Karen Papin: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Divine Worth Podcast, where we are letting go of our self-doubt, anxiety, fear, limiting beliefs, so that we can step into the divine roles that God has for us. I am your host life coach, Karen Papin, and together we are embracing our divine worth and potential.
Welcome to the Divine Worth Podcast. Today’s guest is Rachel Rhien Tucker. She is a wife and mom of four who lives in Southern California. She is a certified faith-based life coach, a writer and speaker, and has published two books that focus on divine identity and purpose. Rachel loves writing, speaking, and teaching about faith and Jesus when she’s not spending time on those things. She’s walking the hills in her neighborhood, being a full-time dance mom to her littles, loving on her two adult kids and spending time with her best friend and husband. So Rachel, thank you so much for coming on here and talking with us today.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: I’m so [00:01:00] glad to be here. Thank you for asking.
Karen Papin: Well, I am really excited to have you on here and especially to talk about what we’re talking about today. You posted a little while ago on Instagram about spiritual truths of growth, and so we’re kind of gonna dive into that today. And to begin, let’s.
Start with the first one. Okay. Spiritual growth is intimately personal. It’s just between you and God. I’d like to hear kind of what you have to say about that.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: So I write on Instagram and I started during Covid and I wanted a place to be able to share my testimony and I do love to write, so it was kind of a nice outlet for me.
And as that Instagram account has grown and I’ve evolved in my personal focus, I that while I am trying to. Increase other people’s faith. And I am trying to share things that will grow people’s relationship with the savior. It’s not about me at all. [00:02:00] Maybe I can help facilitate, but really our spiritual growth and our relationship with the savior is directly between us and him.
Right? And other things can influence for good. Certain things can influence for bad. But we really need to take stock of where we’re at in our personal faith journey and our relationship with Jesus and then just own it. And what’s gonna work for me to strengthen my faith might be different than what’s gonna work for you in the end.
They’re all tools, right? But I just think it’s really important to remember that. Other people should only have a little part to play in our faith journey. ’cause really it’s about us and our heart and our unique and personal relationship with him.
Karen Papin: I love that you have brought that up both online and here today, because one of the things that comes to mind as you talk about, okay, it’s between you and God, is.
Is how Satan likes to do [00:03:00] counterfeits. Like he likes to try to get us to think, okay, we need to focus in on what? Like, and I’m a huge personal development person. Like I’ve been studying it since I was 15, right. I love it. And yet I can see how we can get so caught up in the next cool thing about personal development.
And the next tip that we completely focus, we lose focus of the savior. So I love that you’re bringing that in, that it’s not necessarily, yes, other things can kind of influence us and help us to be able to become better and, but it’s really about our relationship with the Lord.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah. And you know, at this point in our lives, there is so much content to consume.
There are incredible podcasts. There are all, there are years, decades of general conference talks that we can listen to, or BYU speeches. There’re people out there that are doing a lot of good. And there’re all good things, but if we never set aside quiet time [00:04:00] to just be with Jesus, if we listen to all of those things and never read the scriptures, we’re missing the most essential part.
Right. And I do think that Satan is such a great counterfeit that sometimes he uses our own good things against us, where we think, we’ve studied our scriptures, if we listen to a Come Follow Me podcast, but we are not gonna get the same personal revelation as if we just tune out the world and open our scriptures.
Those are two different things. And I like how you put it that there, there are lots of different things that can help us, but in the end. We have to make time for stillness and silence and study, without continuing to consume, consume, consume what other people put out.
Mm-hmm
Karen Papin: so what advice do you have for someone who’s in a busy stage of like motherhood, which I know you’re in right now too? For like carving out that time to be still and to connect with the Lord and get into our [00:05:00] scriptures and. And pray and all those things that help us to connect with them.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Um, I think the first thing, and this is totally coming from experience, is to stop believing the lie that, that taking that time, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, is indulgent. It’s not indulgent. It’s essential, right? It’s not indulgent to tune out and turn everything off and sit in silence and meditate or open up your scriptures and just sit and be calm and read and think.
That seems like an indulgent use of time, and it’s not. It’s a really important use of time, but the world is telling us that if we’re not going at this speed at all times, we’re, I don’t know, lazy or gluttonous or something like that where we need to just be going, going, going. But if we don’t create the space to hear him, we won’t hear him.
My opinion is if you have opened Instagram one time today, if you have made time for that, [00:06:00] even if it’s kind of a jerk reaction while you’re standing in line at the grocery store, then you have time to open up your scripture app. It, we all have time to connect with Jesus. We might think that we don’t, but if we really did, if we broke down our day and looked at where we used our time, we would find time.
We would find things we could replace. You can sit there and stir a pot of soup and read your scriptures online or listen to scriptures, right? You can clean a bathroom and listen to scriptures. You can commute and listen, or you turn off the scriptures and you just think, and you sit in silence. You don’t turn on the radio.
You don’t turn on your favorite podcast. You don’t turn just sit in silence for a little while. That is not indulgent. It’s really important.
Karen Papin: Thank you so much for pointing that out. Let’s go ahead and go on to, like really each one of these we could probably do like a whole podcast episode on, on just each one.
Right. So let’s go ahead and move on to number two. It’s, it was, you will not grow in areas [00:07:00] you don’t give time and attention to.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah. And actually that builds right off of that. Right? It’s all about what we choose to do with our time. I recognize that there are times and seasons in life, right? I fully admit that I don’t give time or attention to family history work.
I go to the temple and I make the effort to do that, and I’ve upped my temple attendance this year, which has been a real blessing to me. I do not sit down on my computer and search out for relatives. Is that something I should be doing? Probably. I believe that there are times and seasons to our lives, but because I am not giving time and attention to that, my spiritual growth in the family history area is lacking.
And I’m just being vulnerable and sharing an example from my life. If somebody doesn’t give their scriptures any time or attention, they will not grow in their testimony of the Book of Mormon. You can’t, if you don’t make an effort, you can’t grow in that way. [00:08:00] Likewise with going to the temple or whatever it is.
So the thing that we want the stronger testimony of, we have to focus on. And it’s no different than anything else in life, right? Anything else that we want to be better at? I mean, I would love to be a really great guitar player. I’ve got a guitar in my room, I’ve got some tabs.
If I don’t ever pick it up, it’s just a pipe dream, right? Like I, I have to make it a priority. And it’s the same way with our spirituality. And again, maybe at one point you’re gonna want a greater testimony of tithing and at one point you’re gonna want a greater testimony of the atonement or the temple, whatever it is.
There are so many areas, that we can grow in spiritually. Whatever it is that we’re seeking, we have to give our time and attention to.
Karen Papin: Okay. Let’s go on to number [00:09:00] three. All growth, including spiritual growth, is at times uncomfortable. It’s worth the growing pains. .
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah. Growth is not comfortable. Right. If you want a bigger bank account, you stop spending money. That can be uncomfortable, right? You want to run a marathon, not comfortable, but whatever goal we’re working towards that takes effort is gonna be worth it.
But sometimes it’s gonna be a little uncomfortable. And I think the same thing goes with, with growing our testimonies maybe in a different way. Going back to the example of Temple attendance for me, I mentioned before we started this morning that I am in the very busiest season of my life. Literally in 21 years of being a.
mom and I felt really strongly in January that I needed to double my temple attendance, and I thought, God, I’m trying to, I’m trying to get rid of things from my plate, right? I’m not trying to add things in, but I really felt like I needed to [00:10:00] do that. And in January and February I actually tripled my temple attendance from what I had kind of typically been doing, and I saw.
My time magnified. Was it uncomfortable? Yes. I was even more pressed for time, but somehow I had time to make the drive into the temple, which isn’t super close. Do a session and come home. Nothing. No one died. Nothing fell through the cracks, like it all worked out. So somehow my time was magnified. but it was a little uncomfortable.
I had to say no to a couple of things so that I could. Kind of accomplish this goal of attending the temple more. But what has happened, the blessings that I’ve received from that far outweigh the discomfort that came at the time.
Karen Papin: Mm-hmm. Oh yeah, totally. And I was gonna ask you to share personal experience, and so thank you for just like going Right.
But, but it’s, it’s so true. Like I think [00:11:00] of Heavenly Father’s plan, it’s like. We are meant to be here on earth to learn and to grow and to become more like him. The only way to do that is by experiencing those uncomfortable moments. ’cause that is how we grow. That is how we become more like him. And so I, I, it just amazes me like how.
Perfect. His plan is, even though it’s hard, even though it’s sometimes we don’t wanna go through the things that we go through, it’s like, I remember being in a period a time where it’s like, I, heavenly father must know me so well because he knew exactly the experiences that I needed to go through because they were definitely the opposite of what I wanted to go through.
Yep. Yeah, it’s, it’s true. It’s true.
Yeah.
Karen Papin: Why do you think discomfort is such a necessary part of the growth process?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: [00:12:00] Hmm, that’s a great question.
Because I think that when we want to grow in an area, it takes. It needs to take discipline or else it wouldn’t work. And discipline only comes when something isn’t easy, right? It does not take discipline for me to eat sugar. It does not take discipline for me to not fold the laundry. You know what I’m saying?
Like the things in life, just stupid examples. Discipline comes in when something is hard. But the whole idea of discipline, which I find interesting that it’s so deeply tied to the word disciple, is it it necessitates some work and work. Whether you’re weeding a garden or cleaning a house, or building a business or training for a marathon, no matter what it is, work is [00:13:00] hard.
Work is uncomfortable. Work isn’t. Always easy, but nothing good or nothing lasting maybe comes from easy, right? Definitely there are good things that come from easy, but maybe nothing super lasting comes from easy, and I think that when we’re asked to be a disciple, we’re asked to be disciplined and discipline comes from doing hard things.
Karen Papin: It makes me think of parenting and like we want to protect our kids and keep them from having all these hard experiences, and yet they need to go through ’em.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah, yeah. Yep. It’s true and it is so hard. You just wanna say, no, I wanna make this easy for you. But we also want strong kids. We want kids who are resilient.
We want kids who can do tough things. And then eventually leave our house [00:14:00] confident that they can do hard things. Right? That doesn’t come when we shield them from everything. So, yeah, good example.
Karen Papin: I am gonna go ahead and talk about this one. Number five, growth isn’t always visible. Be gentle with yourself when trying to measure this growth and recognize the little things. And I feel like that kind of goes along with this growth process or the uncomfortable part of it too.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Karen Papin: So I, I, but first I’d like to hear more of your thoughts about that one.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: I have this recollection of seeing this woman, and this might sound like a really odd tangent, but seeing this woman that I knew and I knew that she was pregnant, and when I saw her, I. She was like nine months pregnant. And I’m like, this was literally the fastest pregnancy ever known to man, because I hadn’t seen her in that time and I was living my life and I was doing my thing.
So I [00:15:00] see her and I’m like, look at you. You’re gonna have a baby like tomorrow. And she’s like, this has literally been the longest pregnancy of my life. And it’s because I wasn’t there for all of it. Right? I can look at someone who has done something big, maybe started a business, and I’m like, wow, did that just fall into your lap?
Like, this is amazing. Look at your success. I haven’t watched the process. I haven’t been there from the very beginning. I haven’t been there, you know, three years ago she got the idea, whatever it was. When we look at other people’s growth, sometimes it seems really quick, right? Sometimes we look at our own growth and we’re like, Ugh.
This is going nowhere, right? This I’m not seeing results. It’s because we’re living in a microwave world. We’re living in a world of instant messaging, instant bank transfers, FaceTiming, everything is right now, right? That’s not how God works. God is not a microwave. [00:16:00] He things take work. They take time. And sometimes when we’re growing and it’s uncomfortable, so like the process is doubly hard because we’re not seeing a lot of growth right away.
It’s really important that we just look for the little things. Maybe you haven’t been good at saying your prayers, and that’s one area you really wanna focus on. So you work on saying your prayers, you work on saying your prayers and you’re not seeing a ton of growth. But then one night you go to get into bed and you immediately drop to your knees without thinking about it because you’ve kind of created this habit.
Own that reaction that you had before you get into bed to drop to your knees. That’s a step that is growth, right? And that’s just as simple example, but it could be applied in so many ways. Growth is slow. Plants grow slow, babies grow slow. You know, there like it’s just this process and we have to respect the process.
So. I just hope that in [00:17:00] all areas of our lives, we can be really gentle with ourselves when we are focused on growth and when we are doing the hard things and when we are making the effort because yeah, we all want results immediately. That’s the human condition, right? But it’s important to recognize the little wins.
And celebrate them and own them and be grateful for them and let those things motivate you to keep going and to keep trying hard. But most importantly, and this actually goes back to number four, which I hope you don’t mind me throwing in there. So we cannot compare our growth, our spiritual growth to other people.
We probably all know that person in Sunday school or wherever who just. The scriptures inside and out and can like quote a scripture from Hebrews and we’re like, I don’t even know where Hebrews is. Like, you know what I mean? We can’t, we can’t do that. It’s an [00:18:00] inappropriate thing for us to compare spirituality or compare spiritual growth.
Our journey is gonna look unique and it’s perfect for us. Our unique journeys of faith will be perfect for us. Um so anyway, recognize the little things, own your wins, even if they’re tiny, and let them propel you to keep going and to keep working hard.
Karen Papin: So good. I love that. I’m, and just how you ated it back to that fourth one of how other people’s growth does look different to us, and I think that’s important. For us to embrace in a few ways. One, in that it helps us to have more self-compassion for ourselves, and it also helps us to have more compassion for others as well.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah, absolutely it does. And I think like on the flip side, you’ve got the, you’ve got the person in Sunday school quoting a verse from Hebrews [00:19:00] without looking at it. On the flip side, you may have a kid who is struggling. You’re like, come on. Why can’t you figure this out? Why can’t you be okay with dah, dah, dah, dah, whatever it is.
When we stop the comparison, when we recognize that a faith journey, a spiritual journey to Jesus is intimately personal, we stop judging on both sides. We stopped comparing ourselves up and we stopped comparing ourselves down. my dad for years. Has said that competition is not an eternal principle, and I think we could use the term comparison in that place.
Comparison is not an eternal principle. It’s not about how you or I look to each other. It’s about our unique relationship with Jesus Christ, right? So you’re right. I think that it does give us compassion, more compassion for other people. I.
Karen Papin: So, and then it’s [00:20:00] kind of also going back to that first one, it’s like spiritual growth is intimately personal.
It’s like you’re focused on your relationship with God. Mm-hmm. Versus how you look to other people.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly.
Karen Papin: Yeah. They’re all interconnected. One other thing as we’ve been talking that has come to mind is
oh my goodness, is my, it’s like I can picture him. He is a really popular speaker from general conference, um, Wilcox, elder Wilcox when he was giving his talk Oh, oh. Youth of a Noble Birthright. And yes, he’s talking to the youth, but you know, it’s important for all of us. One of the things that he talks about is and this kind of goes back to the point that you made about all growth is uncomfortable. And he goes back and he talks about a cruise ship and how, yeah, it looks like all these people are having this great time on this cruise ship, but you’re part of the crew. Yeah, [00:21:00] yeah, yeah. So exactly. I, yeah. It’s just like we.
Are a part, our children of the Covenant. And so there is a responsibility there. and as we embrace these ideas of spiritual growth, that can help us to look beyond even ourselves, but to be able to see something, a greater purpose, and vision for what we can do. And, yeah, this just, I, I love this podcast because.
’cause I’ve learned so much about self-confidence and how it’s actually about focusing on why you’re doing it. And most of the time it’s about blessing the lives of others.
Mm-hmm.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah, absolutely.
Karen Papin: So going along with number four of other people’s growth will look different than yours. how do you feel that we can celebrate our own growth without feeling [00:22:00] discouraged by others’ journeys?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Oh, I, one of my good friends occasionally will be like, stay in your own lane, you know, stay in your own lane.
Really, we just have to let go. We have to change our mindsets if that is something that we are prone to do, compare. We have to change our mindsets, and I think that there’s something really powerful that happens when we start looking for the good things in our lives. And we focus on gratitude because it all plays in.
It all plays into recognizing our own growth. And I. I don’t know a lot of people who are super prideful in terms of like, look at me. I’m so amazing. I know a lot of people who pick themselves apart, right? We’re told not to be prideful. Um, and that’s obviously a really important thing, but I know far more people, especially women who are prone to be the opposite [00:23:00] of prideful, not humble.
Self-deprecating. Right? Or just picking themselves apart and that, that’s not appropriate either, right? We should be confident in our roles as children of God, as children of heavenly parents who’ve given us divine gifts, who we are, genetically connected to spiritually, right? There is a confidence that should come when we understand.
Our role in this plan of salvation, that I think a lot of us are lacking. But if we can start to recognize the good things that we do and our strengths, it makes us better disciples, especially if we can remain humble as we recognize them. And like you said, share them with people. I believe that our spiritual gifts that we’ve been given are meant to help us on our own path.
Draw us closer to God [00:24:00] and bless other people. And I believe that as we use our gifts and our, as we make spiritual growth and recognize that and honor it and then share it with people and in the process lift and lift and help those around us, the blessings just continue to multiply.
Right? That’s kind of how I see it.
Karen Papin: It’s so good. Okay, so next one is number six. You may have to learn to say no to certain things or people in order to say yes to God.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Saying no is really hard, right?
Karen Papin: Yeah, it’s true. I
Rachel Rhien Tucker: know a lot of people pleasers. I’m not sure I’d count myself necessarily as a people pleaser, but I do like to be. Busy and I am, I’m just primed to go, you know? And so [00:25:00] when we are given an opportunity or if someone asks us for help or I don’t know, some, something else comes up where you have the option to say yes or no, I think most people are kind of, it’s ingrained in us to just say, yes, we are meant to help people and we are meant to.
Work hard, put your shoulder to the wheel right. But we’re also commanded to not run faster than we have strength, and that includes not having any time for things of a divine nature in our day-to-day lives. If Tu Tuesdays are crazy and you never ever study your scriptures on Tuesdays, it’s time to say no to something else.
So you can find 20 minutes every morning to just sit in stillness and enjoy. A relationship with the savior. If we never spend time with him, our relationship with him will not grow. It’s the same for any relationship. [00:26:00] Right. but if I really wanna see a friend that I haven’t seen in a really long time, it’s an unfortunate thing when you’re like, we should get together.
How does July look? And it’s March, right? Yeah. Jesus doesn’t want that. And we don’t, we, we cannot have that attitude with Jesus. We need to be like, Hey, it’s Tuesday. I’m here. You’re here. ’cause I’m here. ’cause you’re always here. It’s me. I have to make the time. Let’s not look at July when we’re talking about studying our scriptures.
You’re spending some time with the Savior we gotta look at right now. And if our right now is genuinely too busy, you gotta say no to something else.
Karen Papin: What do you feel are some of the hardest things that you’ve had to say no to in order to prioritize your faith?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: For me personally, it’s opportunities that come, like things that I’m genuinely excited about. I love being on [00:27:00] podcasts, right? Like this is so fun for me and I haven’t, I didn’t know you before today, but I.
I genuinely just love connecting with people. I love talking about faith, these types of opportunities. I just love speaking at a women’s conference, something like that. I really love those opportunities. Those are the hard things for me to say no to and sometimes I do just say, yeah, I’d love to.
Yeah, I’d love to. At the end of the day, I’m like, oh, I, it’s just a lot. So, but that answer is gonna be different for everyone. You know, it may be someone who works and their boss is like, Hey, I need you to come in on Sunday mornings now. And for me, I’d be like, yeah, I’m good. I’m not gonna do that.
You know? But I also am not in a situation where I work directly under someone. So some people might have a really hard time saying, you know what? I can’t work Sunday mornings. It’s, that answer’s gonna be different for everybody. But [00:28:00] everybody listening to this is gonna know their pain point. They’re gonna know that thing that’s like, oh yeah, that’s really hard for me to say no to.
And sometimes you have to say no. In order to grow and give your, give yourself space to connect with the divine. Mm.
Karen Papin: So do you have like any advice for how to discern, okay, this is something that is truly necessary, versus, oh, I’m just avoiding something difficult?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Mm, that’s a really good question.
The interesting thing is it’s kind of a catch 22 because my answer to that would be really prayerful. Like pause and think about it. Yep. Which means take the time. To connect with God and ask him, is this something I should be giving my time to right now? It really all goes back to desire and time.
If you have the desire to have a stronger relationship with the savior, or to feel promptings [00:29:00] more pronounced in your life, you’ve gotta give it time, right? So. What do I say no to? Well, you need to take the time to ask that in prayer and in faith and say, Hey, is this a good idea? Should I take this on right now?
Or should I let this one pass and wait for the next thing to come along? I can’t answer that question, but I know that when we ask in faith and sit in silence, the spirit will tell us, we’ll know.
Karen Papin: I had an experience recently where it was like, as women in the church, like moms, yes. But in general, women in the church, we have like long to-do lists, like in our minds, right?
And I was kind of like, in this go, go, go, do, do, do kind of, mode. And yet I was feeling just like this, lack, like it, it like I [00:30:00] am. Could feel that self-doubt and just like not getting the right things done and just, and I wasn’t stopping to actually take that time to consider mm-hmm. What is going on with me right now.
and so I was putting my little boy to bed and just, I was cuddling with him and I was thinking of all those things that like kind of planning my next day out. And it was just like, I know the lord’s just like telling me, hold on, you know, slow down. And helped me to recognize what was going on in that moment because my mind was so filled with all the things that I could be doing.
Or that I needed, or that I felt like I needed to do that I wasn’t focused on what really mattered.
Mm-hmm.
Karen Papin: So once we take that time to be still, and sometimes it’s not like we’re asking you to take an hour out of your day. It really can be just a few deep breaths where you like, [00:31:00] center yourself, connect with Heavenly Father and say, okay, what is the next, where should my focus be right now?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah. Exactly. It doesn’t have to take a long time, but for some reason, turning off the world, logging off, tuning out, that’s hard. There’s a lot of noise. And the funny thing is a lot of it is really good noise, but when it gets so loud that we can’t hear, that’s a problem. Right.
Karen Papin: So number seven is working towards spiritual growth requires vulnerability, honesty, and humility.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Sometimes I think that we lie to ourselves. Maybe we lie to ourselves by saying, I don’t have time for this. Maybe we lie to ourselves by saying, no, I’m working really hard, but we’re not being really honest in how much effort we’re giving. maybe we lie to ourselves by justifying certain behaviors or [00:32:00] lack of behaviors.
It just requires perfect honesty. A lot of vulnerability. And the truth is, our savior knows our heart anyway. He knows the truth, whether or not we’re willing to admit it, right? Yeah. But sometimes I think it’s hard to be honest with ourselves about things. There’s a talk called Be 100% Responsible.
I don’t know if you’ve read it. It’s so incredible. And it’s an amazing talk for anyone who wants to study something that’s really gonna make you, do some deep self-reflection. But it talks about how really to have good growth in any area, we have to be completely honest with ourselves.
And sometimes that’s hard to do. Sometimes that hurts. So,
Karen Papin: yeah, that’s such a key part of it, and [00:33:00] yet it’s, it is, it’s really hard to be vulnerable and he, and humble and honest and all those things related to, but, it is really hard. But are we really growing if we’re not taking the time to. Be honest with ourselves.
Mm-hmm.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah. Yeah, it’s a good question.
And like I said, we can, we can sort of, I don’t know the right word, pretend with ourselves or justify certain things, but in the end, the savior knows what’s true anyway. He knows our hearts perfectly and it really just slows our progress when we’re not completely responsible for our actions or we’re not completely responsible for our time or we justify things or we’re not totally honest.
Karen Papin: Okay, so one [00:34:00] thing with these lies that we’re telling ourselves and how we’re kinda like blocking ourselves from being humble. I just wanna point out that we are doing that because we’re protecting ourselves in some way. And so, in those moments where it does feel like too much, it’s like bring the Lord in and ask for his help because he is there to help us and support us through being able to feel those, all of those.
Emotions of self-doubt and anxiety and guilt and all those emotions that we might be protecting ourselves from. They’re actually still there. Yeah. Hiding from them, right? Yeah, exactly. The Lord in because he will carry you and help you to be able to find that vulnerability and honesty that you need in those moments.
Yeah.
Karen Papin: Yeah. So number eight is spiritual growth isn’t permanent. What isn’t nourished cannot live. It takes consistent focus and attention. But with that [00:35:00] effort comes increased strength, increased understanding, increased power, and increased peace. So good. So good. So, I would love to
hear more about your thoughts on
that.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: I don’t know why I keep taking this back to running. I ran a marathon in 2011 and I ran a marathon in 2013, 26 miles. Right. And then you add up all the miles that you run to train for those. I would be really hard pressed to run three miles without stopping right now. Like really hard pressed. And I am, I’m in good shape, but I didn’t keep that momentum going.
I didn’t. My body is not primed to run three miles, much less 26 right now, right? I have lots of house plants. If at some point I just stop watering them. I mean, I have a bunch of dead house plants, I mean, it applies to almost everything in life. [00:36:00] What you stop cultivating, what you stop working on, stops thriving.
Hmm. And that’s another part of being honest. Are you really giving what you need to to X, Y, and Z in order to grow in that area? Are you really putting in the time? Did you really do that 14 mile training run or whatever it is? When you stop cultivating something, it stops growing and it kind of goes back to, which one was it that said,
you will not grow in areas you don’t give time and attention to, right? We can do all this work and get ourselves to a really good place. Here’s a good example in terms of like spirituality.
I taught early morning seminary for five years, and in that time I was in my scriptures a lot and I was cross-referencing and using footnotes and finding related articles that go with scriptures and probably an hour and a half, right?
Every day. Well, I don’t think the Lord expects me at this. Stage of my life, [00:37:00] not being a seminary teacher to spend an hour and a half in my scriptures every day. That’s not my time or my season, but it is a good example of something that was cultivated. Then given all this time to scripture study, I don’t feel so much a scriptorian now then I kind of did then because that’s not what I’m giving my time and effort to. But it’s the same with anything in our lives that if we want things like that to grow, we put in the time and effort I. I do think it gets easier once you’ve built something, once you’ve made something, if you’re going to the temple twice a month, and that becomes a routine.
Maybe when you had tiny kids that was like, I could never, I don’t even, I can’t conceive of that, right? Going to the temple twice a month, but then you enter a stage where you’ve worked to make that possible and you, it becomes a little easier to maintain that. But when we slow it down. Then we have to build up a whole lot of momentum to get going again with certain things.
And [00:38:00] it’s the same for scripture study or prayer or meditation. I used to be such a good meditator and it was just part of my morning routine where I would take 15 minutes and do like either a guided meditation or just sit in silence. And the truth is my life has gotten busy there. I’m gonna be honest.
Right? I have let that part go. I want that part back. But before it was, I was in a good rhythm. It was just, I would get up and I would do it, and it wasn’t hard. If I start tomorrow, it’s gonna take some effort for a few days to get up at five 30 and meditate or listen to a guided meditation because I’m out of that habit.
Does that make sense? Mm-hmm. So we’ve gotta cultivate what we want to grow. It’s just really simple
Karen Papin: and what you’re doing is. It’s that momentum, like one of the things that you mentioned was once you get it going, then it doesn’t take as much effort. Mm-hmm. Like, we’re not saying that you need to go and [00:39:00] you need to study an hour and a half of your scriptures to really connect with God.
It’s like, but it’s gonna take you some effort to be able to start. Being more consistent in your scripture study. Yeah. Even if you’re reading just a few verses a day, but that’s gonna get you started and then you can, you start to build that momentum and it becomes easier as you go.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Yeah, exactly.
Karen Papin: Yep. So, mm-hmm. well Rachel, this has been a great conversation. Thank you so much for coming on here and sharing with us those eight spiritual truths about, or Eight truths about spiritual growth. And I know that each one is something that we can apply and I. Can really help us as we apply them to be able to just embrace that grace in our lives, and recognize that importance of just being still and connecting with our Heavenly Father.
So thank you so much for sharing.
Rachel Rhien Tucker: I’m so happy to have been able to be here and to chat with you. Thank you. Thank [00:40:00] you.
Karen Papin: I did forget a question. How can those listening connect with you?
Rachel Rhien Tucker: Oh. so I write every day on Instagram. That’s really where I’m most active. It’s at simplyrachelclare on Instagram. I also have a newsletter if you go to my website, which is seeking diligently.com. there’s a spot where you can sign up for my newsletter, and that’s an easy way.
But mostly I’m active on Instagram. All right, great. Thank you.
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