me of something someone had said If God called you to it, you won't have to fight to keep it. But if it's something that you have projected and you have wanted and you have made happen. You will have to fight tooth and nail to keep it. And God's not going to bless it and chances are you're not going to keep it because it wasn't meant for you.

Speaker 2: 31:02

It wasn't for you. Yeah, you have to hold anything tight. I was just talking to a girlfriend. She said her word for the year was release and I was like, oh, that was my word a couple of years ago. I am so sorry you felt called to do that word. And she was just like, oh, no, she's like I already know what you're going to say, so don't like say anything more. Life or death, life or death. And so I was just like I'll tell you my testimony at the end of the year on what happened the year of release. I can't wait to hear yours.

Speaker 2: 31:26

But essentially, if you have to hold anything as tight as you have to hold the steering wheel, it's not made for you. Literally, you should be able to have your arms, your hands, your fingertips wide open with the thing that the Lord has given you, because if he called you to it, it's already been created. Yeah, it's already been constructed. He's already brought all the resources that you need. But you do have to act. You don't get to just sit up in your Bible chair and be like God. You go do that thing. No, he's like I told you to connect with Lorraine today on her podcast, because the person listening is going to call you. It all has purpose in the kingdom and he can see the grandiose picture. And so we get to operate out of rest, versus out of that heavy laden yoke that we would otherwise take on if we decided, hey, this is my role, this is the job I want.

Speaker 2: 32:13

This is the partnership I need, and those things will literally present themselves. Like I said, we said with the enemy, they'll present themselves as good, but everything good is not God.

Speaker 1: 32:23

Yes, yes, yes, yes, oh. So much of that when I first started this whole my business and all of this, and it was out of. You know, god downloading this dream in my heart and this vision, and a vision bigger than I could ever even imagine, and my first thought was no way, there's no way I can do it. And then I was like okay, well then, that is from God, because God is definitely going to give me something that I can't do on my own.

Speaker 1: 32:49

And it's going to take him and his resources and connection. And then it led into a year of just grabbing everything and trying to control everything and do all the things. And it was so, so, just heavy, and I'm like I am not letting God take the wheel in this. I am trying to control all of it and do all the things. I was chasing all the worldly things. It led to problems in my marriage and problems in the home. It was so much so to where I was like I don't care what's happening in my house, I'm pursuing this. God gave me this dream and I was dead set on that. You had talked about it. If your home's not right, that's what God had steward you to begin with, and that's the heart of it all. If it's not right, you got to stop, and I didn't, and it just kept unraveling and unraveling and unraveling and finally I got to a point where I was like, okay, god, I'm the heck with the business.

Speaker 1: 33:51

I need to focus on my home, and I need to get that right. And it wasn't until then that the things started healing and mending in my marriage and it's a beautiful thing now and, yeah, we have bumps and hiccups, but it's nothing like it used to be and I see the fruit of it now and I see the momentum in my business now and now that I'm holding it loosely now I'm seeing the fruit of it. It's not where that dream is right.

Speaker 1: 34:21

I'm not there yet, but I am so excited because I know I'm being obedient and I'm meeting people like you and I get to go to these retreats and I get to learn and be loved on and be around other godly women that are on the same path, different but same, and it's amazing. And I love being around other women, other believers, that are doing it too and that are doing what they're called to do.

Speaker 2: 34:50

One thing that came to mind and it never has in this context, so I know it's from the Lord, because I've never said it out loud and I've never seen it together is, as you were talking about that, from the connectivity of home, and I have this devotional that's in my app. It's a five-day devotional around joy and how do you get into the joy zone, and there's an alignment factor of heart, head, home, health handbag, man bag. If you're a guy listening, yeah, you can use a Merce, they're cool. Now it's like okay, well, like, heart is obviously the heart of God. I'm coming back to the heart of worship. I always think about that specific song and then it's the head, it's the head space, it's the head trash, because if you don't get in touch and you can't take every thought captive, then all of the head jargon that you're bringing into your home, your marriage, your mothering journey, it's going to be somebody else's idea and it's likely the enemies. Right, because he's actually parented you longer than God has parented you, satan, literally. He's the prince of the earth, he's the prince of the air and he has stewarded us. Whether you believe that or not, it's true. Everything that's been presented to you that is not holy and sacred and godly is of the enemy. And so when I came to these revelations and I'm listening to you say this I'm like man.

Speaker 2: 36:07

Even the Israelites. They had an old identity. Their identity at this season of Exodus is slavery, is bondage, but that's all they knew If they raised their hand to what's my role? Yeah, that's me, that's my role, that's my job. I'm the scum of the earth right now and I have to listen to these particular rules. And I think we feel that way often, and it's not to say everyone's been supposed to be an entrepreneur, but a lot of people get jobs that are not actually their purpose or their passion and they feel at some point in their life like, oh, I got to go to work again. It's bondage to that thing.

Speaker 2: 36:44

Well, when they were brought out of Egypt into the well, what will be eventually the promised land, into the space that was 40 years of wilderness by Moses, they didn't have a job. And I was just thinking about that as you were saying that, thinking what was their responsibility at that point? Their responsibility was to pursue the heart of God by cloud, by day and fire, by night, to establish their homes right, to be in communion with one another, daily, through this manna, to trust other people, to say I'm only going to take my portion and to just follow God. And this is not a season that many of us are ever graced. Right, and most of us would say a wilderness. No, no, no, I want to be purposed, I don't want to be in a wilderness.

Speaker 2: 37:34

I want clarity. These are the things I hear all the time and I'm like, yeah, but God, god has such intention in those times that you feel like you're going in circles, even circling the thing that is the promise. They circled Jericho, the very first city that they took over. They circled seven times before the promise ever came. You don't think on the fifth time you're like why are we going trumpets around this city for another day? This is ridiculous right.

Speaker 2: 38:02

And then the city walls crash and what God promised comes to fruition. But guess what, when they get access to the thing God promised them, they didn't just get to walk in the city and dwell there. They had to fight for that city, they had to fight for that dream, they had to fight for that promise. And as I've been processing that, I'm doing the Bible recap, which is the Bible in a year, chronologically, with a girl, tara Lee Cobble. I'll shout her out. I have no affiliation at all, but she has the same initials as me. Tamara Lee is my name, she's Tara Lee and I was Tamara Lee Carnaval.

Speaker 2: 38:34

I'm like okay, lord, I like this, but I am processing it and a lot of people look to the Old Testament and they throw it out. It's like you can't throw out the baby with the bathwater. There is such purpose in this. And so, as you are listening to this and you're thinking, gosh, I have a huge dream that God has given me too, and I feel like I've circled it 20 million times. I would say, probably not circle it again, because if the city walls, the access point to that dream, has not been opened, the city walls haven't fallen and God is trying to teach you something.

Speaker 2: 39:04

One of those things that he's trying to teach you is probably the power of praise, probably the power of promise in your current predicament, probably the fact that he goes before you, maybe the fact that the Ark of the Covenant, which is what they actually followed with the trumpets as they went around, is the temple. So is your temple well? Are you personally? Well, because if you're not well when those city walls come down, when you have access to the dream, you are not going to be able to take territory because you're not going to have the willpower to fight, and so we have to find that inside of us, and it's going to take a wilderness season before you get access to it, and then the access point is going to be, and you have got to be prepared, you've got to want it.

Speaker 2: 39:48

You've got to be certain that this is what God told me to do, because when we go after things that are not of God, that are not presented by him, we're probably, like you said, we're going to gain it really quickly. The access is going to come really quickly. You see, this actually happen with, maybe and I say pastors, I don't want to just use a pastoral lens it could be businesses who have like a fast claim to fame. This is great NFL or any athlete. They got that fast claim to fame. They get all of that money and then they blow it. Why? Because they have not established their temple.

Speaker 2: 40:21

Well, now, they might be amazing athletes and you might see their temple as well, but what we're looking to remember is the heart first, then the head, then the home. These are all generally quiet places, places that the world does not see. Then they see health, then they see handbag, and what is it? The kingdom is an upside down business. I just told you the business plan of God, the kingdom of God business plan. Everybody else flips it upside down. That's Satan's territory.

Speaker 2: 40:52

He says let me give them the money, because they'll go after the money. Then I'm going to give them the health. Ooh, their body's going to function. They're going to be fast, they're going to be the best on the field. All of this is going to work. This is going to be great. Oh, and then they're going to infiltrate their home. Yeah, I'm going to give them the wife. I'm going to give them the kids out of wedlock. We're going to give them all these things and it's going to just be chaos. Their life's going to be chaos. They're going to get other people pregnant. They're going to be hanging out with other wives right, this is for guys and girls too. So, other men, other husbands. Then they're going to come into the self-help arena. Ooh, let's go. Mental health let's talk about the headspace.

Speaker 2: 41:27

I earned this. This is mine, this is all for me. Self-made millionaire self-made billionaire.

Speaker 2: 41:41

And then the heart, which is the most deceitful thing. We know this if it has not been transformed by Christ. Now they're literally, they've convinced themselves, or the enemy has convinced themselves both, and that they've got it all and that this chaos that they've cultivated, that they have to hold so tightly to, is their plot in life. This is good enough, but, in my perspective, if I knew the heart of those people, if I knew the insides of what was happening in their lives, which eventually always comes out yeah, yeah, they are the Israelites before the Exodus. They're living a life of slavery. So what we perceive as they've got it all, they've taken the city, it's actually a complete demonic lie, and so we have to build everything we build from the inside out, not from the outside in. Run it back, yes, the top, okay. So the kingdom of kingdom of god, the order, his business plan is heart, head home, health handbag. There we go I love it.

Speaker 1: 42:42

Oh, that's fire right there. I've never got to share.

Speaker 2: 42:45

That was a total download from the lord for the exodus and explanation of the wilderness. Don't discredit your wilderness.

Speaker 1: 42:53

Yes, amen, oh, my goodness, okay, friends, oh, we could go on forever. Oh man, what a, what a wonderful, wonderful time. I thank you so much, tamara, for for all of this, um, I will have. So. You mentioned always becoming what's, what's, uh, what's your latest and greatest book?

Speaker 2: 43:15

that you've just released.

Speaker 2: 43:16

Yeah, we've got the joyful entrepreneur, which is a series, and it is truly a treasure trove because I am operating alongside 20 in the first version, 17 in the second, and it's these experts, industry experts, who have done this work that we're talking about here.

Speaker 2: 43:32

So I trust them. There are people that I can stand behind in the businesses that they've cultivated, and I know now, because I did it so wrong before, where everything was about me that if we do not come together in community, the Jericho walls will never fall down, because that took an army to do that. And so I am loving partnering with other authors, people who've never yet spoke, never yet written, never yet brought a podcast to life, and they're ready to do that. They're ready to take their message and turn it into a movement of other warriors, no matter what the topic is. It would be an honor to partner. So we are actually enrolling for Anthology number three, which will be coming out in January of next year, but we are so excited we have a couple more seats in that anthology. We have a women's devotional coming out later this year called More Than Enough, which is going to be so profound, as you know.

Speaker 1: 44:25

I haven't seen some things on that.

Speaker 2: 44:27

More than a wife, more than a mom, more than my body, more than my religion, more than my past, more than my trauma oh, such good. More than my job Six different concepts that are going to blow people's minds. So we're always creating collaboration opportunities for people because I know sometimes financially we can't do it alone, or you just don't know how to do it yet. So let someone show you the ropes and then you can turn your individual message in a movement by having an entire built-in community that has already collaborated with you and is ready to champion you because they know who you are.

Speaker 1: 45:01

Amazing, and all of that we can find if I attach in the show notes your website. Is that the best way for people? Yes, cameraandresscom.

Speaker 2: 45:11

Yeah, you'll get to all the different places. Also, fit and Faith Media is probably where you'll find more of the heartiness of the publishing house and what I do for business, but the other one is my personal site that has all of those things, and I'd love to give your community an opportunity to access the self-assessment on where they are as a millionaire messenger and my definition of millionaire is inside of there, and it does include the dollar sign. So don't think it doesn't. I am not for people making money. I believe that that's a kingdom of heaven resource that he will give us access to when we've done the work and we're going to steward it. Stewardship becomes the conversation about who are the millions that God has called you to and how can you create a movement. So you'll have access to that, too, by just jumping in the show notes and clicking on the link.

Speaker 1: 45:55

Awesome, awesome. Well, thank you so much. Wow, this has been incredible and all of the information will be in the show notes. And, as always, guys, if this message, if this podcast has been any sort of help for you, share it, tag us. We would love to connect with you and always remember you were divinely created for a divine purpose and there was no mistake in you. Catch you on the next episode, guys.