Diana Frazier's guest appearances

Diana Frazier

The Arise Podcast

Rebecca Bender

Ken RIley

Leticia Ochoa Adams

Bobby Martin

Danielle Allen

Alex Jacobson

Michael Walker

Dan Taylor

David Hayward

Chris Bruno

Susan Cunningham

Kelly Welk

Jay Stringer

Steph O'Brien

Cyon Edgerton

OwlTail

Diana Frazier - Story-teller, musician, worship leader, mother, wife and entrepreneur who's on sabbatical from her business Poulsbo Elderberry. Alex Jacobson -  Leader, speaker, writer, avid book reader and book reviewer, activist, advocate, lives on her hobby farm with her husband of 12 years and their five children. She's an excellent cook and provides tips and tricks on her instagram and blog @inspirationclothesline---We check in with these ladies who were on our podcast back in April (season one episode 25):Diana’s business was booming back in April, so much such so that she was killing herself with up to 60 hours a week AND she had all her kids home from school. She knew something had to give.Most days now, managing her children with distance learning is deeply challenging: There’s just not enough of her to go around. “It feels like you’re sucking at everything all the time and no one is getting the very best you.”Alex and her husband feel like they are handling things differently than most; they have very limited contact with the outside world because they have autoimmune disorders in their family. One of things that she has learned in this season from an online parenting class  is around the idea that kids have “buckets” that need to be filled in order for them to even be able to behave properly. Basically she came to realize that she can’t ask or expect her kids to function without some shifts in the way they are as parents. They are trying to get one-on-one time with each kid for ten minutes twice a day. It doesn’t happen everyday but the intention is to fill their kids’ buckets up so they have the energy and emotional bandwidth to behave when they are asked; and they are being asked to do more than before covid out of necessity.  It has increased the quality of their nuclear family. The biggest shifts have been in these internal systems. Everything is always changing, and even person to person.Alex says, “Life moves on in a pandemic. Life moves on in quarantine. Life has real issues, whether that is a presidential election, family drama or health issues… those things don’t stop. They get exponentially harder.”But thank God for therapy over zoom!Danielle says we are all trying to harness all the fragments of life, that normally other places in our lives would have collected for us. There is a spiritual and collective weight to what we’re all bearing. Trauma forces us to shift systems and perspectives, to cut out the [unnecessary] fat in our lives.Diana says this year has been “a walk in the wildness that I didn’t know I needed.” She has come to realize that in so many ways in her life she has been silenced, through trauma, abuse, theology… And it has forced her to not be able to show up as herself, bringing all of who she is. That she has had to shut down who she is in order to make others more comfortable. As she has been healing in this season, that means "I’ve been really unpopular with my family for sure and a lot of people this year because they are not used to this version of me. I’m not used to this version of me.” It’s a continually living in the “messy middle.”Diana said to her husband that he may have thought he was marrying a quiet, compliant church girl 15 years ago but instead has married someone very different. “We never could have known.”Maggie named that it has been costly for Diana; She’s become aware of that places she has been silenced and the ways she has had to shave off her sides in order to fit into other people’s spaces. She is reclaiming herself now. This covid season has in some ways given her the freedom to hold those boundaries and say, “No, this is who I actually am.” Maggie also noted how beautiful it is that in this season Diana is stepping into her prophetic truth-telling gifting, calling things out and becoming the best version of herself in the middle of a global pandemic.Alex says one of the things that happens when you are doing an internal work is that you realize you’re a part of systems. Whether that be systemic racism, a religious system, a familial system…  the way that you were was a component of that greater system. “When I change, the system around me will be forced to change. And I can’t manage how someone else feels about that change.”Alex mentioned a quote by Maryam Hasnaa “Be prepared for the emotional reactivity that’s going to come when you decide to release the pattern of trying to make everyone else comfortable at your own expense.”Alex says, if you are at all evolving, in your faith, in yourself, in family dynamics…If you’re evolving in anyway you are changing the systems around you.The questions Alex are asking are what will come out of this when we all are actually able to get back to interacting in the world? With people changing and systems changing, what will it look like to reenter with each other again? How am I going to react or respond to other people’s change, or changes in the systems that I am a part of? “We’re all literally going to come back into our communities different people.” Some more different than others.Danielle brings it to our physical bodies; how do our bodies interact with other bodies? We are going to have to deal with our scratches. How will we regulate — will it feel like coming home or coming into strangeness?Diana brings a quote from Emmanuel Acho from Uncomfortable conversations with a black man: Proximity breeds care and distance breeds fear. Acho meant it in the context of relationship to race but Diana believes it applies in our current situation in this pandemic: When you were physically in the same room as someone, face-to-face, and are looking into their eyes, you are able to feel a deeper level of compassion and empathy for them and to see their humanity. Now with masks there is even some distance there and dehumanization from not being able to see each other.It will be different when we are able to be with people again—we’ll need to meet people as they are, not who we knew them to be.Maggie loves Diana’s invitation to meet people anew, who they are now. Covid has been like a purification—we’re sloughing off the stuff that doesn’t fit or things that aren’t who we want to be—and it will continue when we are able to be with people again. We may not continue in some friendships that have changed in the interim, and that’s okay. In the absence of old relationships there will be the opportunity for new growth and new relationships.Alex notes that systems had to change in this season. Nothing is the same. We have inserted this new way of living into our lives that were already full and it has forced things other things come out because their isn’t enough room for it all. Everyone decided what it was that needed to be removed. Her family has had privilege in this season as their family was already a single-income household where her husband worked remotely for most of the week. But she acknowledges there have still been changes, additions and subtractions to their lives.“We are all doing this shifting prioritization juggling game to make our lives function. That alone changes us.” We may not opt to re-enter all the places we were in before.Danielle adds that we are slogging through this season. We can not process trauma while in trauma.Coming into Thanksgiving, Advent and Christmas—Danielle holds to this idea of a broken Hallelujah.Diana says her typical pre-covid  holiday season is really busy as a musician. But this “happy happy joy joy” version of Advent isn’t resonating this year. She’s exploring, “The Lament of Advent;” The pain and grumbling of the Advent season. She reads a passage from Reformed Worship:“Worship that is oriented to the coming kingdom leads naturally to two central expressions: intense groaning and expectant hope. Notice how Paul describes these two expressions in Romans 8:18-27. When we think about the coming kingdom of God, we can't help but long for an end to warfare, abuse, hunger, violence, illness, and death. Liturgical lament is our expression of this longing. As such, lament is not whining or complaining like that of the fickle Israelites in the desert. Rather it is the expression of the groaning that we feel as we long intensely for the coming kingdom of shalom.”She said she is trying to keep hope in these dark days… holding both the grief and the hope.Alex adds on to this discussion of hope with a quote from the Evolving Faith Podcast, Episode 17 with Derrick Dawson, “Sometimes I feel like I don’t have to hopeful. I just have to be diligent and faithful and get up the next day and do it again.”Advent can be different this year; Alex says they are not missed traditions, they are different ones. The intention is to acknowledge the growing this year as a way to increase the expectation.Diana says we are all growing, and there are growing pains. We need to use our new eyes! You have a new perspective. And this year, Advent can have new eyes and new perspective.Alex said they have blended the gratitude of Thanksgiving into their Christmas so that both traditions serve their family better—writing the things they are grateful for on slips of paper all month long and putting them in their stocking so that on Christmas they create a paper chain of gratitude.Alex asks, How do I parent them when I am so changed? We are experiencing growth and it’s is a good thing, so how can we incorporate these changes into our families this year, this Christmas?Danielle says “It’s not a lost faith, but a found one.” We’re actually ecstatic that Jesus is born because He bridges beauty and  brokenness, pain and joy, the now and the not yet. It’s something to celebrate!! Kids are not too young to learn, and it’s a way to disrupt the system!Maggie felt close to what Alex said regarding traditions in this season and also the lament that Diana talked about. This is a season where we can feel the darkness more than ever, and the need for Jesus to bring Light into the world. It is an invitation for us to shift in our traditions in a more meaningful way. ----Diana is reading: Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free by Linda Kay KleinDiana is listening to: Africana Music and Richard Rohr's The Universal Christ Book on tapeDiana is inspired by: People who are doing the hard and excruciating inner work during this season.Alex is reading: Something Worth Doing by Kirk Patrick and The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abby WaxmanAlex is listening to: "You're not Finished Yet" by the Belonging Co.Alex is inspired by: women and like-minded moms who are speaking life into her. And therapy

Diana Frazier - Story-teller, musician, worship leader, mother, wife and entrepreneur who's on sabbatical from her business Poulsbo Elderberry. Alex Jacobson -  Leader, speaker, writer, avid book reader and book reviewer, activist, advocate, lives on her hobby farm with her husband of 12 years and their five children. She's an excellent cook and provides tips and tricks on her instagram and <a href="http://www.inspirationclothesline.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">blog</a> @inspirationclothesline---We check in with these ladies who were on our podcast back in April (season one episode 25):Diana’s business was booming back in April, so much such so that she was killing herself with up to 60 hours a week AND she had all her kids home from school. She knew something had to give.Most days now, managing her children with distance learning is deeply challenging: There’s just not enough of her to go around. “It feels like you’re sucking at everything all the time and no one is getting the very best you.”Alex and her husband feel like they are handling things differently than most; they have very limited contact with the outside world because they have autoimmune disorders in their family. One of things that she has learned in this season from an online parenting class  is around the idea that kids have “buckets” that need to be filled in order for them to even be able to behave properly. Basically she came to realize that she can’t ask or expect her kids to function without some shifts in the way they are as parents. They are trying to get one-on-one time with each kid for ten minutes twice a day. It doesn’t happen everyday but the intention is to fill their kids’ buckets up so they have the energy and emotional bandwidth to behave when they are asked; and they are being asked to do more than before covid out of necessity.  It has increased the quality of their nuclear family. The biggest shifts have been in these internal systems. Everything is always changing, and even person to person.Alex says, “Life moves on in a pandemic. Life moves on in quarantine. Life has real issues, whether that is a presidential election, family drama or health issues… those things don’t stop. They get exponentially harder.”But thank God for therapy over zoom!Danielle says we are all trying to harness all the fragments of life, that normally other places in our lives would have collected for us. There is a spiritual and collective weight to what we’re all bearing. Trauma forces us to shift systems and perspectives, to cut out the [unnecessary] fat in our lives.Diana says this year has been “a walk in the wildness that I didn’t know I needed.” She has come to realize that in so many ways in her life she has been silenced, through trauma, abuse, theology… And it has forced her to not be able to show up as herself, bringing all of who she is. That she has had to shut down who she is in order to make others more comfortable. As she has been healing in this season, that means "I’ve been really unpopular with my family for sure and a lot of people this year because they are not used to this version of me. I’m not used to this version of me.” It’s a continually living in the “messy middle.”Diana said to her husband that he may have thought he was marrying a quiet, compliant church girl 15 years ago but instead has married someone very different. “We never could have known.”Maggie named that it has been costly for Diana; She’s become aware of that places she has been silenced and the ways she has had to shave off her sides in order to fit into other people’s spaces. She is reclaiming herself now. This covid season has in some ways given her the freedom to hold those boundaries and say, “No, this is who I actually am.” Maggie also noted how beautiful it is that in this season Diana is stepping into her prophetic truth-telling gifting, calling things out and becoming the best version of herself in the middle of a global pandemic.Alex says one of the things that happens when you are doing an internal work is that you realize you’re a part of systems. Whether that be systemic racism, a religious system, a familial system…  the way that you were was a component of that greater system. “When I change, the system around me will be forced to change. And I can’t manage how someone else feels about that change.”Alex mentioned a quote by Maryam Hasnaa “Be prepared for the emotional reactivity that’s going to come when you decide to release the pattern of trying to make everyone else comfortable at your own expense.”Alex says, if you are at all evolving, in your faith, in yourself, in family dynamics…If you’re evolving in anyway you are changing the systems around you.The questions Alex are asking are what will come out of this when we all are actually able to get back to interacting in the world? With people changing and systems changing, what will it look like to reenter with each other again? How am I going to react or respond to other people’s change, or changes in the systems that I am a part of? “We’re all literally going to come back into our communities different people.” Some more different than others.Danielle brings it to our physical bodies; how do our bodies interact with other bodies? We are going to have to deal with our scratches. How will we regulate — will it feel like coming home or coming into strangeness?Diana brings a quote from Emmanuel Acho from Uncomfortable conversations with a black man: Proximity breeds care and distance breeds fear. Acho meant it in the context of relationship to race but Diana believes it applies in our current situation in this pandemic: When you were physically in the same room as someone, face-to-face, and are looking into their eyes, you are able to feel a deeper level of compassion and empathy for them and to see their humanity. Now with masks there is even some distance there and dehumanization from not being able to see each other.It will be different when we are able to be with people again—we’ll need to meet people as they are, not who we knew them to be.Maggie loves Diana’s invitation to meet people anew, who they are now. Covid has been like a purification—we’re sloughing off the stuff that doesn’t fit or things that aren’t who we want to be—and it will continue when we are able to be with people again. We may not continue in some friendships that have changed in the interim, and that’s okay. In the absence of old relationships there will be the opportunity for new growth and new relationships.Alex notes that systems had to change in this season. Nothing is the same. We have inserted this new way of living into our lives that were already full and it has forced things other things come out because their isn’t enough room for it all. Everyone decided what it was that needed to be removed. Her family has had privilege in this season as their family was already a single-income household where her husband worked remotely for most of the week. But she acknowledges there have still been changes, additions and subtractions to their lives.“We are all doing this shifting prioritization juggling game to make our lives function. That alone changes us.” We may not opt to re-enter all the places we were in before.Danielle adds that we are slogging through this season. We can not process trauma while in trauma.Coming into Thanksgiving, Advent and Christmas—Danielle holds to this idea of a broken Hallelujah.Diana says her typical pre-covid  holiday season is really busy as a musician. But this “happy happy joy joy” version of Advent isn’t resonating this year. She’s exploring, “The Lament of Advent;” The pain and grumbling of the Advent season. She reads a passage from <a href="https://www.reformedworship.org/article/september-1997/time-weep-during-advent" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Reformed Worship</a>:“Worship that is oriented to the coming kingdom leads naturally to two central expressions: intense groaning and expectant hope. Notice how Paul describes these two expressions in Romans 8:18-27. When we think about the coming kingdom of God, we can't help but long for an end to warfare, abuse, hunger, violence, illness, and death. Liturgical lament is our expression of this longing. As such, lament is not whining or complaining like that of the fickle Israelites in the desert. Rather it is the expression of the groaning that we feel as we long intensely for the coming kingdom of shalom.”She said she is trying to keep hope in these dark days… holding both the grief and the hope.Alex adds on to this discussion of hope with a quote from the <a href="https://evolvingfaith.com/all-podcast-episodes/ep-17" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Evolving Faith Podcast, Episode 17</a> with Derrick Dawson, “Sometimes I feel like I don’t have to hopeful. I just have to be diligent and faithful and get up the next day and do it again.”Advent can be different this year; Alex says they are not missed traditions, they are different ones. The intention is to acknowledge the growing this year as a way to increase the expectation.Diana says we are all growing, and there are growing pains. We need to use our new eyes! You have a new perspective. And this year, Advent can have new eyes and new perspective.Alex said they have blended the gratitude of Thanksgiving into their Christmas so that both traditions serve their family better—writing the things they are grateful for on slips of paper all month long and putting them in their stocking so that on Christmas they create a paper chain of gratitude.Alex asks, How do I parent them when I am so changed? We are experiencing growth and it’s is a good thing, so how can we incorporate these changes into our families this year, this Christmas?Danielle says “It’s not a lost faith, but a found one.” We’re actually ecstatic that Jesus is born because He bridges beauty and  brokenness, pain and joy, the now and the not yet. It’s something to celebrate!! Kids are not too young to learn, and it’s a way to disrupt the system!Maggie felt close to what Alex said regarding traditions in this season and also the lament that Diana talked about. This is a season where we can feel the darkness more than ever, and the need for Jesus to bring Light into the world. It is an invitation for us to shift in our traditions in a more meaningful way. ----Diana is reading: Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free by Linda Kay KleinDiana is listening to: Africana Music and Richard Rohr's The Universal Christ Book on tapeDiana is inspired by: People who are doing the hard and excruciating inner work during this season.Alex is reading: Something Worth Doing by Kirk Patrick and The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abby WaxmanAlex is listening to: "You're not Finished Yet" by the Belonging Co.Alex is inspired by: women and like-minded moms who are speaking life into her. And therapy

Season 2, Episode 9: Diana Frazier and Alex Jacobson talk about Covid disruption, changing systems, hope and advent

Jennifer Tompos

LEAD

Diana Frazier - Entrepreneur, mother, story teller, musician, worship leaderWe start by checking in with Diana and how she is doing during this time of shelter in place.She says it’s been crazy.  As she tells her kids let’s “taking one day at a time,” and she takes her own advice by waking up and thinking only of today.Diana’s business - Poulsbo Elderberry - is the busiest it’s ever been in the year and half that she’s owned it. This comes during a time when she now has her four children at home with her and her husband still working. She says is overwhelming, “How do I keep producing and keep up with the ever increasing demand while also being a mom some how?”When things first starting amping up she was so busy that one day she realized she hadn’t gone to the bathroom in over six hours. It was because she was working, not stopping to eat or  even to go to the bathroom all the while her “house was exploding around her” with kids running around.We asked her why is her business booming so much? She started Poulsbo Elderberry back in 2018. It’s a pre-made Elderberry syrup with herbs that used as an antiviral immune support. Diana said even just 5 years ago people didn’t really even know about Elderberry. The added herbs like echinacea, hibiscus, ginger and other things that help boost the immune system. It’s been growing in popularity since 2018 but with the Coronavirus she says that even people who “wouldn’t believe in that stuff” are even thinking they should try it.Winter cold and flu season is usually her busy time of year of but she has seen her business increase by 500%!! Which is insane. She said it really would be more but she actually runs out and can not meet the demand! Like a lot of businesses right now she is stuck waiting on the supply chain. Diana always tries to buy locally and support other business in the Seattle area but when the Coronavirus hit it was sudden and hard she found herself unable to get the bottles she used and even some of the herbs. She has to order from 7 or 8 places and hope that one of them will be able to fulfill her order and actually show up.It’s said all over media that this is “unprecedented,” we are living in a time when nothing like this has ever happened. It reminds Danielle about trauma and how it has all these tentacles reaching so many different parts.Diana reiterates that trauma is a place of powerlessness and right now none of us have control over what’s happening or will happen. She said she can feel like she is in control by placing orders to her suppliers, but she doesn’t have any control over whether they will be filled.She and her husband have a long history of significant medical trauma and so to experience COVID-19 right now she is coming from a perspective of “I’ve already sat vigil while he was dying three times…. I don’t want to do that again.”  She finds her herself busy with work and wondering if she is busy because she doesn’t want to think about or experience the trauma they are in. Everything is amplified for a lot of people because of trauma that we carry with us.The fact that this is a medical trauma feels very personal for her.There is this sense of triggering; we’ve done this before, while also having nuances that are different and how our responses can be different. Most of the time when someone is triggered they are having feelings from the past come up in the present but their present self is actually safe. Diana says what we’re experiencing now is a trigger but with a real sense of danger to our present self.Danielle said many people are struggling to just validate their reality. There’s this attack against our reality. “In this moment I may be safe, but I don’t know.” That is legitimate fear.  COVID lives in the air for three hours so the air we breathe could be toxic even when there is no one around. So even when we take all the precautions of social distancing there’s this weight that it is not enough. How do we validate ourselves without freaking out?Diana says there’s an inner dialogue happening, “Am I spiraling right now?" Where we critique our own feelings. There’s so much peace in just saying, no that’s a real feeling right now and there is so much that is uncertain for ourselves and our loved ones. We also don’t have the benefit of being able to go on a walk with a friend or get coffee with a friend.Maggie says she is an extravert this is has been a hard season of not being able to get together with people. She asks Diana what she does in lieu of not being able to go hang with her friends? Diana says she is also an extravert and her self care is looking like showering every day. “What can I do that gives me a sense of normal right now? I shower and I put on makeup and it doesn’t matter that I won’t see anyone.” She also finds time to play piano and sing, working out. She does these things not because she is pretending everything is normal but knowing that she isn’t going to feel great if she has not showered and is not dressed and ready for the day.Danielle asks Diana about any resources that she has been using during this season: Going to therapy! Still having a safe connection, a place where she can empty out what she is processing. Diana also curates what she is viewing on instagram, making sure that she is not seeing things that make her feel like she is not enough. She I just aware of what she is interacting with with.You can connect with Diana at: poulsboelderberry.com also on facebook and instagram.----Alex Jacobson: Wife, mother of 5, leader, bible journal-er, speaker, writer, avid book reader and book reviewer, activist, advocate, lives on her hobby farm with her husband of 12 years, and she’s an excellent cook sharing her cooking tips and tricks on Instagram.Alex has been strictly  social distancing since March 13th [16 days at the time of this recording] because both her husband and her father, who she usually sees daily, have auto-immune disorders so they have been taking social distancing very seriously from the start.It’s weighty to carry the responsibility of her husband’s health as well as trying to keep the trauma low for their kids by making the experience positive while also keeping them informed and helping them understand why we’re going through this. “There’s a very specific reason we’re taking extra precautions.”For her kids, only one even knows or heard the word “coronavirus.” Their family had gone screen-free two months ago, which she felt was a prompting for her family, and so her kids are getting very little outside influence. She says that they know that they are staying home to stay healthy, and that means not seeing going to see friends and really not even going out to the store for errands. It’s a means to protect their Papa who has diabetes, as well as their grandparents, “Nona” and “Dandad.” They’ve focused on re-learning to wash hands. They are keeping medical visits through screens as well as with their kids’ teachers. “We’re just really being selective as to what screen, what media they engage with.”Danielle said that’s a lot to juggle: managing her kids and protecting her husband and father… But how is she doing?Alex says she normally ends her days “tired" because she is a high energy multi-task-er but now she ends her days exhausted. She’s been sore in her body and also more sleepy-tired, sleep being much harder to come by with a nursing baby. She said she also has less child-free adult time, and that has been hard as well. She knows sleep is important so her husband has been trying to give her an extra hour of sleep in the morning. In the evenings she has been caring for her body by getting in the hot tub to relax. She is watching an hour of news every couple of days and reading which feeds her. And with this that she HAS to do, like cooking three meals a day, she tries to make them fun by trying new recipes and sharing on social media.When their self-quarantine started she recognized her need to acknowledge what she’s grateful for. She hasn’t ever kept a gratitude journal or anything but she just knew she needed to say what she is grateful for in this season and she decided to share it on social media. And on that first day she had a response that it was so good to read that she decided to keep it up every day. Now that she’s doing it, it’s easier to find things she is grateful for.Alex has always done cooking at home in her Instagram stories but now that people are home and cooking at home they are reaching out to her more and using it as a resource. One thing she’s been thinking about in this time is how to care for others. She said,” there’s only so many things I can do during the day” but responding to people on Instagram about their cooking questions feels like one way she can care for others during this time, especially as she is limited by the walls of her home.  Alex wants to love on and encourage others as best she can.Danielle remarks that social media has become more community oriented. Before social media was a polarizing and isolating, plagued with comparison. And now there’s this sense that “no, I don’t have to be Alex… can you help me? How do you do this?” It’s a sweet connection.Alex noticed the same thing. She was watching Kelly Welk’s instagram story on pizza dough and it inspired her to try it. It didn’t work for her so she jumped over to her cousin’s post on some quick and easy Korean beef bowls and she was able to whip that up instead. The sharing on social media as been life-giving in so many ways. The ways we are influencing each other, rather than comparison, are more unifying.Maggie asked Alex how is is staying connected during this time of social distancing. She said her church has moved it’s services online and she’s been loving that. She’s also using a new app called House Party were you can play games live with friends. Because she’s an android user she doesn’t have FaceTime so she’s actually been using Zoom for a long time. Alex also uses Marco Polo which is a video messaging app, which you can view whenever it’s convent. When she thinks of someone she texts them right then, because she believes theres a reason she is thinking about that person.Alex, over the past year or so, has been in the practice of writing prayers and using scriptures as prayer. When she thinks about her friends she’ll write a prayer, send a scripture or a worship song that reminded her of that person. She tries to let them know the exact words she prayed over them.Connect with Alex:InspirationClothesline.com@inspirationclothesline for both facebook and instagramShe also has done IGTVs and fb live.Alex is doing a book review of Jen Hatmaker’s upcoming book: “Fierce Free Fire” so stay tuned on her blog fo the review.-----Jennifer TomposJennifer is a  Pastor in Oregon. She's a Leader, Mother, Wife, Graduate student, hard worker and friend.In light of COVID Jennifer has found that her work has been confusing.  She and her team have to redefine what a win looks like and how to make a team work well. “It’s hard to lead teams when you’re not getting together.”Musical time has been a felt loss.What are we offering to people, how do we offer community when no one can be together, and how to make content that’s helpful rather than just more noise.There’s so much context out there already. Pointing to other stuff out there lacks the personal connection, the people you know. Contextual applicable down to the community level.Staff signed up on a google sheet and are taking turns going live online instagram for 5-10 minutes to keep people updated and communicated with. You don’t want to run the risk of being just “promotional.” You don’t want to be distracting. There’s a tension — they need to hear from you and you need to let people off the hook.It’s easy to be discouraged right now, “Am I accomplishing anything?” Everyone is asking these same questions during this time of upheaval. Before you can ask someone to meet another person’s need, as a leader you need to make sure they are okay first, to experience their own grief.This season marathon not a sprint.Sabbath and rest is super important for Jennifer. This time is not a break for everyone, especially for people who are being targeted by racial injustice, who are low income or are struggling finically to make it through this time.This time is a little counter cultural - everything is normally very fast paced and we have an opportunity to slow down. Jennifer calls it the silver-lining of this current situation is to make time for rest as leaders. Jesus rested!It’s easy as a leader to become a part of the problem if we’re pushing our people to be more productive. It’s actually antithetical to the gospel. This is an opportunity for healthier rhythms, rhythms that create more peace in the midst of this anxiety.Danielle says there is already a layer of trauma in our society. One way to numb out from trauma is to get really busy so you don’t have time to notice what’s around you, to feel depressed or traumatized. We are living through trauma right now it is ongoing, and we need permission to feel, to become un-busy, and to rest in the grief.Jennifer says she wonders if leaders feel awkward doing instagram live; there’s a vulnerability to saying things out into the internet and not knowing who is listening out there…. It feels more intimidating than in person trainings that aren’t recorded.Danielle asks Jennifer how she holds zoom meetings and work from home with kids and do grad school. She replies, “well it’s all a big circus!” Her husband interrupted her zoom meeting last night because their son had swallowed a plastic dinosaur and had to go to the ER. “Not a place you want to be going during a pandemic.” She said most of her life works right now because she and her husband are tag teaming it. She knows it is a privilege that her husband is working from home right now and not everyone has that luxury, so that helps. She is leveraging tv time, using it for when she needs to do video conferencing.Jennifer said that she’d had to lower her expectations. She finds there’s a correlation between expectations and her level of aggravation. There’s more freedom at her house than their usually would be… Kids pick up on tension and anxiety from us. The kids are also missing their friends and the regular schedule.Jennifer in regards to her grad school said she would not advise learning an ancient language in the middle of a pandemic. Every day she sets expectations for what is reasonable to do during this day only in regards to self care, kids, husband, school, and work.Connect with Jennifer on Instagram @JenniferTompos

Diana Frazier - Entrepreneur, mother, story teller, musician, worship leaderWe start by checking in with Diana and how she is doing during this time of shelter in place.She says it’s been crazy.  As she tells her kids let’s “taking one day at a time,” and she takes her own advice by waking up and thinking only of today.Diana’s business - <a href="https://www.poulsboelderberry.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Poulsbo Elderberry</a> - is the busiest it’s ever been in the year and half that she’s owned it. This comes during a time when she now has her four children at home with her and her husband still working. She says is overwhelming, “How do I keep producing and keep up with the ever increasing demand while also being a mom some how?”When things first starting amping up she was so busy that one day she realized she hadn’t gone to the bathroom in over six hours. It was because she was working, not stopping to eat or  even to go to the bathroom all the while her “house was exploding around her” with kids running around.We asked her why is her business booming so much? She started Poulsbo Elderberry back in 2018. It’s a pre-made Elderberry syrup with herbs that used as an antiviral immune support. Diana said even just 5 years ago people didn’t really even know about Elderberry. The added herbs like echinacea, hibiscus, ginger and other things that help boost the immune system. It’s been growing in popularity since 2018 but with the Coronavirus she says that even people who “wouldn’t believe in that stuff” are even thinking they should try it.Winter cold and flu season is usually her busy time of year of but she has seen her business increase by 500%!! Which is insane. She said it really would be more but she actually runs out and can not meet the demand! Like a lot of businesses right now she is stuck waiting on the supply chain. Diana always tries to buy locally and support other business in the Seattle area but when the Coronavirus hit it was sudden and hard she found herself unable to get the bottles she used and even some of the herbs. She has to order from 7 or 8 places and hope that one of them will be able to fulfill her order and actually show up.It’s said all over media that this is “unprecedented,” we are living in a time when nothing like this has ever happened. It reminds Danielle about trauma and how it has all these tentacles reaching so many different parts.Diana reiterates that trauma is a place of powerlessness and right now none of us have control over what’s happening or will happen. She said she can feel like she is in control by placing orders to her suppliers, but she doesn’t have any control over whether they will be filled.She and her husband have a long history of significant medical trauma and so to experience COVID-19 right now she is coming from a perspective of “I’ve already sat vigil while he was dying three times…. I don’t want to do that again.”  She finds her herself busy with work and wondering if she is busy because she doesn’t want to think about or experience the trauma they are in. Everything is amplified for a lot of people because of trauma that we carry with us.The fact that this is a medical trauma feels very personal for her.There is this sense of triggering; we’ve done this before, while also having nuances that are different and how our responses can be different. Most of the time when someone is triggered they are having feelings from the past come up in the present but their present self is actually safe. Diana says what we’re experiencing now is a trigger but with a real sense of danger to our present self.Danielle said many people are struggling to just validate their reality. There’s this attack against our reality. “In this moment I may be safe, but I don’t know.” That is legitimate fear.  COVID lives in the air for three hours so the air we breathe could be toxic even when there is no one around. So even when we take all the precautions of social distancing there’s this weight that it is not enough. How do we validate ourselves without freaking out?Diana says there’s an inner dialogue happening, “Am I spiraling right now?" Where we critique our own feelings. There’s so much peace in just saying, no that’s a real feeling right now and there is so much that is uncertain for ourselves and our loved ones. We also don’t have the benefit of being able to go on a walk with a friend or get coffee with a friend.Maggie says she is an extravert this is has been a hard season of not being able to get together with people. She asks Diana what she does in lieu of not being able to go hang with her friends? Diana says she is also an extravert and her self care is looking like showering every day. “What can I do that gives me a sense of normal right now? I shower and I put on makeup and it doesn’t matter that I won’t see anyone.” She also finds time to play piano and sing, working out. She does these things not because she is pretending everything is normal but knowing that she isn’t going to feel great if she has not showered and is not dressed and ready for the day.Danielle asks Diana about any resources that she has been using during this season: Going to therapy! Still having a safe connection, a place where she can empty out what she is processing. Diana also curates what she is viewing on instagram, making sure that she is not seeing things that make her feel like she is not enough. She I just aware of what she is interacting with with.You can connect with Diana at: <a href="http://poulsboelderberry.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">poulsboelderberry.com</a> also on facebook and instagram.----Alex Jacobson: Wife, mother of 5, leader, bible journal-er, speaker, writer, avid book reader and book reviewer, activist, advocate, lives on her hobby farm with her husband of 12 years, and she’s an excellent cook sharing her cooking tips and tricks on Instagram.Alex has been strictly  social distancing since March 13th [16 days at the time of this recording] because both her husband and her father, who she usually sees daily, have auto-immune disorders so they have been taking social distancing very seriously from the start.It’s weighty to carry the responsibility of her husband’s health as well as trying to keep the trauma low for their kids by making the experience positive while also keeping them informed and helping them understand why we’re going through this. “There’s a very specific reason we’re taking extra precautions.”For her kids, only one even knows or heard the word “coronavirus.” Their family had gone screen-free two months ago, which she felt was a prompting for her family, and so her kids are getting very little outside influence. She says that they know that they are staying home to stay healthy, and that means not seeing going to see friends and really not even going out to the store for errands. It’s a means to protect their Papa who has diabetes, as well as their grandparents, “Nona” and “Dandad.” They’ve focused on re-learning to wash hands. They are keeping medical visits through screens as well as with their kids’ teachers. “We’re just really being selective as to what screen, what media they engage with.”Danielle said that’s a lot to juggle: managing her kids and protecting her husband and father… But how is she doing?Alex says she normally ends her days “tired" because she is a high energy multi-task-er but now she ends her days exhausted. She’s been sore in her body and also more sleepy-tired, sleep being much harder to come by with a nursing baby. She said she also has less child-free adult time, and that has been hard as well. She knows sleep is important so her husband has been trying to give her an extra hour of sleep in the morning. In the evenings she has been caring for her body by getting in the hot tub to relax. She is watching an hour of news every couple of days and reading which feeds her. And with this that she HAS to do, like cooking three meals a day, she tries to make them fun by trying new recipes and sharing on social media.When their self-quarantine started she recognized her need to acknowledge what she’s grateful for. She hasn’t ever kept a gratitude journal or anything but she just knew she needed to say what she is grateful for in this season and she decided to share it on social media. And on that first day she had a response that it was so good to read that she decided to keep it up every day. Now that she’s doing it, it’s easier to find things she is grateful for.Alex has always done cooking at home in her Instagram stories but now that people are home and cooking at home they are reaching out to her more and using it as a resource. One thing she’s been thinking about in this time is how to care for others. She said,” there’s only so many things I can do during the day” but responding to people on Instagram about their cooking questions feels like one way she can care for others during this time, especially as she is limited by the walls of her home.  Alex wants to love on and encourage others as best she can.Danielle remarks that social media has become more community oriented. Before social media was a polarizing and isolating, plagued with comparison. And now there’s this sense that “no, I don’t have to be Alex… can you help me? How do you do this?” It’s a sweet connection.Alex noticed the same thing. She was watching Kelly Welk’s instagram story on pizza dough and it inspired her to try it. It didn’t work for her so she jumped over to her cousin’s post on some quick and easy Korean beef bowls and she was able to whip that up instead. The sharing on social media as been life-giving in so many ways. The ways we are influencing each other, rather than comparison, are more unifying.Maggie asked Alex how is is staying connected during this time of social distancing. She said her church has moved it’s services online and she’s been loving that. She’s also using a new app called House Party were you can play games live with friends. Because she’s an android user she doesn’t have FaceTime so she’s actually been using Zoom for a long time. Alex also uses Marco Polo which is a video messaging app, which you can view whenever it’s convent. When she thinks of someone she texts them right then, because she believes theres a reason she is thinking about that person.Alex, over the past year or so, has been in the practice of writing prayers and using scriptures as prayer. When she thinks about her friends she’ll write a prayer, send a scripture or a worship song that reminded her of that person. She tries to let them know the exact words she prayed over them.Connect with Alex:<a href="http://InspirationClothesline.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">InspirationClothesline.com</a>@inspirationclothesline for both facebook and instagramShe also has done IGTVs and fb live.Alex is doing a book review of Jen Hatmaker’s upcoming book: “Fierce Free Fire” so stay tuned on her blog fo the review.-----Jennifer TomposJennifer is a  Pastor in Oregon. She's a Leader, Mother, Wife, Graduate student, hard worker and friend.In light of COVID Jennifer has found that her work has been confusing.  She and her team have to redefine what a win looks like and how to make a team work well. “It’s hard to lead teams when you’re not getting together.”Musical time has been a felt loss.What are we offering to people, how do we offer community when no one can be together, and how to make content that’s helpful rather than just more noise.There’s so much context out there already. Pointing to other stuff out there lacks the personal connection, the people you know. Contextual applicable down to the community level.Staff signed up on a google sheet and are taking turns going live online instagram for 5-10 minutes to keep people updated and communicated with. You don’t want to run the risk of being just “promotional.” You don’t want to be distracting. There’s a tension — they need to hear from you and you need to let people off the hook.It’s easy to be discouraged right now, “Am I accomplishing anything?” Everyone is asking these same questions during this time of upheaval. Before you can ask someone to meet another person’s need, as a leader you need to make sure they are okay first, to experience their own grief.This season marathon not a sprint.Sabbath and rest is super important for Jennifer. This time is not a break for everyone, especially for people who are being targeted by racial injustice, who are low income or are struggling finically to make it through this time.This time is a little counter cultural - everything is normally very fast paced and we have an opportunity to slow down. Jennifer calls it the silver-lining of this current situation is to make time for rest as leaders. Jesus rested!It’s easy as a leader to become a part of the problem if we’re pushing our people to be more productive. It’s actually antithetical to the gospel. This is an opportunity for healthier rhythms, rhythms that create more peace in the midst of this anxiety.Danielle says there is already a layer of trauma in our society. One way to numb out from trauma is to get really busy so you don’t have time to notice what’s around you, to feel depressed or traumatized. We are living through trauma right now it is ongoing, and we need permission to feel, to become un-busy, and to rest in the grief.Jennifer says she wonders if leaders feel awkward doing instagram live; there’s a vulnerability to saying things out into the internet and not knowing who is listening out there…. It feels more intimidating than in person trainings that aren’t recorded.Danielle asks Jennifer how she holds zoom meetings and work from home with kids and do grad school. She replies, “well it’s all a big circus!” Her husband interrupted her zoom meeting last night because their son had swallowed a plastic dinosaur and had to go to the ER. “Not a place you want to be going during a pandemic.” She said most of her life works right now because she and her husband are tag teaming it. She knows it is a privilege that her husband is working from home right now and not everyone has that luxury, so that helps. She is leveraging tv time, using it for when she needs to do video conferencing.Jennifer said that she’d had to lower her expectations. She finds there’s a correlation between expectations and her level of aggravation. There’s more freedom at her house than their usually would be… Kids pick up on tension and anxiety from us. The kids are also missing their friends and the regular schedule.Jennifer in regards to her grad school said she would not advise learning an ancient language in the middle of a pandemic. Every day she sets expectations for what is reasonable to do during this day only in regards to self care, kids, husband, school, and work.Connect with Jennifer on Instagram @JenniferTompos

Season 1, Episode 25: Collection of Stories from Women Who Lead, Diana Frazier, Alex Jacobson, and Jennifer Tompos