Episode 2 - Before Dating (Part 1) - Planted, Not Buried

Today, we're blessed to have Maya join us as we explore the heart of singleness from a godly perspective, discussing the profound concept of being 'Planted, Not Buried.' Together, we dissect the complex emotions surrounding the longing for a partner and share our own experiences of feeling sidelined in a world that often prioritizes relationships. Through stories of personal growth and finding joy in Christ, we affirm that being single isn't a waiting period—it's a time for deep roots to grow.

As we open up about our own paths, we confront the internal battles that can leave many of us singles questioning our worth. The transformative potential of scripture becomes our focal point, guided by Romans 12:2, which reminds us not to conform to the world's patterns but to renew our minds. Maya offers invaluable insights into how counseling and therapy, particularly from a Christian viewpoint, can help navigate through past traumas and pave the way toward emotional health. This journey isn't just about preparing for a future relationship, but about embracing the completeness that exists within our relationship with God.

We wrap up our heartfelt discussion by addressing the practical steps in seeking therapy and mentorship, overcoming loneliness, and resisting temptation. I share how parenthood has reshaped my vision of God's unwavering love and the way it parallels our capacity to love others. The conversation culminates in celebrating the blessing of a spouse who shares a commitment to spiritual growth, and we close with a prayer that encapsulates our gratitude for God's ever-present guidance. Whether you're single and searching, or simply seeking to understand singleness from a Christian perspective, this dialogue will uplift and inspire.

Transcript

Michael: 0:02

Hey guys, Michael Sanchez here. Thanks so much for listening again today. Welcome back to our podcast. We have Maya with us today.

Maya: 0:09

Hi everyone. We're so excited that you were able to come back and we just want to say thank you to our listeners for supporting and for listening. We hope that this has been effective. We're hoping that this is helping you. We're hoping that this is really just supporting your dating life, and we're excited for the next topic that we're going to dive into today.

Michael: 0:28

Yeah, we got some really good response from the first podcast and we're just excited to talk more about some of these details. When it comes to dating, maya actually came up with this title, which I think is really cool. It's Before Dating, part 1, planted, not Buried. So, maya, do you want to explain to her how you came to that?

Maya: 0:46

Absolutely so. Sometimes, when people are trying to encourage you, you may hear the words you are planted, not buried. That's in the context of this episode is a direct nod to the fact that sometimes singleness can feel very overwhelming, especially if you've been single for a long time. Or let's say, maybe singleness has not been happening for a long time but singleness is not yet enjoyable for you.

Maya: 1:10

I know for me, when I was single especially when I was a lot younger, like my teens and throughout my college years and things like that people would say things like oh, you're so young. Or they would say enjoy your singleness and then just leave it at that. They wouldn't explain what that meant and sometimes that can kind of just feel like I don't know. It can feel like you're just being silenced when in reality there's a lot of different things that you're struggling with. And so the idea behind being planted but not buried is that, if you think of yourself as a seed, being planted can feel a lot like a burial. You can feel like life is just passing you by and everybody else is having their turn, everybody else is getting married and having kids and you're not feeling like you're progressing, or maybe you're in a season where you're in between relationships and it's just really deeply painful. Can you relate to that yeah?

Michael: 2:11

absolutely. For me it was like I talked about in the previous podcast I had a divorce. So for me it was like feeling a lot of loneliness of, obviously, at the time you get divorced or like, okay, try to find somebody new, this is exciting, whatever, unhealthy, but ultimately you sort of get through that and then you're like, wow, I'm actually single again and you can really struggle just with the feelings of loneliness, with the feelings of, okay, everybody else has somebody. A lot of my friends are married and here I am in the single life again. I really don't know what I'm doing and am I doing the right things? Am I following God the right way? What do I be thinking about? So, yeah, I really relate to this, and it actually is in the first point that we put together, which is longing, and you put noticing the difference between wanting and needing, which I think is great, because I really believe that it's so important to define those two things Do you need a partner or do you want a partner?

Michael: 3:12

Those are two totally different things and if we have our roots in Christ, we need Christ, but we don't need a partner. We should want a partner. God definitely provides us the pathway to learn more about Him, to get close to Him and then ultimately find somebody. That's really ideal for us. But we don't need that to be happy. We need Him, we need Christ to be happy. And then a partner can come along and, like we're going to talk about in this podcast, if you do it the right way, you can really get to a point of just being relaxed and not really needing to do certain things or date. You can just become just happy in the life that you've created.

Maya: 3:50

Yes, definitely. I want to talk a little bit about what my experience is like as a single person. I just felt like I kind of felt like I was a nerd for a very long time and just wasn't the kind of person that people would go after, even though that's not necessarily true you never know what like secret admirers you have out there but I remember feeling unnoticed at times. I remember feeling that there are people who are interested, but not necessarily interested enough to actually take a plunge, try to get to know you, try to enter into a relationship with you, etc. So I remember feeling that a lot. And then I also remember, you know, in the years before meeting you, michael, once I did start dating, maybe not seeking the right people because I'm just trying to fill in that gap that I felt, but knowing what I know.

Maya: 4:42

Now it's so important how you wait, and you'll hear so many people say this.

Maya: 4:47

You know this is probably not the first podcast or the first book that you've read or the first person that comes across your life to let you know that patience has so much to do with how you wait, and so that's essentially what we're getting after.

Maya: 5:00

Here is number one the first thing is there's nothing wrong with having a desire and it's so important to be able to just. I think just acknowledging the desire and the longing to have a partner is totally normal, it's totally healthy, it's okay. So maybe that looks like you writing in your journal like I have a desire to be with someone. It can be included in your prayers. It can be even just conversations you have with your parents or with your friends. It doesn't need to be the thing that you are after morning and night, day and night. You know sounding like a broken record, but it's okay to acknowledge the fact that there is a desire for a partner and that there's a desire for all of the benefits that come with having a partner. That's, I would say, the first step, is acknowledging that longing.

Michael: 5:52

It's really good, yeah, for me, you know. You know, as I was really working on myself and really working on, you know, obviously, the failure of divorce. You know that takes a grieving period to really get over that and to to really have God heal that, that part of your soul. For me, you know I I got so much peace and and comfort and just listen to a lot of sermons. You know, for me, I listen to a lot of Rick Warren sermons. One that I highly recommend is, if you type in Rick Warren dating, I'm a lot of the principles that we actually teach throughout the book and just, you know, things that we talk about really relate a lot to that sermon.

Michael: 6:27

You know, rick Warren dating that we watch together, honey, and you know it just gave me a lot of comfort knowing that, okay, god has somebody out there that is following these exact things. Like you know, there's a lot of them, like emotional health and bitterness, addictions, like. But you know, now I know exactly who I'm looking for and I'm really able to stay patient and be able to find that person based on knowing that. You know, if I'm working on these things, that they're gonna, you know, come across, you know, in the future. So for me, I was just I found comfort in that to where I felt like I didn't need a woman. I felt more like I was excited that in the future I was gonna find a woman, you know and and she was gonna fit. You know, ultimately I found you. So that was what was exciting for me. So I think just continuing to really work on yourself is so important definitely.

Maya: 7:14

I'm so glad that you mentioned sermons, because the next one, the next thing that you want to prioritize when you are planted but not buried, is finding peace and rest in God's word. This looks like two different things. There's your personal, your private study of God's word, and then there's your group study of God's word. I believe so strongly and listening to sermons that lift you up, listening to sermons that encourage you, and finding it just examples. It's so great to find examples, godly examples in the Bible and also godly examples in real life, people that you can look up to, role models that you can look up to. So the great thing about studying God's word is that you can see incredible examples of people who did follow God and people who did pursue spouses throughout the Bible. We're gonna talk about that quite a bit. You can dive into into God's word and see how God placed, you know, women and men's life to be able to help them with their purpose, their divine purpose, and how those strong partnerships and those strong bonds allowed for God's, god's will to be moved forward, to be advanced throughout, you know, throughout history. Then you have people that you look up to like. For you, it's definitely Rick Warren. I always knew who Rick Warren was, because my mom was always a huge fan of the purpose-driven life. I would say that one of my huge role models was her name is Heather Lindsay. I don't know if I've talked to you about her before, but she's someone who she's written so many amazing books and she is just a huge life example, huge role model for not just how to deal with relationships but also how to deal with your relationship with God. So there's so many different things you can do.

Maya: 8:58

You, honey, when I met you, you had a deck of flashcards with Bible verses that you were committing to memory and it it was right there on your what's that thing called? And the end tables, the end tables on the couch, and it was right there. You're constantly like being refreshed by the word. There's so many groups you can join. I would.

Maya: 9:23

When you met me, I was in Bible. I've still in Bible study fellowship. I feel like BSF keeps me out of trouble. That's kind of my thing that I like to say, and it's so amazing because you are prioritizing small groups. Another thing your church probably offers a small group that you want to be, want to really pair those things together where, let's say, you're part of a large group but you're given questions to study in your private time. So you're given some kind of programming whether that's something that you find on Pinterest or searching Google or anything like that, or your church is offering it to you. It's time that you're spending to yourself to develop your private relationship with the Lord, and time that you're spending with others to get different perspectives on what God's word is trying to say to you that's really good.

Michael: 10:13

So, you know, the biggest thing is, you know any way that you find easiest to to read the word of God. So in my case, I love Rick Warren sermons because you know he puts verses right there on the screen, so like I'm constantly just getting the word of God all throughout my day because I love listening to Rick Warren. So you know, even even though it's not just like a traditional just reading the Bible, it's like I'm watching sermons that have constant verses going out, you know, going on throughout. So you know that's where I wrote down, you know those on flashcards and you know, so those I'm also able to read those verses throughout my day and that really does a lot, you know, but everybody's different. Some people prefer, you know, reading the Bible in different ways. They prefer devotions, they prefer different things.

Michael: 10:57

But the most important thing is that the more that you digest the word of God, the more you're just gonna start doing things that follow what the word says and that's where that's gonna influence, ultimately in a positive way, your dating life. You know, if you're, if you're able to constantly be seen that and the opposite of that is there's so many things in the world. You know I want to relate to. You know social media. You know, if you're constantly looking at social media, it's sort of the opposite effect, like if you see where you know people are dressed a certain way and they're trying to make a bunch of money and they're doing things that the world finds valuable. That's the opposite of seeing scripture all throughout your day.

Michael: 11:35

You know, if you're saying, if you're just scrolling through social media constantly and that's all that, you see, it's really putting trash into your mind and that's really where, once you decide that, okay, I'm buckling down, I'm going to really focus on the word of God and just put it into my heart as much as possible, it will transform your life. It will and it really makes a difference in all areas of life. It will make you less desperate, it will make you more content, because you know God will give you that peace in your heart that all you need is Him. And those things will, all you know, be really positive. When you start going on dates, like with Maya and I, we start going on dates and you know I'm not doing some things that maybe some crazy guys do like because I'm I'm more natural, I'm more grounded. I think is a good word.

Maya: 12:20

I love that so much, babe. So you're reminding me of a very specific memories that I would have, and I'll just be completely transparent. There were some nights I would keep myself so busy but then I would get hit my head, would hit the pillow and I would just be like in tears thinking about how lonely I felt. And sometimes the difference between continuing to cry yourself to sleep and falling asleep is a Bible verse. So my question for you I'll give you a second to think what was a verse that really encouraged you throughout your time of singleness? For me it was in Lamentations, where pain may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning. That was something that I would repeat to myself all the time is like I'm crying right now, but in the morning I'm going to feel fine. Pain may endure for the night, but joy comes in the morning. What about you? What's a verse that kind of just held you? Sometimes you're just held together by God's word.

Michael: 13:12

For God's to love the world. That's a joke from our podcast, our last podcast. I really, I'm really into Romans. Romans 12, verse two, did not be conformed to the pattern of this world, and that really relates to what I just said, which is that the world has a certain way that they want you to be. The world wants to control your mind and there's so many great sermons on the battle of the mind that I highly recommend Rick Warren.

Michael: 13:38

Just look up, rick Warren mind, because the world wants to consume your mind. Satan wants to consume your mind. He wants you to think things that aren't true. He wants to make you believe that you're not good enough. Those are all things that are toxic and dating. If I'm going on a date, if I'm talking to Maya and I'm thinking I'm not good enough, I'm going to act insecure. She's going to pick up on that. It's going to lead to us not connecting. She's going to be questioning my faith, which you should. You know is God really in this man's heart. So I just think it's so important to just be diving into the word and having that all surrounding you. And yeah, that's definitely one of my favorite verses. There's so many good verses in Romans guys, I highly recommend reading the whole book of Romans. It's an amazing place to just get a lot of biblical truths.

Maya: 14:24

Yeah, clearly we're very passionate about this topic of emphasizing God's word, so maybe that'll be a podcast episode on its own and it'll definitely be a chapter in the book. So I want to go ahead and move on to the next one, the next thing that you want to remember when you are planted, but not buried, within your singleness season, and that is prioritizing your emotional health. So this is definitely something that has become way more popular within the last. I don't know, I would just say within our generation. It's become more popular. I know that. I have to say that my mom has helped me so much in this area, so it's not just our generation, but it's definitely becoming more popular now.

Maya: 15:07

And that's the area of seeking counseling and seeking some forms of therapy, especially if you've been through some form of trauma throughout your childhood.

Maya: 15:17

There's so many different things that can happen to you throughout your childhood.

Maya: 15:24

Some people have suffered abuse, some people have suffered just tragic circumstances, and if that's the case, it is so, so, so important to be able to get in front of someone who can help walk you through what you've been through and help you overcome, because this is something that will you know if you basically do not stop the bleeding, it will negatively affect your dating prospects, it'll negatively affect your marriage, and so you really, really want to be able to just put one foot in front of the other in this realm of therapy and counseling.

Maya: 16:11

It's definitely a really sensitive topic, because not everyone necessarily believes in therapy, not everyone necessarily believes in the ministry of psychology and things like that, but we certainly do. We've both prioritized it. And then I think the other thing that's challenging with this, too, is that sometimes people feel like, okay, well, how am I going to pay for that, you know, depending on what season of life that you're in? So, just, we definitely want to recognize that the journey to getting that care can maybe challenging, but it's something that at the very least, should be considered and explored, because there's so many different resources that the church likes to offer as well. What do you have to say about that, babe?

Michael: 16:56

Yeah, it's really good. I want to start, I want to preface this by saying that everybody has baggage. You know, no matter who you are, we all come from. You know certain childhoods, certain you know traumas, certain things that just you know we did really before we were transformed. You know God has the ability to transform us and totally change a lot of those habits, a lot of those things that we have in our past. But, you know, the biggest thing is that we want to put people in our lives that can help us through some of that pain, some of those things that have happened to us. So I highly recommend a therapist or somebody that you can talk to.

Michael: 17:27

And what's important to understand too and I think a lot of people, especially younger people, they might think, oh, I'm a crazy guy if I have a therapist or something like that, and that's not true. You know, even if you have an extremely healthy marriage, like we do, we're still seeing counseling, we're still seeing a therapist. You know, together, separately and together, and that's really important because they're able to identify their experts and identifying, you know, certain instances, certain times in your past where you might have done something or something's happened to you, and then they really are experts that are allowing you to talk about it openly, get it out, because a lot of times you can't do that internally, like you need somebody to help get that out of you. Now, one thing I want to mention, honey, that's really important, is that you need to have somebody that is counseling you. That's a Christian. That's so important. I've heard multiple times of instances where people are seeing a therapist but they're not necessarily a Christian. They're giving really bad advice. You know, for example, a therapist could also you know, could be self-centered themselves and sort of make you think like you should be self-centered, like you should get your way, you should get this, you deserve this, this and that that's really the way of the world that's all around us. You deserve a break today. You deserve, you know all these things that social media tells you. So if you have a therapist that emphasizes that, that can make you really retaliate in a relationship because ultimately you're you know you're saying okay, you're doing things to me, you're hurting my feelings, you're doing this to me. So it's so important that you get somebody that can give you good Christian counseling, good Christian direction. So I think that's really important.

Michael: 18:56

The other things I want to mention are, you know, the importance of small groups. Small groups are so important People that you have in your life that can just you know, speak into you, hear things that are going on in your life. I mean, that's really how God created the universe. He created the universe that we're better together. We're better with relationships. So not just the relationship I have with Maya, but also the relationships I have with my small group members, you know, and so I attend a small group on a weekly basis. It's really important because they're able to see things maybe you're not seeing and you know, give you advice, give you encouragement. You know, in the space of your life, maybe if you're single, they're able to encourage you with that and you're just going to feel less alone. You know, when you have people in your life, you know people that are in your small group, a therapist you don't need to be dating for all that. I mean you can really establish yourself, you know, in this life, you know with those things and that's going to make you a much better person. So I think small group is really important.

Michael: 19:53

The last one I want to mention is a Christian mentor. You know I've been following, I've been. I've had a Christian mentor now for a couple years and it's an older gentleman and I've gotten to know him and he's been amazing. He's probably listening to this right now, hi, tim, and he's just somebody that you know he has a lot more wisdom than I do. Okay, I'm 30, almost 38 years old. You know he's older, he's, you know he has a lot more experience in life, so he's able to really give me good advice, good sound Christian advice and honey. There's been multiple times where there's been like a situation where he's kind of come in and given his advice and has totally changed what we've done and it's been really positive. You know just the way we see things like because we're like we're younger I mean we're in our 30s and people that are older just have more wisdom. So those are the three ones therapist, small group and Christian mentor.

Maya: 20:45

Absolutely agreed. Wow. So the the topic of therapy and counseling if you have specific questions on how to find one, we definitely have tons of resources. Focus on the family is a great resource for finding a counselor or therapist that's local and can take appointments. There's also, your local church may have free counseling, or your local Christian therapy center may have something along the lines and they may have options that you can consider. And then the the church and different small groups, like you said there, you may just want to ask someone hey, are you willing to mentor me on a weekly basis? There's, there's always someone older than you, wiser than you, who's been the path, been down the path that you are headed down, that would be more than happy to serve God by by counseling and mentoring you. So love that, so much.

Maya: 21:40

Okay, the next one is fighting loneliness and temptation. So this one kind of sort of goes hand in hand with the first point, which is longing. But the big difference here is that, whereas when you are longing for someone, it's just noticing a very healthy desire that's God's place in your heart, versus really being consumed by the loneliness and being consumed by temptation. Temptation is just everywhere. When you're a single person growing up. You know, in this society, temptation is really everywhere, and it's not so much that temptation is bad, but how you respond to temptation can really determine how long it takes for you to actually meet the person of your dreams. And sometimes temptation can lead us to make decisions that we regret, and we don't want Anybody sitting in regret. We want to be able to give you the tools for how to be able to fight temptation.

Maya: 22:42

The other thing that comes up for me when I when I talk about fighting loneliness and temptation is Sometimes, when you're single and the loneliness is consuming you, you may get desperate and Desperation is like a weed, since we're talking about being planted and everything. There are things that are that are watering you as you're planting, there's things that are fertilizing you as you're planted, and then there's things that are really can really choke you out, and I would say that being desperate is one of those things that can just choke you out. Being desperate is the kind of thing that can have you saying yes to the first person that comes along, whether, regardless of whether that person is right for you, regardless of whether that person actually cherishes you, values you and treats you like you're supposed to be treated the way that God would want you to be treated. Desperation can have you what's that saying? Where it can have you falling into sin, and essentially sin is the kind of thing where it will Take you where you don't want to go and keep you longer than you intended to stay, so you do not want to be desperate. I was talking to Michael. I hope you don't mind if I bring this up now, babe, but I was talking to Michael about something that's really trending right now. So at the time we're recording this this is March 2024.

Maya: 23:55

On Valentine's Day this year there was a lady on tiktok named by the name of Risa Tisa and she released this 50 part series.

Maya: 24:04

She basically people are calling it the first blockbuster of tiktok where she essentially married a pathological liar and she's talking about how much this person essentially Messed with her head, hurt her and lied to her and did all these things. And the one thing that she Indicated you. You kind of your heart goes out to her. In one sense, you're kind of like girl, you missed all the red flags and then, on the other sense, it's like man, your heart goes out to her because she kept on emphasizing how she was hoping that it was her turn. She was hoping that it was. She was seeing other people in their life, their life moving on. She's so desperately wanted it for it to be her turn. But it's like At the, by the end of the series, she was basically saying it would have been so much better for me to remain single Than to be married to that person who was completely, completely wrong for me. So what do you have to say about that, babe?

Michael: 24:55

when it comes to Desperation being desperate, yeah, when you were talking earlier just about Temptation, you know I really want to go into temptation because it's so important to understand temptation. One of the big breakthroughs that I had and this was actually After my divorce, I didn't even realize this until I was, you know, early 30s Was that the things that come into our mind. We actually have a choice. We have a choice whether to accept a thought or decline a thought, and Before that what I really was thinking was okay, if I have a thought, it means it's true, it means it's what I thought, me, me, me. I came up with this thought, so that's what I should act on.

Michael: 25:41

The second thing you realize that a thought is just a thought, it's just something coming into your brain, that you have a choice that can totally change a lot of things, because now you have the ability to decline it, to manage it I think is a good word, highly recommend Rick Warren mind. If you look up that sermon at the end actually goes a lot into temptation as well and just how this all relates to the mind. But the second thing you realize that that's a huge, huge breakthrough because you know, like, like what you were saying, honey, temptation is actually not wrong.

Michael: 26:13

Right you know we can be tempted. It's actually just how we act, right. So you know, there's gonna be a lot of things that are gonna come in your mind. If you're a single person, right, you're gonna be thinking about. You know, in my case it was going to the bar. Like you know, I want to go to the bar, I want to meet a girl. I want to, you know, drink some alcohol. You know, like those are all things that are going into my mind.

Michael: 26:34

I would say, at 6 pm On a Saturday night, right, should I go or do I want to go to the bar? So thing is, you have to manage that. You have to first all you have to know that, okay, saturday 6 pm, it's probably gonna be a time when I'm gonna be tempted, so I should just leave or do something else, or go See a family member or something. You have to be smart about managing temptation. I highly recommend that sermon. You guys gonna learn a ton off of that. But once you can really understand that, you can manage those thoughts, you're gonna be in a totally different place when it comes to managing dating, of course.

Maya: 27:05

So as you were speaking it's so funny you said it's the way you act, because that's Tiktok sound, that lives rent free in my head, or this guy he's like it's the way you act. Anyway, there's a Bible verse that reminds me of what you were just saying Second Corinthians, chapter 10, verse 5. It says we demolish arguments and every Pretention that sets itself up against the knowledge of God and we take captive of every thought to make it obedient to Christ. This is a huge. This verse is gonna help you so much in your life to be able to say okay, there's a thought, I'm noticing it, but I'm making it obedient.

Michael: 27:43

Right that one down. That was definitely on my note cards. That's a great verse.

Maya: 27:47

Yeah, that's second Corinthians, chapter 10, verse 5.

Michael: 27:52

Great, so yeah, so those are the first four, so let's go into the desperation, okay so? But yeah, I mean, basically desperation is gonna come from those thoughts that come into your mind that you have to manage. That's where I was kind of relating that to, because you know, if we, if we act upon the things that are coming into our mind from Satan, we're gonna become desperate. I'm desperate now to go to the bar. I'm desperate now to drink alcohol. I'm desperate now I know other choice I'm desperate to look at pornography. You know what's one time you know.

Michael: 28:23

So these are all things are going into your mind that you have to manage. So if you just let everything come in like a freeway, like just you know, going right through your mind everything, and you accept it all, you're gonna be in a really tough place. I really believe you're gonna have a really hard time with dating if you just accept every thought because no matter how good we are, no matter how strong we, we decide we want to follow Jesus, you're gonna have these tempted thoughts and they're not wrong, but they're gonna come. So you have to know how to manage them.

Maya: 28:49

Yes, and I just want to. I just really want to speak to your heart as the listener of this podcast. The truth, you know, the saying is always gonna try to tell you a lie, sell you a lie and wrap it in. You know, sugarcoat it and and Sell you, you know, on on a lie. Always, he's always gonna try to deceive you. Right, he's gonna wrap it in bacon, right?

Michael: 29:12

Yeah, he's gonna try to make it like bacon, but he's he's gonna.

Maya: 29:16

He's going to, he's really going to try to make you believe that you actually are desperate, but the fact of the matter is I want you to take this completely and open your ears all the way and listen to what I'm saying. The fact of the matter is that if you are a believer number one, you are set apart by God. You are beautifully and wonderfully made by God. You are more than a conqueror. You are so many things. There's so many things that God says about who you are, so many things that God says about your identity that you completely get to hold on to and you get to grasp. It can be so hard to believe that before you meet the right person, but it's one of those things where you'll be thanking yourself down the line for choosing to believe that you are who God says who you are, rather than choosing to believe that you're desperate.

Maya: 30:13

The truth is that you're not desperate. The truth is that you're fun to be around. The truth is that your loved ones love you and there's so much more than just being in a relationship. There's so much more that life has to offer you. So take hold of all of those things before you start thinking I have to get married by this age, or I have to start having kids by this age, or things like that. The truth is that you're not desperate. You have so many options and there's nothing that God can't do in your life. Okay, I'm off my soapbox.

Michael: 30:49

That's all good stuff, amen, all right. Well, let's go into the fifth one, the last one we put together, which is prayer, and prayer is so important, obviously, I'll start with this one. I would say the formula for success is really managing the thoughts, getting all the junk out of your brain and then praying Praying to God that God will continue to help you manage those thoughts, that God will bring the right person into your life, but also just give you the contentment and the patience and if we call upon his word, he will give us that strength. God will give us a strength of patience, of contentment, of gentleness, of all the things that it takes to get into the dating scene, to get into finding the right person.

Michael: 31:40

It takes working on yourself and prayer, praying to God and connecting with God. Because if you have that ultimate relationship with God I know you may not feel it if you haven't really been following God lately or don't even believe in God at this point but if you have that, that is the ultimate thing You're going to feel so good about yourself, your confidence is going to go up, you're going to be ready for whatever it is that you want to go for and you're going to have purpose and reason for living, and it doesn't take having someone to get that. It takes having God Jesus. So praying is everything. What are you thinking about, Donnie?

Maya: 32:14

Awesome. So prayer is your lifeline to the Lord. Prayer is so, it's everything, because it's basically your never-ending conversation with God. You can pray. First of all, it's free. Second of all, you can do it whenever you can pray, in the middle of the night. You don't have to wait for opening hours to be able to pray to God. You can pray in the language that makes sense to you. It doesn't have to be King James Version prayers. You can just approach God, you can just talk to him and prayer is ultimately acknowledging that you have divine parenthood.

Maya: 32:56

So a lot of us we don't necessarily understand just how deep the Father's love is for His children and what it ultimately comes down to is understanding that there's a Father in heaven who hears your cries and hears your desires and wants to comfort you, wants to love on you. Some people do not have a concept of what a good Father is like, because maybe you didn't have a good Father inside of your life growing up. But regardless of what your earthly Father situation is like, you have a Father in heaven. Or maybe your Father left too soon, maybe a Father has passed away, or something like that. You have a Father in heaven who is dropping everything because he never stops working right. The Lord. You have a Father in heaven who hears your cries, who envelops you with his love, who comforts you and who speaks to you and lifts you up. The Bible says that he sings over you. I believe in Zephaniah. I could be wrong on that, I'm going to have to Google that later but the truth is and it's so crazy I was asking Michael the other day. I was like has having our baby changed how you feel God feels about you? And you said yes. I think I said yes too where it's just like. The love that I feel for our daughter is just crazy. Like when we set eyes on her in the morning. It just never gets old. Every time she cries, I'm like I'm dropping whatever it is and I want to run to her.

Maya: 34:34

It's so important for you to understand that that's how the Father thinks about you, and even more, 10 times more, way more than we could ever ever feel. So it's so important to you to take hold of that. It's so important for you to say to the Lord God, I'm longing. God, help me to find peace in your word, speak to me through your word. Help me find a Bible verse, god. It's so important to say God, please help me find a good counselor, help me find a good therapist. Lord, help me find a mentor. God, god will provide your every need. You know, it's so important to say to the Lord Lord, I'm desperate, I feel so desperate, I just want to go to the bar. God, help me. And God will always help you find a way out of temptation. He will always provide a way out.

Maya: 35:23

So prayer is so huge and, ultimately, the reason why prayer ended up on this list is because I think it's so important to say to the Lord Father, please help me find a spouse. There's nothing wrong with saying God, I have this desire. You place this desire in my heart, please. I pray that you will help me to fight temptation so that I can outlast, you know, the temptations that are trying to take over me, and help me to really identify the person that you would have me to be with and reserve me for that person. You know, hold me on the side, lord, so that I can be fresh for that person. And, yeah, prayer is just everything. Amen.

Michael: 36:05

Yeah, it's just so exciting, you know, to think about. You know, when you have two people that are both doing these exact same things, you know, so it takes you doing your part. But then I want you to just think about like there is somebody else out there doing the same thing you are, and how comforting that is to where all these other junk, all these other things that you know the world wants you to believe. You know, you know where, how people are acting. You know at the bars and how they're acting. You know rejecting you or just all these other things, like you know.

Michael: 36:37

I want you to just think past that, jump over that and just think that if I just do the right things and work on myself and put God first, that Maya is out there doing the same, you know, and we're both doing it together, and then when we meet, it's like this is exactly the perfect person. You know it's like. You don't even question it because it's so natural, it's so perfect. We're both emotionally healthy. We both have, you know, a therapist. We both have, you know, we're both in small groups. We're we're both going to church. We're both, you know, putting God first, like, yeah, and when you find that it's like it's so exciting To where.

Michael: 37:11

It's like you know you want to talk to the person, you want to get to know them, you want to, you know build up, you know the dating process and for us it took what honey? Six months and we were married and then now we have a little girl and and to relate to what you said about having a baby, I mean it's, it's unbelievable. I mean, just you know the, the way you feel about your daughter or son. If you guys haven't had kids yet, you know you're gonna. It's nothing that you've ever felt before, like just the love for your child. It's unbelievable and that's really how God loves you, so it's really good. Well, I think we should pray.

Michael: 37:44

Yes, definitely, let's do it and we just, you know, and then we'll conclude Our God. We just want to come to you in prayer, lord. Just thank you for the ability for us to just Come to you, learn more about you, lord, and just the resources out there where we can just connect with you and and where we can, you know, work on ourselves and get to a place where we can, you know, eventually meet the love of our life. You know a lot of people are listening right now, lord. They really want to meet the love of their life and they really want to have that connection and that that deep, that deep desire they have. Lord, just to help them manage that and, you know, to call upon you for Patience, to call upon you for strength as they're going through this process.

Michael: 38:25

Lord, I just pray that everybody listening will consider a therapist, somebody that can Help them guide them through life. Also, if they don't have a small group, that they would consider finding a small group, as that's so important and just to have people around them and focus on themselves. You know, to where they're, not in desperation, as they're dating they're, they're content. They're content in their relationship with you. Lord, just help them to see that another big one, lord, just help anybody listening just to manage social media, just to you know, to really stay away from it. Possible, just things that are trash, you know, things that are telling lies that are not true. You know, ultimately the truth is you, lord, and that's, it's everything we need in life. We don't need social media, you know, to give us those. You know those temptations. So, laura, just pray that everybody listening will just get closer to you and we just thank you for your word, your mercy, your grace. In your name you pray, amen.

Maya: 39:26

Amen, thank you so much. We want to thank you, the listener, for listening to this episode, and this is actually part one of two. So the first episode is called planted, not buried, and the second part, which we're basically calling before dating, before you get to the dating era of your life, is Blooming where you're. You're planted. So this you if you want to think of this as a little analogy, this is establishing the foundation of your life, so that anything that comes on top of it, or just, you know, the walls and the home of your life, the rest of it, is gonna support the rest of your dating. But these are the things that are really need to be taken care of urgently, need to be attended to urgently, and in the next episode, in part two blooming where you're planted We'll talk about some other things that'll support your dating life. All right, we love you and we want to thank you for listening.

Michael: 40:23

Have a good day.

Maya: 40:24

Bye.