Interview with Esther Joy Goetz, episode 110

0:00 If you love a prodigal, you can discover help and hope for your wilderness journey right here at the When You Love a Prodigal podcast, and also help and hope for your own life journey. Well, I am excited, my dear listeners, to introduce you to someone you might not know, but you will be glad that you do after this. Her name is Esther Joy Goetz. Did I say that right? Yeah, just Esther. Good. Do you use the Joy usually? No. My mom used to use it when I was in trouble. That's the only time. All right. So I am excited to introduce you to Esther Goetz, who focuses on helping moms of bigs.

0:48 Now, what does she mean by bigs? She means big kids like teenagers and young adults, kids who have left home, gone to college, moved out on their own, that kind of thing. Her intro says, I have a fierce passion to restore hope for the sacred space where our hearts and our homes meet. That includes faith, marriage, and motherhood. I really like that concept of where our hearts and our homes meet. I really love your help, often with some humor, to help people realize they're not in control anymore.

1:33 They probably weren't ever really in control, but they had authority and the responsibility for those children. But as they get to be bigger, they get to make their own decisions, and that's really hard for moms. That's what you know, and that's why you've come and helped them. How would you finish this sentence? Your great desire is to? Yeah. So that's my tagline. My great desire probably is to give, in this space where my heart meets my home as far as my kids, is to give them the roots of unconditional love and the wings of freedom to be completely themselves.

2:18 But themselves is the hardest. Yes, it is because we'll watch them and first of all, we just have dreams and hopes. But then we see who they are and we see strengths and weaknesses, and skills, and gifts. So we can start planning their lives for them. I love the idea that they have the roots to know that they're loved, and for the safe place that they have come from. But they have wings to become who they will be. That's a great gift that you're giving to moms to help them on that journey, because that time when their kids start to move away from them is one of the hardest times in their lives.

3:11 Well, maybe some of them is like, oh, thank goodness, but for most of them, it's like they're leaving. Now, who am I and what will I do and how do I navigate with them? So welcome, Esther. Your mom's at Biggs is on Instagram and any place else that they would find that? Yeah, I'm also on Facebook. Those are my two platforms where I write from. Of course, I have a little website and stuff like that. But those are the two places that I- We'll get to some of that a little later. Yeah. But I just go there and I see her because she posts pretty often, and I love the things that she posts.

3:56 So what we're going to do to start with is I'm going to read a couple, two or three of some of her pithy sayings and let her respond to that on anything she would like to say about it. So let's get started. Well, I didn't tell you much else about her, did I? So how many children do you have, Esther? I have four and I call them grownish and flownish. As we know as moms, they're never quite in our minds at least fully grown or fully flown. I just keep laughing about that idea of their, but they are all mostly in their 20s.

4:40 Okay. Where do you live? I live on the East Coast in New Jersey, and I have kids in three of the four corners. So I have one son in Florida, Southern Florida, he lives in Southern Florida. I have a daughter who lives in Southern California, and then two of my children live within a couple hours of me here on the East Coast. So you get to see them a little. One is threatening to move to Seattle. So there you go. There you go. You will have every corner of the whole country. Yes. That's a good thing. Okay. So here is a basic premise that you have.

5:22 You've already mentioned, but I'll read this. Dear big kids, we pray that your wings are as strong as your roots are deep. Love, your mom. So people do ask me a lot about, what is that saying that I have the roots of unconditional love and the wings of freedom? I do think as moms, we want to establish deep, deep roots of unconditional love. For me, that means letting go of expectations and agendas and control, and that they would know that they are loved, just period, end of story. I don't think we have that much of a problem as moms doing that.

6:04 We do because we have agendas, but the wings of freedom to be completely themselves, the strong wings they have for independence is very difficult. I'm very passionate about that launching process between the teenage and the young adult years. That's kind of, nobody really talks about that very much. The grief actually that we have as moms. Yeah. I think owning our own grief there does provide them to have the wings, but it is probably one of the most difficult processes in all of parenting. I think you're right. It's that time where we let them really let them go.

6:46 I mean, they're going to go no matter what. It's really our job is to begin to allow them to do that. The wings of freedom, like I just mentioned, I have kids that live all over the country. I have friends who are like, I don't want to limit my kids for a whole host of reasons. There are going to be people that come into their lives that need them. I don't really have the right or the authority to hold anybody back from whatever you want to say God's plan for their life or their own plan for their own lives. Yeah, I feel so passionately about that.

7:28 It's been very hard for me. I mean, it's not like, oh no. That's why you can say these things because you've had to work through it. Right. When my 19-year-old wanted to move to California, and I thought, when will I ever see her? It's been hard. I mean, but yes, she wanted to do that since she was five years old. Having lived in California for 25 years before I moved to Florida, yeah, it's a lovely place to go to but I wouldn't want to live there anymore. That's me. Right. Yet, it's so good for her to be launching out. I just see it isn't one of our jobs as moms to put our time and resources into what makes their hearts come alive, not ours.

8:16 Absolutely. One of my daughters spent a year in China, and then she came home and finished college, and had in mind she would probably go back to China. But then she got married, and they moved to Colorado and my other daughter, well, she's lived about six places. I just was like, every time I think they're so far away, one's in Montana, and then I think, but they're not in China. So I can just hop on a plane and go see them right now. So yeah, it's a hard thing when they leave, especially when grandkids come.

9:00 So here's another one of your things here. There are places that no matter how hard I try or even want to as a mom, I can't personally heal all the wounds of my kids' childhoods, but I can create an environment of grace and space for them as they work to heal themselves. A lot of people would say, we did our very best. They don't have wounds, and I'm like, oh yes, they do. Well, they have wounds that have come from even our most well-meaning intentions, and they also have wounds that come from things that are completely out of our control.

9:46 We are humans that live in a world that's rough and it's beautiful, but it can be brutal at times. So our wounds are our responsibility, and their wounds are their responsibility. But I do like the idea of grace and space. I've said to my kids on a number of occasions, I want to have grace for who you are now, with all your struggles and strengths, but I want to make sure that I'm providing space for who you're becoming and who you will be. I even think about the grace that they need to give me for who I've been, and maybe I need to give them the grace for who they've been in the past as well.

10:34 Because we don't only hurt our kids, our kids hurt us. So that's just part of being human, is that we do hurt each other. I think about the necessity of grace as we go on this healing process of who they've been, who we've been, who we are now, who they are now, and then the space for who they're becoming and who we're becoming. That's another big thing. I actually have it, I think, on my back wall that we always want to offer. I said, just breathe, but right under there, it says, give yourself grace and space.

11:14 That's a bigger thought for me. I think hopefully within that framework, there will be opportunity for healing. Hopefully so. Grace definitely helps make possibility healing. Grace is one of the main topics of anything I do almost. So it's an important place. Yeah, and giving grace for our, I think one of the things that we can't give our kids grace unless we've given that to it. We can't give away what we have not been able to. Don't have ourselves. I always joke, I'm like, you can't give somebody $10 if you don't have $10 to give.

11:55 So just even starting from receiving grace, yourself from others or God, and then giving grace to yourself. We are the hardest, I think, on ourselves. Much harder than God or even others are on us. I think about the idea of forgiving, and this came from my daughter. She, I apologized for some of the harm that we did to her when she was younger. She said, mom, be tender with the former version of yourself. Okay. She learned something, didn't she? Yeah, I do think about that. I have to be tender with the former version of myself.

12:37 Because we all make tons of mistakes and have so many regrets. I just think the only place that we can meet those regrets are with compassion. So yeah. Okay. Here's another one. One of our top mom jobs might just be doing everything in our mom power to convince our kids to believe in themselves. So if I look back on my parenting, one of the ways I did do a good job, and probably because this is just naturally who I am, is I love to cheer people on. I'm just a cheerleader at heart. I love it.

13:17 It's probably why I do this mom's a big, so I'm trying to cheer moms on. I just love being a cheerleader. So it is one of my strengths. I have plenty of struggles like control freak and other things. But this is a strength I have, and I do think about how much the world beats people up, and especially our kids. They get evaluated and beaten up to a pulp. They really do. I was determined not to do that. I just think naturally it came to me like I'm a high praiser. I loved being like, oh my goodness, show me your picture. I did sneak those pictures into the recycling bin after a while.

14:00 Eventually, yes. But we had a huge, I didn't have a good fridge for posting, but we created a whole back door for all the things. Just wanted them to know that they had the gifts and the strengths to be completely themselves. So how could I not? If I believe in them, and I believe that they have the ability to be completely themselves, and that's what I was looking to do. Yes, believe in the gifts that you have, believe in the strengths, and understand the shadow sides that you have too, and the struggles, but that's okay. That was my job.

14:41 That is our job all the time. I think it gets a little harder as they get older because the voices of society get much louder. Yes. Schools are so requiring so many things. Yes. So I mean, we could talk about this probably as a whole podcast in and of itself. But I do feel like that is one of my top my job. That's great. I love it. Here's another one. Dear moms, it's not about having perfect children, but fully loved ones. After all, look at mine.

15:22 Love God. That's God talking to the moms. He says, I love that. That's what I'm telling my audience all the time. Love them. Keep loving them. Yeah, it helps me. I always used to joke with friends, especially during the young years and the teenage years, about how God is the perfect parent and still look at us. Look at us. So with that in mind, his mission, God's mission is to just love us. And so then it frees me up to not have to worry about having perfection in myself and in my kids.

16:10 Perfection is all of that black and white thinking, right? Either or. It must be this or it must be this. It's terrible or it's wonderful. It's good or it's bad. And it doesn't leave room for nuance. What does perfection do but create an environment of more perfection and striving? And so if we can be allowed to be human and allow our kids to be human and just love them in all of their humanity and love ourselves and allow ourselves to be loved in all of our humanity. So yeah, it's just a big freedom thing for me. I love it.

16:51 That's why I wanted you here, because I love the things that you're saying. And I just I always wonder like who has perfect kids. I don't know any. I haven't I have not come in contact with any. Not a one. And I've not I've not come in contact with any perfect human beings. No, not a single one. All I have to do is look in the mirror. So here's going on to some just the nitty gritty of living with teens, older teens, young adults. Here's one of the things that you gave me that we could talk about. What if we were able if you were able we are able to say to our big kids, I did am doing my best, but sometimes you deserve better.

17:42 How might that bring healing to all of us to understand that? Yeah. I think that then I've done I've had to do this so so often with my kids is to say, yeah, you know what? I did do my best. And there's I think it's Maya Angelou quote, when you know better, you do better. And that's really all that we can do. We can't we can't change the past. And I do love a quote, this quote by somebody else that says there are no do overs, but there are makeovers. And that's where we can start from today.

18:23 Right. And say, I'm really sorry, because even my best. Was like the best at times. I mean, it was lacking, right. But I that's part of my humanity. I think the struggle we have as moms is to not spiral into shame. To hold that space for ourselves, to say, you know what? I did do my best at the time and almost pull back and and say, I was doing my best and I couldn't have done anything different. Yeah. Yet it's true. That I still hurt my children even in doing my best, and it's OK to apologize for that now when we know, I mean, the things that we've discovered about kids and what works best.

19:11 We did not have that when I was raising my kids. We didn't have all of this great information that's coming out now. And our parents didn't have the information we had. And so even less. Yes. And so hopefully each generation comes along and looks to break generational cycles from the past and even to break the cycles that we even created in our homes that we like. I joked about me being a control freak. And one of my kids was like, you can try to control me all you want. And it's just not going to work. And I remember for whatever reason, I listened to that. And he said, you're just afraid. Oh, well, then it struck me.

19:53 I don't know why he was 13 and he was kind of backtalking, but he was he got it. But he was right. And I had to listen through the. Back talk or whatever we would want to say to hear what he had to say to me. And it did and it didn't require a lot of change on my part after that. And then I would say to my kids, I know this looks like I'm controlling you. And I am because I'm so afraid. And they would be like, we get it, Mom, we get it. And I'm like, I'm not there yet. I'm not there. But I knew it was like a long, slow process. And I'm still afraid all the time. Well, the world's a scary place.

20:33 Yeah, I'm still I'm still afraid. I mean, my daughter's getting on a plane tomorrow night from L.A. to New Jersey. I just get like, oh, you know, will she make it? Is, you know, all those normal and I love that. I think there is those fears are normal, Mom, fears. But I also think we we are brave. We all forget that how brave we are as moms. To have children. Yes. And to continue in this process. Like, I think we talk about our brave our fear a lot, but we keep showing up and keep doing the stuff. And we're so brave. So, yeah, we are afraid. And again, there are good reasons to be. But.

21:16 Yeah, we have to walk past that and. Yeah. And help them learn to. Yeah. So I love this invite. Don't demand and then respect their answer. So this is a huge one for. This is a huge one, I would say, for moms of teens and young adults. And it is one of those places where they are going. They're going to be, you know, spreading their wings and they're not going to respond with yeses all the time. But I say our job is to continue to invite. Right. We we continue to pursue as much as we possibly can, even if they're no is often.

22:00 But I think one of the things that we do is we. We have to do is we have to do the things that we want to do. And I think that's one of the things that it does is it allows for good boundaries and it gives and then it gives me permission to say no. I remember my daughter wanted me to come to something and I was like, well, I'm in the middle of something that's really important to me. And this time, I'm not going to drop everything. So I love I love the idea of having those healthy boundaries where I can love you and me simultaneously. Right. A long term healthy relationship like I know the guilt card was used on me and I used it for a time and it just is not healthy and it's manipulative.

22:41 And it works in the short term. And so I know that's why a lot of parents do it. But in the long term, do you really want. Your kid to be with you based in guilt, like, or do you want your an obligation or do you want your kid to be with you? And I agree that and i'll say it because I Here's really a littleFunny bit that you said I had this idea it was awesome and I that they had a really durable connection. And really, we think celebrating a child's isso needs to have the opposite. So sometimes we really need to make sure that they're grounded in choice, which is love. Right.

23:22 We want really healthy relationships are grounded in choice. all day long when it comes to the holidays, we have vacations. I mean, it is, and even like I remember my son and you know, he was a junior and he was madly in love with his girlfriend and it was Christmas Eve and their family invited him over for, they were Italian for seven fishes and he made the choice to go. And we respected his no to us. And that was very hard. And cried. And then we went in the shower and cried. That is the thing that I think we are allowed to do. We are allowed to grieve their nose without using, but then, and then stop.

24:07 My son a couple of weeks ago said to me, I was like, you know, you're gonna go see grandma because you know, she's kind of on her last legs and you know, and she was like, oh my gosh, mom, you preach, don't use the guilt card. And I said, true, true. You get to choose when you go to see grandma or if you don't go to see grandma. Yeah, you can express your desires, but with open hands. Oh, with open hands and crying. I usually try not to cry in front of them too much if they're the cause of it. I can cry about other things in front of them. Yeah, that's so wise.

24:48 I love that you're saying that. We need to have other support systems for when they hurt us. Or even, and they're not even, it just things they do hurt us. Not even that they're harming us, but that the things they do cause pain. It's hurtful, but we can say that makes me sad, but it's your choice and I respect that. Right. My mother-in-law was so good at this. She would say to me, I will really miss you, but I've learned to be okay with who's here, but I will really miss you. And she was so invitational. Oh my goodness, she was so wonderful with this. It changed everything for me.

25:30 You were very blessed. I was. This is my mother-in-law. Yes, I heard you. That can be a little challenging sometime. Here's another one. You had a whole thing on, what do you wanna say to your big kid about all the things you like about them or appreciate them? And so one of them was figure out a way to tell your big kid that you are thankful for them, even if they hurt your feelings or been a pain. Yeah, one of my missions, I have a lot of missions, but one of my missions just in my own person is to practice gratitude.

26:13 Oh, me too. It's one of my main things in life. Yes, practice gratitude. And it does really continue to bring hope to us, I think, when we practice gratitude. And I think that's one of the things with kids, I think, especially if we're going through a really difficult time with our kid, let's say our relationship is estranged or we're seeing behavior that is harmful to them or whatever it is, we're just on the struggle bus. I think in my life, when I'm on the struggle bus, practicing gratitude is what really gets me through and really gives me hope.

26:55 And I started in November, like 30 days of gratitude, because it happens to be Thankful Month. But I tried- See, we should read each other's 30 days of gratitude. Yeah, we should. I love that. And but I just think it has to go to the regular nitty gritty parts of every day, right? So when you're in like, just, yeah, I called the struggle bus with one of your kids to find something that you're thankful for about them. But here's the key, tell them. Tell them, absolutely. You can write it down all day long, but find a way to tell them. And don't tell them couched in other stuff.

27:39 Don't tell, like be like, well, you know, you're horrible, but I'm really thankful for you. If there's a but in there, you're not doing it right. And if your kids are, and you have to communicate to them in their language, like if it's a text, send them a text. If it's an email, if it's a phone call, if it's getting them a little gift, whatever their love language, whatever it is. So if you tried it on TikTok, yeah. Yeah, on TikTok, whatever it is. Like my joke, I think on that post was send a carrier pigeon. I mean, whatever you have to do, I used to just leave small notes on the mirror, you know, when my kids were home, just let, you know, like, hey, I was really thankful that you emptied the dishwasher last night.

28:19 Whatever it was, I just, or just trying to find something. And then it gave me a spark of hope. Yes. That they weren't terrible people actually. There are still good things there. There's still good, there's still goodness. And I didn't fail totally. Or. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So here's another one that I think is incredibly important. Never try to shame your big kid into good behavior. No one is ever shamed into a happy, healthy adult. Well, I alluded to it before, right? About the shame spiral that we all go to. And I think we, many of us grew up in a culture where shame was the number one motivator, fear and shame, right?

29:08 And I think about the difference between what Brene Brown says, guilt and shame. And guilt is legitimate because it's based on bad behavior. And you can do something about it where shame is saying you are bad, right? You are bad at your core, like, and you take that identity on. And I think that shame, people use shame, and we're tempted to use shame on ourselves and our, and the people that we love, our kids, because it works. Yes, people respond and do what you want. Yes, it works. Sometimes, not always. Right, it works in the short term, but it destroys in the long term.

29:51 It just, everybody I know, every female I know, every mom I know, when they try to move to a place of more healing, or they try to get healing, they go to therapy, they pray, whatever they are doing to become their best version of themselves. This is the mean monster that seems to rear its head all the time. And we certainly don't want to pass along the things that we have to heal from. Yeah, because it will affect them throughout their lives if that has been the main way they've been pushed to do something or be something.

30:31 Absolutely, we're going to do it whether we want to or not, but we can quickly course correct and say, oh my goodness, no, that was wrong. That's really wrong of me. Course correcting, I mean, what would we do without apologies and forgiveness? Oh, yes, I think that is one of the key things that the Lord invites us to, is to repent and apologize and to forgive. And yeah, well, that's all another message. But not doing shame is hugely important.

31:14 Okay, a couple more of these and then some summary kinds of things. Okay. Okay, so just perspective on life. We've been talking about the living with our bigs. Mine are all now in their 40s. Oh, wow. So we've made it through a lot of this. Yeah, yeah. But I like this concept. You don't have to set yourself on fire to keep others warm. We do it all the time as moms. We sacrifice ourselves on the altar of our children and we burn ourselves to the ground in order for them to stay warm.

32:02 I mean, I think that is very normal and natural, especially as they're younger. I mean, but we continue to do it where we take care of the things that they should be taken care of. I mean, that's another, like, oh, we could talk a long time about that. But I just think, like my big joke is, you know that reports that they didn't get done or the taxes that they didn't file on time, all those things where, like, suddenly we're hopping to it and we're giving up our sleep or we're giving, I mean, all those things we're doing, we're jumping in the car and we're solving problems for them that they can solve on their own.

32:46 So that's that long, slow progression to independence, right? Right, it is. And sometimes you will set yourself on fire for them in a sense because that's the need, the real need at the time because of things. But other times, you know, like you said to your daughter, I can't come this time. Right, a counselor said to me once, their urgency does not have to become your emergency. And there's a big difference between urgency because our kids are gonna think that everything's urgent. Yeah. And that, you know, they've had a mom who took care of them since they were really little. So of course they're going to feel like everything's, you know, an emergency.

33:30 And why wouldn't they until they have to learn what is urgent and what is a true emergency. And I do something, I take a one day a week, and I've done this since my kids were four to 11. So I've done it almost 20 years where I took one day a week of like, I call it like a Sabbath, where mom was not on call. It was the reality, we got pizza, I mean, we were poor, we got pizza, I didn't cook, you know. And then as they moved away and up in high school, like they knew, and for me, it was Fridays, I took the day. I didn't work that day. I, and I had to tag team with my husband because kids have stuff, right? He was on Sundays, mine was on Fridays.

34:12 And we, but it was like, mom is off. You have anything, you text dad. And now, and as they got into college, I said to them, okay, I'm turning my phone on, do not disturb. And that means in order to reach me, if it's a true emergency, you have to call me two times. And, but it was a long, slow process for them to learn what's urgent and what can we do tomorrow for mom and what's an emergency that I actually do need help. And they've been very respectful. And now, now they're like, you know, now they all are like, oh, whoops, it's Sunday. Whoops, ups, like, come on. Now. They're learning. But you sit there then equipped as they become parents.

34:56 Yes. They will understand some things. But a long, slow process of uncoupling yourself from your kids. So true, so true. Okay, here's your big statement. And then I wanna talk about things you're doing. Okay. Other than that, okay? All we want from our kids as they leave home is to know in their hearts that our home is forever their safe place. Yeah. I feel like I can't create a safe world. No. Just what you said. It's not a safe world. But my job is to create a safe place within me.

35:36 That they can be whoever they are, say whatever they are. I mean, obviously respect and all those things. I'm not saying that, like, I also have to be careful of my boundaries, but just an emotionally and physically safe place for them. That's my job. I think that's my job actually for everybody. Yeah. I agree. So our kids are just people. And I know that it started for me when other people were a safe place for me. That's what changed me. That's what caused me to grow. I think about how safe God is for us. And I think about that I can be God with skin on for others.

36:20 And my kids are part of the love one another. They're part of the others. Pretty high priority of the one, the love one another. Yeah, pretty high priority, right? And they're in our yard. I mean, they're in, like in our small circle. Those are the people that we have intimate contact with. Those are the people that we have intimate contact with, hopefully, or would like to. So I just keep thinking about that. I can't make everybody else safe and everything else safe, but I can provide that I'm safe for them. So, and I say this, like, it makes it a lot easier for them to want to be with me if I'm safe. Yes, absolutely.

37:01 I mean, I can think of people who don't feel safe. I can think of not many in my family, but some that never felt safe. And you just, you don't even want to go there. Yeah, you don't want to be, yeah, I had another like pithy saying, which said, I don't want to be the mom who my kids love. I want to be the mom who my kids love being around. Absolutely. Yes, because otherwise they quit coming. Yeah, and all that stuff, it's just, and it's complicated and there's not quick, like I love that we unpack my pithy sayings, because as you can see, there's so much behind what goes into them, right?

37:43 Yes, yes. It's like a much deeper issue than like, oh, this quick thing. It kind of helps moms to really think like, oh, what does that mean? And how does that, how do I unpack that in my own heart and in my own, you know, and in my own parenting relationship with my kids? And I would imagine as people read your pithy sayings and ones you borrow from others, and that some of them say, oh, that's good. But some of them, it hits, it strikes deeper and they stop and it's a God moment for him to say, can we work on this?

38:23 Or is this, are you seeing growth in this area? Or do you see what this means for your loved ones? That's, I just, I really like what you're doing. I think it's really helpful to people because sometimes when we're just directly, quote, preaching something, which I can do, it's nicer to come at it from something that's a little not direct in your face kind of, and then they kind of get it themselves. Right, right. And so I think God's giving you a good example. For the choir, I'm preaching to myself. I'm preaching to, I didn't even say the choir.

39:05 I'm preaching, a lot of why I write and a lot of why I do this is for my own process of being the best mom that I can be. As my kids continue to age and grow and I have grandchildren and such like that, I wanna be this all for my grandchildren too. Oh yeah, that's a joy mostly. And so tell me about the other things you're doing, the projects you have or you have a book coming out. Yeah, I'm excited. So I have three things I'm working on right now. One is, anybody out there, and I'm not sure where your people are, I have a 50 day college mom journey called Roots and Wings that starts every fall, it's on sale now, I have that.

39:49 That is a 50 days of walking through this time of saying goodbye. It's really 50 days of grief and boundaries. So it's online and so they subscribe to it. Yeah, it's on my website. Yeah, and you can. Okay, we'll give them that information. There's a Facebook group that's on and my store. And then I have something else called Real Talk and that is twice a year, I team up with eight other moms and my co-host and we have a Raising Teens and Young Adults Summit. We had our first one that did really great in January. We're having another one in the fall. We're taping, I'm taping actually right after this for that and that's gonna be coming out.

40:31 So what format does that take? That is, you get a video or audio every day for 10 days into your inbox and we did a general thing about raising teens and young adults and now we're working on this next summit will be on health, healthy relationships, physical health, all that stuff related to being a healthy mom. So, and having healthy kids and yeah, so things like communication and self care and yeah. Well, and that's really important now because all you read about is how unhealthy mentally and emotionally the younger generation is right now.

41:14 So. Yeah, so that's coming up. The best way to find out about all of that just really quickly is I have a weekly email for moms that is much like people who follow me that want to dive deeper. I do a once a month ask me anything questions and I kind of talk, do a little more preachy advice but a lot of it is resources, something that's really laying on my heart. I'm tackling something like what we tackled here. What does it really mean to invite and not to meet? Like I really go into that like once a week. I have usually a quippy story about my kids that everybody cries about and then some really good resources like either a book or a podcast, something like this.

41:56 This is where I would share this podcast, those kinds of things to my email list, which is ever growing. And so any, I, all of that comes out every Wednesday. You get it into your inbox and I have a great community there. And then the last thing I am is I'm working with a publisher on a book, two books. The first one will be all of my essays in a book where I unpack these things a little bit deeper. I think I may be calling it bedtime stories for moms of bigs. And it's gonna just be like 60 little stories, a couple months and that'll be going on mail and not mail. That's a great title. And then I will have more of a mom self-help book that's coming out after that.

42:38 But yeah, I do have a book coming out. Fantastic. Well, we will put those resources and information. I understand if they subscribe to your letter, they get a free gift. They get 23, it's like 23 of my little mantras of how my really things I would tell my adult children. Okay. And secretly that I tell myself. I'm very much big about the moms and the kids. And there's, you know, like I said, the sacred space where our hearts connects to our homes. I love them. I do have everything too on our web, my website, which is estherjoygets.com.

43:21 And I know you'll put that in. I will put that in. And I will encourage them though, especially to begin with at least immediately to sign up. And this will air on June 27th. And we will have in the show notes, there'll be information on all of these things. So thank you so much, Joy. Joy, your name is Esther. Joy has been my theme this, the last month. And so I'm kind of have the word in my mouth. I love, I love my middle name. It's a great middle name, but Esther is also a good name.

44:02 Yeah. And so I am very grateful that you have joined us. I have a good audience and they're pretty consistent and faithful it would appear. So I'm loving to get to talk to them and I'm trying to give them different perspectives on things. And so they get some hard words a lot of times and that lead to hard actions. And I'm trying to help them know more about love and joy and grace, grace, a lot of grace. So lots of grace, lots of grace. So thank you. Thank you. And God bless you. Thank you. I appreciate it.

44:43 Okay. And to my listeners, be sure you write down anything you heard from Esther that you want to remember and put in practice. If you don't write it down, you'll forget. I know, cause that's what I do. And then be sure you check the show notes so you can follow up on the things that she's talked to us about and go deeper with her. And I trust you will find with your children, your loved ones, especially the big ones who sometimes make it harder to live with, that you're gonna find some really great help.

45:24 That things you can do that will make a difference in your relationship with them and give you a better chance at a lifetime of a loving kind of relationship that's full of grace. So thank you. Thanks, Esther. Thank you. God bless.