Episode 35: Seasons Change-Life & Career
The Seeds
Name: Minnie Lee
Age: 50
Where do you call home: San Francisco, CA
Relationship Status: Single
Season of Work: Speaker, Teacher, Business Advisor, Pain Management Coach, Student
Hobbies: Hiking, Travel, Learning
Jesus Journey: My grandmother (mom’s side) was a huge influence…she always was amazed by Jesus and gushing about how he saved her. She was kind, funny, and joyful although her life was filled with challenges and sadness. I didn’t become a true Jesus follower until I was 39. After falling in and out of faith, I finally came to a point where I had to ask God to show me he was real because I didn’t want to devote my time and energy to something that wasn’t real. Aaaaaaand…be careful what you wish for. ;)
The Branches
The first 3 episodes of Season 4 feature Olive Us Alumni. This mini-series is titled: “Stepping Into New Seasons.” It’s all about the changing of seasons. Transitions. We’ll be taking a look back so we can continue to move forward with the plans God has for us. I don’t know if you got a chance to take a look back at your SHORT episode (#bcInstaTV 3 years ago lol) but what did you observe about yourself & our conversation?
I didn’t know it then, but as I look back, I think I approached the first interview with a lack of understanding as to what it all meant. What I did know then, was how surprised I was that you asked me to be your first interviewee. Because, until then, I was hurting and struggling silently, and I saw my life as a continuation of that. I didn’t know what to say or not to say. I wanted to be authentic about my experience, but I think I was really careful about not sounding like I was whiny/complaining. I think there was a lot of shame deep inside about my illness. You...Rachael, through Olive Us, gave me a voice. At the time I wasn’t sure what that meant. It did feel oddly comforting to be able to share with you and other people what it feels like to live with chronic pain, and I think something cracked open in me since then.
It’s officially FALL! What “leaves” are/have changed in your life since the 1st Olive Us episode?
Wow…so this is when I realize God can do so much in 3 years…I want to be comprehensive yet succinct here because this could go on for a long time…
Vocationally - I used to oversee finance and administration at our home church, Epic Church San Francisco. Now (starting Sep 2021) I’m a teacher/speaker.
Physically - I still have my chronic conditions, however, my capacity has increased, as a result of learning and implementing a completely different self-care rhythm over these 2-3 years. This includes daily posture & conditioning exercises (which I am now certified for so that I can help other people), and establishing a work/rest rhythm that’s right for my body, etc.
Mentally & Emotionally - invested a lot of time in counseling/therapy working with a phenomenal Christian clinician, plus God gave me crazy breakthroughs… One of them was accepting my physical limitations - which helped me in turn finally stop trying to be like everybody else and establish my rhythms without shame or apology. And of course, a lot of trauma work, healing of past hurts, etc.. and as I was becoming healed inside, it helped me heal physically too.
Another thing I want to add is friendships. There are a handful of friendships that God blessed, and one of them is with you, of course, I cannot even begin to tell you… These close friendships got even deeper and closer, and it was pivotal in my life, especially as these changes started blossoming.
Out of those different buckets of change…what has been the hardest and why?
The hardest part is the physical part, but I also think it’s so intertwined with the emotional & mental. My greatest shame, I realized, resided in my physical limits and my changing vocational capacity and lifestyle because of it (it touched everything in my life). When we first interviewed Rachael, I don’t know if you remember, but it was right around when I had to go part-time at Epic. My title changed from executive director to administrative director. People might think the title doesn’t matter, but for me, it was a definitive admission with my physical condition that I couldn’t operate at an executive level (and to me, because identity was so important at that time, I was hurting/grieving). For 3 years, I was learning how to live in this new reality - I had chronic pain for a long time, but my body couldn’t carry me anymore through working full time and having a social life, etc.. doing all the things, being everywhere (for almost 20 years, I was trying to live as if I didn’t have limitations). That sucked. I hated having to say no, and being home more than I would like. I was also living under the false assumption that I had to be physically well to be as effective as I would like to be. But God broke that thankfully. True acceptance and freedom came a few years later. It did not come easily, and it required a lot of alone time in pain and feeling like I would never get out of it - but it was all with God, up close and personal.
‘Olive us” go through seasons of change. What or who has helped you move from a liminal space (God’s waiting room…the middle) to being in the new season?
Oh man, talking about these people is going to make me cry. I’m gonna name names and briefly mention how they played a divine part.
Rachael Wade, you! Like I said earlier, you gave me a voice and narrative about my pain. That led me to be curious about other women out there like me - and I learned that women preachers and writers, etc. exist out there doing their thing, with chronic pain conditions! Tiana Spencer, Alia Joy, etc.
Ben Pilgreen (and Lindsey Lee, Will Moraza, etc. Epic staff) - Ben and these guys had to live through my pain and physical, and emotional challenges with me - my limits impacted my work, which impacted the team. To be honest, I was so scared that my worsening limits were going to make me completely useless to the team. I tried a few times to resign and remove myself from the team. But Ben and these guys wouldn’t let me. I know they took a hit, very often, and in a significant way. But they didn’t quit on me. They made adjustments as they gave me room to make adjustments, and they were encouraging and loving along the way. Also, um, who was crazy enough to ask me to teach with him, although I was terrified of and terrible at, public speaking? Ben Pilgreen. Who invited me into his process of writing sermons so that I would become interested in doing them myself? Will Moraza. Who holds my shaking hand before I go up on stage to speak (and so much more)? Lindsey Lee.
Ruthie Kim & Kat Armstrong - these are my teachers! I attended Ruthie’s Own Your Voice workshop in Spring 2021 (a few days after I signed up, Ben asked me if I would teach with him on the topic of Shame, which he knew I struggled with a lot), and Kat Armstrong taught the Preacher Girl teaching cohort…which you (Rachael) were a part of as well! Ruthie’s teaching focused on understanding and accepting the voice God gave in each of us, while Kat’s teaching was about the process of writing a sermon and how to become an effective speaker in various contexts.
Camp Well - Fall 2021 (and my prayer supporters Frances, Praise, and Christine). Right after I resigned from Epic, without a clear path forward. I just knew I had to move into a new season, and I had some ideas as to what that might be, but I was an empty canvas. Camp Well helped me think seriously about who I needed to invite into the next stage in my vocation. I was used to doing things alone until then…God was pretty clear about me NOT doing that.
Vocationally much has changed in your life. How did you go about deciding how you would help people bring about healing, growth, and wholeness?
God brought wholeness into my health, personal finances, and spiritual existence. God also blessed me with a wonderful career in strategic and operational finance. I wanted to pull it all together. I know what it feels like to feel stuck in the rut of feeling terrible, being in debt, and having this disconnect between my faith and what God says. I have a deep desire to work with those who are experiencing a similar “stuckness.” I know that feeling of “will this be the rest of my life?”. I had to learn some new things (like how to write and give a sermon) and get certified for some specific things (posture alignment specialist), but business planning/advisory is me picking out what I enjoyed doing the most during my previous career. I’ve had some of the best experiences and results being the person who can offer clarity and sanity to business leaders who want to push their vision forward. God made me a thinker and translator of concepts into reality. I like to wrestle with something that isn’t tangible (yet) and turn it into some type of tangible output/action plan or whatever. So I feel like I’m applying this skill to various contexts that I feel super called to be a part of.
I’m sure there is a lot more you COULD DO Minnie, but you can’t say YES to everything. What advice would you give to the Olive Us family concerning how to decide if a decision…a new season…a career change…whatever…. should be a YES or a NO?
I don’t have a 5-step template or whatever (sorry!), BUT I tend to focus not on the decision itself, but more on the situations surrounding the decision at hand. My transition didn’t happen fast - it was in the making for years. Did I know that then? NO. The moment of decision came for me when I found myself extremely frustrated that I wasn’t able to do ‘XYZ’ because of my current work commitments. I LOVED working at Epic and serving my team and my community - at the same time. I clearly remember praying out this irritating conflict in my head. I wanted to be able to help my friends who were in so much pain, similar to what I went through, but I couldn’t. I wanted them to get the postural therapy I received that helped me so much - but it was cost prohibitive. I wanted to spend more time studying the Bible and taking Hebrew classes and writing sermons. But I had my work commitments - which I didn’t mind, but I had all these other desires that were only getting bigger and bigger as I sat on them and did nothing. When I was talking to God, He reminded me He’s doing a ‘new thing.’ A new season is coming. My job at Epic was done (plus I had a vision for Epic when it comes to its future and leadership that I wasn’t in…weird) I finished what I came for 6.5 years ago. I was like, woah! I better make an appointment with Ben (my boss) to chat about this. So I guess this boils down to desires, proximity with God (you gotta be close to him to hear him), and completion of a previous assignment (timing). I didn’t know exactly what I was doing next, but I knew the current season was coming to an end. So I moved on it. It’s vague, I know. But what’s going to be clear in any situation like this is that, when you’re like, you can’t think of much else except for this new thing, there is no point in holding onto the status quo. I think that’s how I was led to other major life decisions (it’s just clearer now with God).
A few months back you officially launched “This Curious Life.” Tell us about this new season in your life vocationally and share one story of how you’ve already seen God at work.
This Curious Life is a landing page for all the things we just talked about - letting people know this is what I’m doing and this is how things work, how to contact me, etc. It’s been scary and fun! I had to learn how to do all this self-marketing and branding stuff, and I’m still learning, limping my way through it! It’s so crazy I’m building a client base and have no idea what my income is going to look like in the next 3-6 months. Keeps me on my knees! At the same time… the clients that I have worked with… give me so much joy. When a business leader is happy about gaining clarity on what their vision could look like in an actionable plan, or someone who has been in so much pain for years finally smiles and feels hopeful about their future after their first session, I know I’m doing what I’m supposed to do. I’m also reminded that this year and next will be hard, sowing years - I gotta put in the work to build a business from scratch. God gave me a word recently, and it was a tough one:
Habakkuk 3:17-19: “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my SaviorThe Sovereign Lord is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to tread on the heights.”
He showed me it will be hard for a while, but He will be there with me and do His thing in His timing. My job is to keep sowing in His joy.
Encourage the Olive Us woman today who is considering a complete 180’ in vocation change. Meaning…they’ve been doing ‘X’ …but feel the Holy Spirit prompting them to do something completely different.
If the end is going to be a 180’, perhaps there is a 5-degree change you can make right now . Maybe that means learning a new thing, starting to offer something similar for free to your close friends, or just sharing the idea with your most trusted friends who can pray with you. There is something you can do NOW. See where that leads, and keep building from there as the opportunity comes.
This fall series is all about transitions and changes, but some things don’t change. Minnie, can you give us an update on the chronic pain you spoke about in Season 1, Episode 1? Encourage the one eagerly awaiting their season to change or healing to happen.
Yes, seasons change, but some things like my chronic pain and fatigue are still with me. But you know what, I did mention earlier that it took me finally accepting it as is to be free from it…which is so non-intuitive. Sure, I would LOVE for God to take it away, because He can, just like that. And I just talked about making a 5-degree change for a 180’-goal change, so to speak. When I stopped trying to resist this thing, “fix” myself, and finally accepted the fact that this is my reality, I started thinking about, then…what does it mean? How do I live WITH it? And I want to LIVE, not just survive. I made several 5-degree efforts, like counseling, posture therapy, and processing it with God…and I continued for years, one day at a time. They continue to help me day to day. Although I’m not healed, I do think I’m healed, at the same time. I no longer am governed by the fact that I have chronic pain - I know I have it, yet that doesn’t determine who I am or I am not anymore. I’m not freaked out when I have flareups. I just see it as it is. It just tells me I can’t do certain things a certain way. It taught me to respect my limits, not hate them, and God taught me over time how to make the best of my active time - and how to rest in Him when I’m done. His freeing me from shame helped me learn how to say ‘No’ and rest without apology. What’s crazy is that - I’m doing more than I ever thought I could, yet I’m resting more than I used to when I used to work full time. I don’t know how that works. He’s multiplying my limited yet surrendered strength and time. But the greatest freedom comes from knowing that, even if I couldn’t do anything, I would still be loved and valuable. God heals, trust me. Your healing is coming - ask God to help you see it when it comes, because it might come in a very different form than you expect. I think that’s what’s happening to me. I don’t see myself mainly as the girl with chronic pain anymore - I see myself as a healed, whole person, by the grace of God…even if it’s future tense. I want to help others see themselves that way.
Olive Us was created for women to share their in-process experiences and their "Only God" moments so we can remember we’re connected through Christ and not alone. Why is this important?
Because isolation would tell us the opposite. Isolation keeps us down, discouraged, and never curious about the amazing “what-if”s God has in store for us.
The Olive Tree
Finish these statements:
God is… for me. For you → For His glory.
My life & career has changed and I….am scared AND embrace it fully!
Stepping into new seasons requires…knees on the ground and eyes on the Father.
‘Olive Us’ are better when…we are known, seen and heard.
Olives to Go
Minnie’s Favorite Books
Sheila Walsh - It’s Okay Not to Be Okay
Minnie’s Teachings
When Shame Moves Out - The God who Re-parents Me
About Healing: Come for the Healing, Go with the Healer
Minnie’s Newsletter
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