the Messy MESSY Middle

Here's the big question. How are these average, everyday moms getting radical results in their lives? How are they able to transform their health, money, families, homes, and have fun doing it? The trick. We're not average. I'm Hannah Keeley, and I'm going to spill our secrets and answer your questions right now in that mom. Okay. Somewhere between where you are and where you want to be is this thing called the middle. And we always want to make it shorter and simpler and sweeter and nice and clean, but the truth of it is, it's horribly messy. So what do you do when you're trying to get to that next level and you feel stuck in the messy, messy middle? Tell you on today's podcast. Okay. That messy, messy middle. No one really likes to talk about it, but everybody's got to go through it. And it's that messy middle where you have a goal. Let's say you want to lose a certain amount of weight or you want to reach a certain level in your business. You want to organize your home, declutter it. Whatever the goal is, that's the goal. Okay? That's. That's, like the top of the mountain, right? And we look at it. We're, like, sitting there at the base camp, and we're looking at it and we're saying, yeah, man, that looks great. And we get excited, and all of a sudden, like, about a third of the way up the mountain, we're like, oh, my gosh, this really sucks. Like, this is the worst. This is the worst. And I. I'm just wondering. Sometimes we really. We really overlook the fact that we're made to do hard things. We think things should be easy and they should be simple. But the truth of it is, we have the capacity as living, breathing human beings, creations of God Almighty, we have the capacity to do hard things. So I'm wondering. Sometimes we think it's really hard because you're doing it wrong. And I would like to propose that it's really hard because you may be doing it right. It's not supposed to be easy. We fail a lot. I think about the success that I've achieved as a business owner, as a mom, as a wife, as a home manager. It was really hard. It was full of failure. It was like the whole pathway was laid with bricks of failure. But I want you to understand that just because it's messy doesn't mean you. You can't do it and you can't get through it. But what do you do when it's just frustrating and it's hard. And you're like, I'm tired of this. Like, there's so many times that I think I'm done. Like, stick a fork in me. I'm done. I'm out. But I want you to understand that Jesus is with you in that process. And I want you to find out how to really access the strength that's available to you that you may not even realize you have. First of all, when Jesus was talking to his disciples, and it was actually in the evening, and they were on the shore on the river, and he said, hey, let's. Let's go the other side. Let's get a boat. Go the other side of the lake. Okay? This is in Luke 8, 22. He said, One of those days, he and his disciples got into a boat, and he said to them, look, let us go across the other side of the lake. So they put out to sea, okay, maybe it wasn't a river. It was. It was more like a sea. Okay? It was this huge mass of water. It wasn't like the lakes that you and I think about when we think of lake. I mean, it had, like. Like waves and storms and everything, but it was fine. It was in the evening. They didn't question Jesus. They said, all right, let's do this thing. They got into the boat, they headed out. Well, sure enough, about halfway through comes the messy middle storm arises. And the Bible says that this is a storm of hurricane proportion. It rises. They think they're all gonna die. And then they're like, jesus, don't you even care about us? He's like, dude, chill. Like, come on, don't you know anything? Like, I've showed you how to use faith. So the storm called, and they reached the other. The storm calmed, and they reach the other side. But here's the deal. We do the same thing. God will place it in our hearts, like, hey, let's go to the other side. Let's do this. He gives us a dream. He gives us a vision. And we get this, like, attitude, like, wait, this is possible. I can do this. We get excited. And let me tell you, everything feels good in the beginning. Everything is exciting when it first starts. A workout program, a diet, decluttering kit, projects. Everything is so much fun at the beginning. Like, the first five minutes, all right? Or when you just get the idea, it sounds so great. And then you get in the middle of it, and if you've ever decluttered anything, you know, the middle of it looks like a storm broke loose. Like, it junk all over the place. Recently, I decluttered my closet. Not decluttered. It wasn't really cluttered, but I just went through all my clothes and gave a lot of stuff away. And, man, it was like bags and boxes and piles of stuff, and it looked like a mess. But then afterwards, it's perfect. It's exactly how I wanted it. So the thing of it, we've got to understand that the middle has to be messy. And if it is messy for you right now, if it's hard to stick to that diet, if it's hard to go to the gym, if it's hard to continue to remind yourself to talk nicer to your kids and not get angry and not blow, you know, blow the roof off yelling and. Or to declutter your house or to get it organized. And if it's hard to do that, I want you to understand that means you're doing it right, because it doesn't have to be easy for you to be able to do it. As a matter of fact, it's going to be hard. But I want to show you, in Philippians 1:6, it says, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ. So what that means is, look, he started it, all right? He began a good work in you. If he gave you a desire or dream or a goal, he began it. He's the one that gave you that. Whisper that into your. Into your deepest part of your mind. He said, girl, come on, this isn't the body you want. You can have a healthy body. Or maybe he said, girl, this is the home you want to live in. You want it organized and clean and beautiful or something. He whispered something into you. He began that good work. And it says he will carry it on to completion. That doesn't mean he carries all the burden, but he has ensured and provided for everything you're going to need along the way, including the strength, including the stamina. I like to call it a reserve tank. You know, like sometimes in cars, they'll have a reserve tank. So. So right when you think you're running out of gas, all of a sudden the reserve tank kicks in and you got like, I don't know, like 10 more miles or something like that. All of us have a reserve tank. And usually when we're like, oh, my God, this is so hard. I can't take it anymore. We're only, like, 40% done, really. We have a reserve tank, and if we reach into there, that's where the Holy Spirit lives. That's where that presence, that power of God is. We reach in there, we're like, you know what? I can do one more day. I can do five more minutes. I can do one more rep in the gym. I got this. I can do it. And I'm not going to call myself short on it. I'm not going to underestimate my ability. I'm going to push myself and I'm going to know that God has given me this power. But I have to tap into it. I have to exercise it. See, he's the author and the finisher of our faith. That's what it says. It says, looking onto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and he sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Now, let me explain something to you. When it says that Jesus is the author and finisher, in the Greek, that word finisher actually means developer. And if you've ever noticed, like, I know everything is digital now, but way back when dinosaurs roamed the earth before the meteor struck, there was this thing called film cameras, okay? And you actually took pictures on film. And you would haul your butt all the way over to, like, Kmart when it was still a Kmart or Walmart or the drugstore and get the pictures developed. Remember that? Anyone remember that? Getting film developed into pictures. And so this developing always had to take place in the dark, right? It was always in the dark. That's how pictures were developed. And so when. When it's saying that Jesus is the author and finisher, it's like, look, he began it and now the development has to take place. So it's not just developing your dream, but it's also developing the dreamer. It's not just where you're going is who you're becoming in the process. And sometimes that's in a very dark place. It's where nobody sees it's showing up when no one's looking. It's doing the hard work when no one's holding you accountable. It's doing that hard work in the dark, in the supernatural realm, things are happening. You may think, I don't see any progress. Maybe you're trying to build a platform of social media. I've been doing live videos for 45 days straight, and I've had five views like no one's even looking. What's the point? That's the dark room. That's where you are being developed to get to that next level, to get to the other side. There's going to be a storm. It's going to be messy. And you know what? When the disciples with. With Jesus in the boat went to the other side, it was dark. It was nighttime. I think that was very carefully crafted on the part of Jesus because he was giving the disciples to vision of what it looks like to get to the other side. It's dark. Sometimes you feel alone. Sometimes you feel like you're the only one fighting for this. But that's where you're being developed. That's why it's so important. It's just part of the process. Think about it. Film has to be processed, right? It has to be processed, and it has to be processed in the dark. But it's just part of the process. You can't escape this process. You can't escape. Escape the messy. I remember there's a show when I was a little girl called Bewitched. I loved this show because Samantha Stevens, I remember she was a witch and she could just like, wiggle her nose and get from here to there. Like, she could teleport. She could have her house clean like. Like that. You know, she could, like, be all dressed up for a function like that. Everything was instant. And sometimes we're convinced of that Bewitched mentality. Like we can get from here to there, and it's going to be simple and easy and sweet. But that's not the process. If that was a process, everyone would be there. The problem is people give up. They're like, this isn't worth it. This is too hard. It's not working. I don't see any results. And they give up. And they're not just giving up on their dream, they're giving up on themselves. The dreamer in John 16:33. I'm going to wrap up with this. I have told you these things so that in me you may have perfect peace, peace and confidence in the world. You will have tribulation and trials and distress and frustration. It's like, thanks, Jesus. Thanks a lot for that. But he's like, look, it's gonna suck. But then he says on the. Just on the heels of telling you how bad it's gonna suck, he says, but be of good cheer. Take courage. Be confident, certain and undaunted. For I've overcome the world. I have deprived it of power to harm you, and I've conquered it for you. Understand this. You have to embrace the suck. It's just part of the process. You have to stand in the hard. Stand there. You can do this. It doesn't have to be simple and easy and sweet and feel good. It doesn't have to because you have the capacity to do hard things. You can still stand in the heart. You can embrace the suck. You can do it because he's already overcome it for you. It's just part of the process. You have to go through it. So I'm encouraging you today. Yeah, it's going to be messy. Just go through the mess. Just say. Just look at it and say. I don't have to bring emotion into it. I don't have to get frustrated about it. I can take courage. I can be confident. I can be certain. I can be undaunted right here, here in the mess. Because the mess doesn't define me. What I do in the mess, that's what defines me. That's what develops me. It's just part of the process. Embrace it. And today, take one more step through the mess. And the truth is, you don't have to know what comes next because you already know what comes next in the process. After this comes the other side. And you're gonna get there, girl. Let's link arms. We're gonna do this together. I love you. Be blessed like crazy.