ACHIEVE MASSIVE SUCCESS With This One LIFE LESSON! | Sarah Jakes Roberts

The end of the day, whether we are moving or staying stagnant, we're giving ourselves permission to either stay stuck or to evolve. But there is permission being given in some capacity.

You know, you've had such an extraordinary life. Obviously, it always didn't start out that way, but what I wanted to start off with specifically is, you know, I think that there are certain pieces of literature or certain pieces of content that come out at just the right time. It's like what's referred to, I guess, in our faith as the now season. Right. What led you to make woman evolve the now season? For right now, it really.

It was really just God really working everything together just to, like, backtrack. But I'm going to bring it back because I'm a preacher, and that's what preachers do. But come on, let's go. So when I first started sharing my story, which I've been really transparent just about my life, I was a teen mom. I had my son at 13, got pregnant at 13. I had my son at 14 years old. My father is Bishop T.D. jakes. So having a pregnancy in that spotlight was really challenging. And I spent 10 years really just having this toxic relationship with self, others, faith, everything. I just didn't get it. I had so much shame and guilt about what took place in my life. And so when I finally kind of hit my rock bottom and I was sharing the encounters I was having with God, people started inviting me to speak, places to share my testimony, and that was so beautiful. And people were following me on Instagram and they just wanted more. And I'm like, well, I told my story. I don't think I have anything more than that. But I kind of still stayed sharing my story. And then one day I was reading in the Bible about Eve. And when I was reading about Eve, I got this revelation that I felt like every woman needs to know about this story. I tried to preach it a few times, and I just felt like there's still so much more to this story. And I was like, what if I kind of built my life's message, my life's work around helping us connect to the story of Eve, the story of ourselves, but ultimately the grace of God. And this was in 2017. Little did I know that that moment would. I mean, that was woman evolve. I just decided to name this exploration Woman Evolve. Kind of like an ode to Eve with the evolve. If you say slowly, yeah. And it kind of became something that I couldn't have even imagined.

I mean, it is. I got to be honest It's. It's. It's not only well written, so kudos to you. Not only are you incredibly vulnerable and transparent throughout it, but more importantly, I have heard my wife, I've heard my daughter and all the other wonderful females that I'm surrounded by for the folks that work with me within my companies that I own and stuff like that. All of them, at one time or another have said some variation of, well, if Eve hadn't just done a blankety blank. Right. And then you come out with this book and you give a whole new spin in on Eve. What, you know, where did you get the grace, so to speak, to kind of look at even a new light? Because she does get a bad rap.

Yeah, she does. And I'm guilty of saying those very things. Like, when I get to heaven, I'm pulling Eve to the side and we don't have to talk. It's like, girl, we gave you one job. Messed it up. But, you know, I really felt convicted about that because I was speaking at the women's conferences and I'm just sharing my story, right. And then telling people, like, the same grace that I experienced from God. God wants to reveal to your. And I kept saying those things. And then one day, you know, I was at this conference and they had on these shirts and it said Sarah and Mary, Ruth, Esther, like, all of these women who are heroes in our faith. And I was like, I know why they didn't put Eve on this shirt. And I was really just kind of being, like, petty and silly, and yet I felt convicted. I've never felt convicted when saying that before. It's always been funny. And then I went back in scripture, and all I saw when I looked at Eve this time was a woman who knew better but didn't do better. And then I couldn't help but think about the times in my life where I knew better and didn't do better. Instead of seeing Eve as this villain, I started wondering what it would be like if I embody Eve's story and experience it. And it was from there that I really felt like I got all of this revelation about her life that was so worthy of every woman knowing.

Yeah, you know, it's interesting because, you know, there are so many things in the book that caused me to rethink. For example, here's one of them. Did Eve really know how bad she was? Quote, unquote, sinning at the time? Because sin had not entered the world. No, death had not entered the world.

If God says you will surely die, what does Die even mean.

What does that mean?

Yeah, it was just concepts like that that really just kept speaking in my spirit over and over and over again that I think are amazing. The other thing that. One of my greatest takeaways, and I think you did it beautifully, is this illustration of identity and how a woman's identity is shaped and how she can really shape it. Break that down, because we have a lot of. A lot of our audience is female, and they're amazing women who have chosen to step out on faith and start to level up their life, start to build, you know, amazing careers while not necessarily sacrificing a house or all that kind of stuff. And. But at the end of the day, you know, one of the things I'm talking to my daughter about all the time is, like, your mistakes that aren't your identity kind of scenario. So talk to me a little bit about identity.

Well, you know, man, I feel like we could spend the whole podcast talking about that. I think that our brains are wired to kind of categorize one specific experience as the totality of something. Was the movie good? Like, no one talks about. The movie's kind of complex. There were moments that were good. Like, we. Is it good or bad? Even when she ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, these categories begin. You're either good or you're either evil. But what happens when we have experiences that are both good and then moments that feel downright evil? What I have learned in my own life experiences is that those moments that are bad tend to shape our identity. We remember those more than we remember the good times. We remember the moments that sting us more than we remember the moments that bring us healing. And so, for me, even as a teen mom, I felt like I would be defined forever by the mistakes that I've made, that I would be defined forever by this one specific label. And women, I believe, struggle with this so much because we want to do well, right? There's this part of us that feels like there's this performance spectrum that we have to fit on. And when we fail in an area, it's difficult for us to separate ourselves from that experience. And so I felt like even in rescuing Eve and revealing that there was restoration after her story, for that woman who maybe feels tied to an identity that doesn't make her feel good about herself, how do I draw confidence from the fact that I got pregnant at an early age? How do I draw confidence from the fact that I'm going through a divorce? People tell us to be confident, but I have these actual experiences that don't make me feel confident at all. And I wanted for women to really understand in the book that what brings us confidence isn't whether or not we had a good experience or a bad experience. It's the wisdom that we extract from both experiences that empower us to move forward in life with confidence, that whatever happens to me, I can process, digest, and use it to work for me.

Yeah, I'm telling you what I mean, it's. Look, it's a book that every woman should read, hands down. But, I mean, men should read the thing, too. And I'll tell you that. And I'll tell you there's so many different reasons. So many different reasons why I'll say that. The truth. So my daughter was also a teenage daughter, meaning I met her when she was a single waitress at a. Basically a restaurant. My wife and I basically adopted her almost on the spot and, you know, walked through or baptized her, the whole deal in our hot tub that we had at the time and kind of walked through that level of faith. And, you know, she just bought her first house. Like, she just bought her first house out of debt, none of that stuff. You know, she's working in the accounting department, one of my things. And as a father, I'm so proud of her. But more importantly, what I'm most proud of her is the fact that she's been able to see past her own mistakes and the things that people would see as mistakes, you know, and then shift those gears in order to kind of open up opportunity. And, you know, one of the things that I was always sharing with her from my heart as a father is, look, you got to be careful about the environment. You got to be careful about all the environments and where you're planted and how you're planted and stuff like that. And then here comes along woman evolve and talk about an entire chapter on environment and the importance of environment. Like, let's talk a little bit about environment, because I think every woman. Like, I wish we could dissect the entire book. I really do. People just need to go get it and make it easy on themselves. But, you know, let's talk a little about environment, because I think there's a lot that we can take away from the way in which you approach the environment and the importance of someone's environment as far as leveling up and having a better life.

Oh, I love that. I love it so much because I'm just, like, always challenging myself, like, what type of environment I'm creating. Okay, so so, okay, so when I had my teen pregnancy, my mental environment was one of shame, it was one of guilt, it was one of negativity. I said all types of terrible things to myself. And the seed of my disappointment, my discouragement, my low self esteem was watered by those thoughts. I kept feeding them. So that seed continued to. It wasn't until I really came to this breaking point where I was basically kind of like, God, if you're out there, God, if you talk to girls like me who've done things like I've done, please help me. But it wasn't enough to echo those words. I had to create an environment for that seed to flourish. And so a lot of times we want to make a change in our lives. We want to make a change in our spirit and our minds. We want to begin feeling differently and doing things differently. But we don't create an environment for this seed of that to really take root and flourish in our lives. And so it's so important not to just identify who we want to become. But how can my environment help me to water the seed of who I want to become? Otherwise I'm going to take a seed that can only grow apples and put it in an environment that can only grow grapes. Like, I'm not a farmer. That's probably a terrible analogy.

But the truth is, hey, it's still growing. It's still growing.

Something is happening there, you know, but we have to be really intentional. What type of music do I need? Who are my friends? Who are the people who can pour into me in those moments? When do I feel closest to that version of myself? Because what is so dangerous is that the environment that comforts us doesn't always nourish and nurture the version of who we're supposed to be in God. And whenever we're at a point of transition, we often have to choose comfort over nourishment. And when we make that decision, we end up really seeing things shift in our lives. And we see that we always had it within reach. We just didn't have the right environment now.

So it sounds like if we take, you know, if we, if we take, you know, some of the misconceptions, we shape the identity and we start to look at the environment, we start to kind of break those things down and merge those department. It seems like it comes down to choice and, or permission. What's holding back from, you know, women specifically from giving themselves permission? I watch my wife from time to time. I'm like, you can be amazing. You already are amazing. Just to put yourself out there. Not really. My daughter, kind of the same. Like, I see it all the time. More so. More so from my worldview, from what I can see. Right. Because men don't like to share their feelings just in general. Right. But the females in my life, the amazing women that they are, a lot of times it seems like permission is holding them back. Is that what you've also found as well?

I think so too. I think permission and really representation, it's really interesting because we want to do something we've never seen before, but we also want to see someone else do it before we've do it. And so.

Yes, I want to be a groundbreaker, but I also want to see how do I actually break the ground. And so I do think giving yourself permission to do what you've never seen before without fear of failure, and I think how we end up removing the fear of failure is to say, at the end of the day, my success is not in the outcome. My success is in the obedience. My success is in dying empty. And so if I'm waiting for the outcome to determine my success, like, the book has done very well. But I wasn't waiting for the book to do well, to determine if the book was a good book. When I closed the laptop, I had to be able to say to myself, this is a good book. And so the process is so important. It's more important than the actual outcome, which is what I try to talk about in the book. I talk about setting things in motion and how when we have the mindset of, I just want to set it in motion. I don't care what it becomes. It's just important to me that it gets out of me. I believe that that's when we can begin to, like, really give ourselves permission. At the end of the day, whether we are moving or staying stagnant, we're giving ourselves permission to either stay stuck or to evolve. But there is permission being given in some capacity.

That's right. That's right. You know, it's funny, as I'm thinking, I just want to love your spirit. I love talking to you. But two, you know, I've just had this. One of the things that's been resonating in my heart ever since I started on this journey, stepping out of faith on my own to start, hopefully trying to impact the world on my own or with my, you know, with things that I'm doing. I've always said that the greatest purpose in life you'll ever have is serving the person you used to Be. And here you come along, come along, and you put something like this together. That at every stage of the turn, every twist of the turn, there's pivot points, there's cornerstone moments. You're like going back to the earlier point, hey, I learned this from the good. I also learned this from the bad. I learned this from the good. I learned this from the bad. And then it's clear that you've done a lot of reflection and you and God have spent a lot of time together perfecting the message and honing in and super sharpening everything. You know, there's this concept called nashah, right, that you bring out in the book. You're talking, obviously, I think it's in the Greek, right, where we're talking about the meaning behind it. And when you translate the word back, it means something totally different than how we normally perceive the Bible when we read the story of Eve and kind of that. Would you mind talking about Nashville for a minute?

Absolutely. So in Genesis 3 and 15, God says to the woman, I'm going to put enmity between you and the serpent. He says to the serpent, I'm going to put enmity between you and the, the woman. And so this moment is so pivotal for just what woman evolved represents. Because just prior to that, Eve talked about how the serpent deceived her and then she ate. That word deceived literally means a seduction of the mind, which was so liberating for me because to be honest, like, I couldn't get over the fact that I got pregnant at an early age. People would call me smart and I would be like, smart girls don't get pregnant. I just, I just couldn't figure out how I got there. Like, I knew it was wrong, but how did that happen? And that word, the deception, really deceived to me, really revealed that at the end of the day that we don't just change the way we show up in the world overnight, that there's a slow seduction of our mind. And in that slow seduction of our mind, we ultimately change our diet. And so now we're in Genesis 3 and 15 and we've got this enmity between the woman and the serpent. And God is saying that I'm going to put war between you all. But that word enmity means hostility. And that hostility is when a woman is a two way street. And it's the hostility that the woman now has because the serpent has upended her life. And I felt like what I wanted women to really understand about this moment in the Bible is that we have Allowed the hostility to be a one way street where we feel like we're constantly being attacked. And oh my word, oh my Lord, all hell is breaking loose in my life. But what I heard God saying in that moment is if all hell is breaking loose, then the woman has the opportunity to let heaven touch worth and have heaven touch earth and have authority. Come on, what's happening in there?

Come on, let's go.

Okay. Because we have authority.

Yeah.

And so I am not one of those people who sit back and say, what are we going to do? All hell is breaking loose. Absolutely not. Hell can't break loose on my watch. I have power and authority and most importantly, I have enmity between the serpent because I've seen what he's done. I've seen what he's done to women throughout the ages and to people throughout the generations. And so that slow seduction of the mind can also work in reverse in which we come back to this place and posture of authority where we believe that we can have enmity right back at the serpent. And not just enmity, because we have the victory when it's all said and done. But that victory is what I want women to fully understand.

Well, you're delivering it in print. I mean, no offense, but I mean, it's a roadmap. And.

I'm thinking about hostility. I'm thinking about the women that I love in my life and how sometimes the most hostile person that they deal with that's hostile is them to themselves.

Yeah.

You know, they're, you know, my wife has a, you know, a bad hair day or the illness is, you know, it's taking a lot of her mobility and stuff like that. You know, she's constantly struggling with identity and significance. And I don't mean that in a way to kind of like share business, but just in general. I think we all deal with that to a degree. But the amazing women that I know are in and around my life, most of them deal with it almost on a daily basis.

Yeah.

How have you been able to. Clearly you're taking power and authority over your own life because, you know, beautiful things have been happening for a long time now. How are you able to work with women to help them get, get to that same stage? You know, what's like the first step for them?

It's so elementary, but to really recognize when a thought comes up that this thought is literally not helping me. My husband and I went to Mexico last week for vacation and I came back and the scale said I went to Mexico for vac.

I Was like, it's vacation for a reason.

And this morning, even this morning, I was putting on something and I was like, you are out of control. Your body, look at your body. This is not good. And I was like, literally, this thought is not helping me at all. Like, I captured that thought immediately and I said to myself, it's not helping me at all. What is a higher thought that can be introduced in this moment? So to really come to this elementary process of talking to yourself the way you would talk to a child, when you start to say things about your body, when you say things about your hair, when you say things about your intelligence and about your mind to on an elementary level say, this is not helping you at all. And if we're still alive, that means we have to show up in a way that helps not just the world to become better, but helps us to become better too. So what is the more blessed? What is a more beautiful, what is a more divine thought that I can have instead? And that's when I'm able to shift into this idea of at least I still have this. At least this is working for me. We have to be willing to capture thoughts and introduce new thoughts so that those negative thoughts don't continue to tear us down. It's not that they won't come. Yeah, eventually, in time and practice, some of them will subside, but it's not that they won't come. But you learn to talk back to those thoughts.

Yeah, almost fight back. I like to say, if it comes at you with a whisper, go at it with a shout.

Love that. Yeah, let's get it right.

You have this other concept that I just love in the book. It's called the how, how, how, how, how, how. Your how is related to your now. Yeah, like I thought it was so pivotal. I wanted to hear your take on it and then just hear you speak on it. Because I think it, I think again, the book is so full of little of wisdom that you're like, okay, what do I pick from? And this is one that just really resonated with me. How was. How is your how related to now?

Okay, so, man, I wish that I could give. Okay, so I'll tell you. So when we are stuck in our now, sometimes we feel so rest and we're wondering, like, how am I going to get to what I have in mind? What I've been exposed to? What is ahead of me? Like, where is the connection point? I don't see how I'm going to move from now into whatever next is supposed to look like. You can listen to as many podcasts as you want to, as many sermons as you want to, but at the end of the day, if you don't see the connection to next, then you feel stuck in your now. And one of the things that I have learned in my own life and my own experience, there is nothing that is happening in my life now that just arrived out of nowhere. There was always this connection from me being a teen mom to where I am now. There were these breadcrumbs that were leading me into that moment. And so then the question becomes, how do I work now with Next in mind, recognizing that I have to honor everything I am connected to? I have to bring intentionality and purpose and joy and creativity and strategy so that. I'm not saying that when I get to next, then I'll do this, and then I'll study this way and read that way. No, how do I. I work where I am now, knowing that I won't be here forever.

Yeah. I think it's wonderful and beautiful because, you know, you're such an accomplished young woman, or young woman, I mean, literally, I think you're still very young compared to me, but you've already done so much. You got a lot of responsibility. Obviously, you're a wife, you're a pastor now. You know, you've been an author now. New York Times. Well, I guess you New York Times bestselling author have been before and like, all that kind of stuff. You have so much going on.

This is my first time. This is really.

No, I don't believe it.

This is my first time.

Well, in that case, what do we. What we need to celebrate, right?

We need air horns.

Well, congratulations. New York Times bestseller, for sure. I was. I was super excited to see that. I kind of saw it coming, especially after going through the book myself, you know, but one of the things that you bring up in the book that's. That's so beautifully talked about is this sense of how creativity and innovation breaks down. Laziness.

Yeah.

How did you discover that on your own? Because that seems like that's a pretty painful lesson to learn.

Oh, goodness.

You know, there is something about having your time zapped away from you that makes you either feel overwhelmed, stuck, and quit everything, or decide, you know what, I'm going to have to get creative in order to make this happen. But the truth is that, like, that creativity and innovation can only come in stillness.

Yeah.

When we were bored as children, like, we became so creative before, you know, like, my. My daughter, she doesn't have a cell phone or really any technology at all, because we want her to be able to, like, use your mind a little bit and don't just have people coming at you. But there is something to be said about this stillness that allows for creativity and innovation to come towards you. And so I think that it really is counterculture when you become overwhelmed, to say to yourself, instead of just trying to and get done as much as I can and working from sun up to sundown instead, what I'm going to do is take a moment to steal away, to figure out how I can better structure my life so that I don't feel so overwhelmed. I think it's attributed to Bill Gates, but he said something like, if you want something done quickly, let a lazy person do it because you're going to find the most efficient way to get it done. And I was like, wow. And then I know people in my life and I am one of them. Sometimes it's like when I need to get the groceries out of the car, I'm like, I can put some on my arm, my head, I can put my sunglasses back on. But that type of creativity and innovation can happen in our life every day.

I love it. I love it. You know, I think we all struggle with this male, female, the whole. The whole gambit. But there's this element of surrender in my life. My life didn't really start to get elevated until I actually surrendered myself. You know, I used to operate in my own power. I know that it's a. I think it seems like it's more human nature to try to try everything yourself first and then wait till all it falls apart and like, oh, hey, God, are you there? If so, can you hook. Can you hook me up? Kind of thing, you know? But, you know, the story that you brought up in the book, you know, about how you actually found your surrender and why it's so important.

Was simply nothing short of amazing. How did you actually discover the importance of surrender in your own life? And what can every woman learn from that power? So hopefully we can. We can keep them from having to waste another day. And in that unsurrendered moment, man, I.

Feel like I'm standing in it right now. To surrender is to resist greatest pressure to become what feels easy, what feels comfortable, and to choose instead to say, if it's hard, I'll do it. If it makes me vulnerable, I'll do it. If it makes me feel uncertain, I'll do it. God is not interested in making you feel stronger in the areas where you already feel strong. If anything, those are the areas he wants to break down so that he can show you a renewed strength. God is more intrigued in the areas of our life that make us feel weak and vulnerable, that require us to be in relationship with him and not just have this one off prayer where we get what we want. For me, even woman evolving. This moment I'm standing is a result of surrender. The last book I wrote came out four years ago and I was was so done with the process. I had my publishers and my agent was like, you got to write another book. We could get this book out next year. And I just felt like I don't want to just manufacture things to say, like, just because I have a following or just because people will get a book doesn't mean that I just want to pull something out of air and put it on paper. I'm not going to write again until I have something worthy enough to say. We're four years out from that. We're Four years of feeling like you're going to lose momentum. Four years of feeling like you're going to be behind. Four years of feeling like, well, anyone even want to listen to the words that you have to say at that point? And yet I knew with certainty that I only wanted to write something that required me to have God on my side when I do it. And I have seen obviously the fruit of that. This book has done better than any book that I've ever written. And I'm receiving feedback that I've never received in any of my other books. But it requires surrender. And now I'm standing in that moment again because the book has done well and people are like, okay, well we need to get you interview an audition for this show and we need to do this, we need to do that. And I'm at this point again where I'm like, I only want to do what requires me to have God on my side to do it. If my team can do it, it's too small. I need something that looks like God. And so Surrender is a lifestyle. It's not just a one off. And yet it's so beautiful because there's always acceleration connected to surrender.

Yeah, no, I mean it truly is. And you know, I like how you just put that as what will. Because it is a life cycle. Life cycle. It really is. I think about all the moments of various crushings that I've been through. The homelessness crushing, the embezzlement time I had some embezzlement, a divorce myself, and all of those crushings got less of my. Took, took out less of my ego and put more of my dependency on God. And out of that dependency came more harvest and more fruit and such a short amount of time in comparison to 10 years striving after this and striving after that and trying to do it on my own and trying to do it, you know, in my own power. When you look at women, obviously as a pastor and as someone who obviously is out in public on a consistent basis.

If you had one core message that you would want them to know in that moment, what would it be be?

Oh.

You know, I, for some reason I'm asked this question a lot and I don't know if it's just because someone is listening who needs to hear this. And I've never given this answer before, but I think that you're worthy. Yeah, you are truly worthy. Usually I have something that's more like, you know, the revolution is closer than it appears and you've got this. But I feel like for some reason there is a need for someone to heal, that you are still worthy, that you are worthy of the life you've been given to live, that you are worthy of the goodness of God that is in your life and that God still wants to lavish in your life. And despite what you've gone through, despite what you're currently facing, the love that is around you, the strength that is around you, instead of rejecting it, I challenge you to come to a place where you can receive it from a place where you place of faith that says, if you say I'm worthy, I'll receive it. If you say I'm worthy, I'll believe it. And I believe that as we step into worthy that we're going to discover the roles and positions and, and opportunities that are connected to the highest, most worthy version of who we are.

Well, I have to say it's been just simply a joy hanging out with you. One, two. I think, I think there's. It bears to say that yes, they are worth worthy, all of them. And I think that it's not tied to a look, it's not tied to a dress, it's not tied to a career, it's not tied to a man. You know, it's not tied. It's what makes us, what makes us special in God's eyes is simply the fact that he created us to begin with. Yeah, you know, it's, it's, it's one of the things I love about, you know, your church and you know, the potter's house. It's Always. It's always has an element as you're constantly being molded and being shifted and being massaged, dodged into the right thing. And it's truly inspiring. And I think a lot of women will gain a lot of courage from your journey because you have been so transparent. You have been so vulnerable. You have spent a lot of time in reflection. I believe you are an example to a lot of women who maybe are very early on in their journey. Maybe they are the teen mom who just got kicked out because their parents don't understand. Maybe they are in a relationship they know they shouldn't be in, but they're still in that relationship again, you know, So I guess. Not that I'm a woman per se, but what I would like to say on behalf of women is thank you for having the courage to step out on faith, to confront the deepest part of yourself, the deepest experience of yourself, positive or negative. Thank you for extrapolating the wisdom and the knowledge that came from that. And thank you most for putting it in print so you can give a roadmap to when the.

Wow.

Thank you.

Thank you. That means a lot to me.

I'm telling you what you're. I think, you know, it's funny with all the. With all the. With all the work you've already done, I think you're just getting started.

Oh, wow, that's crazy.

I really do that. I really do believe that. And that's. That's kind of like jumping up in me like this a little bit.

For those of you who, for some reason, that they're not already following you, they're not already connected with you, how can they follow?

Well, I am on all the socials, Instagram and Facebook and Twitter. On Instagram and Facebook, it's Sarah Jakesroberts, and on Twitter, it's Sjx Roberts. And of course, you can get plugged in with the movement, learn more about how we're helping women every week, every day, to really evolve into the best version of themselves@womanevolve.com Rock on.

Thank you so much, Sarah. Seriously, thank you. It's been a sincere honor and joy to hang out with you and invest some time with you and. And let's change some lives.

Thank you.

All right, take care. See you.

Take care. Bye.

What an inspiring woman. I'm serious. Sarah Jakes Roberts, you're a rock star. Guys, if you love that interview, I know you're going to love this one right here. So make sure you check it out. If you can paint a picture of the worst thing that can happen. You can probably teach yourself to paint a picture of the best thing that could happen. It doesn't happen overnight, but.