If you’re breathing, you’ve been through a loss. Maybe a big one, maybe a quiet one, but a loss. And if you’re anything like me, a woman who carries a lot, you may not have given yourself room to feel it.

Last week I shared part one of my conversation with Pam Vredevelt, a therapist of over 40 years and the author of Mending Miracles. We talked about what grief actually is and why staying busy doesn’t make it go away. This week we went a little deeper, and I asked her the question I’ve been quietly wrestling with. How do you keep showing up, and even keep growing, while your heart is hurting?

Here’s what I took away.

Pam gave a simple way to handle the moments when your feelings feel too big. She calls it regulate, recognize, and release. First you calm your body down, because it’s hard to hear God or think clearly when you’re flooded. Then you name what you’re feeling and what thoughts are attached to it. Then you get honest with God and let it out, whether that’s on paper, with a friend, or on a long walk. She also explains why handwriting matters, and as someone who has been journaling since I was sixteen, I loved hearing that.

Then comes the part I think we skip the most. Listening. We pour everything out to God, but we don’t always stop and ask, what do you want me to see? Pam shares a story about a 91 year old client who had never talked to God like that before, and what she heard back made me stop in my tracks. I’m not going to spoil it.

The thing that helped me most was Pam’s picture of a railroad track. Every day, there are two rails. One is heartache and the other is joy. Both are there, every single day. We don’t have to pretend the hard rail isn’t there, and we don’t have to feel guilty for enjoying the good one. It really is both.

I also asked Pam about something I’ve been praying through, which is Jeremiah 29, where God tells His people in exile to build houses and plant gardens right where they are. Can I really do that when all I want is to crawl into a hole? Her answer was so kind and so practical. She talked about lightening your load without quitting everything, and about how turning your focus toward someone else can be the very thing that gets you out of a dark place.

There’s also a moment where Pam shares words she heard in a hotel room years ago, in the middle of a season she did not want. They’ve changed how I look at every hard season since. You’ll want to hear it in her voice.

And I shared something with her that I came across this season in Nehemiah, a verse I thought I knew, and she added something to it that I hadn’t considered. It made me see joy completely differently.

Pam also tells a few stories from her own life, and they’re the kind that stay with you. I won’t try to retell them here because they need to come from her.

Listen to Episode 192 here

So here’s what I’d love for you to think about this week. Is there something in your life that feels like a setback? And what if God is doing something in it that you can’t see yet?

And if you want to grab Pam’s book, Mending Miracles, I’d encourage you to, even if you’re not in a hard season right now. It’s a gift to be able to show up for the people around you who are.

One more thing. Our book Expansion Syndrome launches November 4. It’s all about what to do when your identity hasn’t caught up with your calling. I’m going live on Instagram at 11am EST that day, and our Firebrand book, a collection of stories from women who have walked through the fire, comes out that same week. I’d love to have you there.