Change is a part of life. Yet every time change happens, I seem to immediately respond with negativity. This season, I want to move forward with anticipation instead.

Thank you for listening to Sabbath Cafe Podcast. You can find transcripts and previous episodes on Sabbathcafe.substack.com.

Sabbath Cafe Podcast is also available here:

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Youtube: @SabbathCafePodcast

I often turn to guided meditations to pause my anxious thoughts. Just 10 minutes can help reset our emotions. Join me for a calm and restful session.

Meditation starts at 0:45.

Music is “Wide Flower Fields” by AudioCoffee: https://www.audiocoffee.net

Welcome to the Sabbath Cafe Podcast. This is Episode 133 - Simply begin again. For transcripts and more episodes, please go to sabbathcafe.substack.com.

Hi everyone! Thanks for listening to the Sabbath Cafe Podcast. And welcome to our first episode of 2025. I hope you all had a good holiday season and had a good restful time.

Usually me and my family, we take a break in some downtime at the end of the year. And so by the time January rolls around, supposedly we're all ready to go, right? I was very excited. I had a great break with a lot of new ideas. And so I thought, "Great. January started, new year. I am ready to go and jumping into all these new projects."

But sometimes, when you're so excited about a vision or all these things in your mind and you sit down at the table to start working on it, all of a sudden, you feel so intimidated.

I think for me it's a few things all mixed together there's the self-doubt of starting new projects, and then just trying to get back into anything after a break always takes time. And I know for sure that the first couple of tries, I will be making mistakes just because I'm trying to remember some of the things… trying to warm up.

And as a recovering perfectionist, I often get stuck at this stage. I don't know why, but the idea of making mistakes often keep me from moving forward.

And a few years back, I learned about this exercise of beginning again, how to begin again. And it has been so helpful for when I feel paralyzed in the process.

This is actually an old Franciscan advice or exercise. Basically, it's to treat yourself as a beginner. And whatever project or whatever you're trying to do, just think of yourself doing it as a beginner. And it sounds simple, but it's such a powerful tool.

When we begin again, we wipe the slate clean. We just toss away any expectation of ourselves and just reconnect and focus on what we need to work on.

And it also helps to get rid of any guilt or shame you may feel about taking a break. The feelings of guilt and shame, they only keep us stuck looking at the past. They don't really help us move forward. And so when we begin again and start over, we can kind of put those things aside and simply jump back into the process.

This is so helpful when you want to make any long-term changes. Whether it's about exercising, eating better, or just building any new habits, it takes time for these new routines to form and to adapt. And so whenever you find yourself falling back into old habits or quitting new routines, there's no need to beat yourself up. Just simply begin again.

This idea of starting and restarting as a beginner is also a great exercise for us folks who wrestle with ADHD tendencies. This practice removes so much of that self-criticism that we always hear in our thoughts that brings the guilt and the shame. And so this exercise is remove those things so we can simply move forward and start to re-engage with the process.

If you have ADHD tendencies, you know what I'm talking about. Even before we start anything, that critical inner voice almost always has already killed any motivation. And so whenever I feel those old voices starting again, I just have to remind myself to simply begin again. Then I can just stop all those criticisms and remove all that self-sabotage.

And so if you have been thinking about starting or restarting any projects or habit in the new year, I hope you will give this a try. Simply begin again and just take that next step.

Treat yourself like a beginner and enjoy the process of learning and discovering.

Treat yourself as a beginner and give yourself the grace to practice without any expectations.

Learning to begin again really helped me get unstuck so many times in my process. I hope it'll be helpful for you too.

And that's it for this episode.

For transcript and the podcast archive, please visit sabbathcafe.substack.com.

Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time.

We're a just few days away from 2025. Are you ready?

Music by Oleg Kirilkov. Use under Pixabay content license.

The idea of Sabbath and rest seem to be a major theme in my life and God often brings my focus back onto rest and the heart of Mary. Maybe this is a good time for me to start sharing on this topic…

Click here for transcripts and more.

Sabbath Cafe Podcast is now available on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@SabbathCafePodcast

Welcome to the Sabbath Cafe Podcast. This is Episode 130, “Praying for Healing”. You can find transcripts and more at SabbathCafe.Substack.com. 

Hi, everyone! 

Thank you for listening to the Sabbath Cafe Podcast. This is Michele, and today I want to talk about praying for healing. 

I guess for me, it's actually a very personal topic to talk about. In the church I grew up in, praying for healing is actually kind of controversial. I don't know why... because in scripture, you just see God constantly healing people.  Whether it's in the Old Testament and especially in the New Testament, you see that anytime anyone comes up to Jesus to ask for healing, Jesus always answered and he always healed them.  

Now, there are many different ways he healed them, but he always did. So I think after a season, I was reading scripture and I just realized God is a compassionate God and that Jesus always was so compassionate when people are suffering from physical ailment, and come to Him and to ask for relief and to ask for healing. Jesus always healed them. And I realized that God is very welcoming for us to come to Him and ask for healing. And He wants to heal us. And that just gave me so much faith and so much encouragement. So I pretty much started praying for myself. 

Ever since then, if I have allergies or if I had a headache, I just started to pray over healing for myself. And there's just been so many great experiences. Sometimes God would tell me, "you're a bit dehydrated, you need to go drink water." That's pretty simple, but hey, you know, it really did heal most of my ailments. 

Many times the Lord would just give me a lot of peace, and then I have a good night rest. And the next day, I just feel so much better. Sometimes, after a season of prayer, I would find and understand what are the triggers that cause some of these symptoms that I was dealing with. And that's kind of also how I started to learn more about how does prayer for healing also work when we have such a great and advanced medical system. 

Here in the States, we're blessed with a lot of pharmaceutical advancements. And there's pretty much a pill you can take to deal with all sorts of symptoms. Also, kind of what I understood is that even with medicine, most of the medicine will manage your symptoms. They manage the symptoms so it alleviates the pressure in your body and helps your own immune system and your body's natural function to kick in. But at the end, it is still your body's own regeneration and immune system that brings about the healing. So that helped me to understand how does prayer for healing come hand in hand with our medical system. 

Also, there's this assumption in many Christian circles that the only way God answers these type of healing prayers is through miraculous, instantaneous healing. They sort of discount everything else. If they don't see it right away, then they discount it. They think that God did not answer their prayers. I actually think that's putting God in a box. In scripture, Jesus healed in many ways. Personally, I think God can heal however He wants to, whether it's instant miraculous healing or through a process. 

And a lot of times, it's also the patient themselves and what is best for the patient's situation. Many years ago, we had prayed for a missionary lady. She was going through chemo. She was diagnosed with cancer. And she's been in the mission field for years, worked really hard.  

And when we were praying for her, her prayer request was that God will heal her quickly so that she can go back to the people that she was caring for.  And as we were praying for her, we just really sensed that God is more concerned about her health condition, and her body was really, really tired. God was recommending that she take her time in the States to go through the recommended treatment and to just take a season of rest. A Sabbath season, if you will, to help her body to recover. 

And it was interesting because she wasn't very happy when we shared what we sensed in our heart. She wanted to be healed, be done with the treatment, so then she can get right back to her ministry work, but what God cared more about was her. God wasn't worried about this other group of people that she was taking care of. What God was more concerned was about this lady herself - that she was tired and she needed rest and she needed care herself. She needed to recover. 

I see that as much as God can heal the sickness itself, what He really wants to do is to address the root of the issue. For most of the time when I'm praying for healing, whether it's for myself or other people, the prayer is just an invitation. It's just a question. And then what's really important is to take the time to listen afterwards. 

In some cases, God will simply affirm our path of care and even help you connect with the right medical professional. And in some cases, God will start to highlight bad habits that had led us to this place. Once after we prayed, God actually reminded us to start giving thanks because thanksgiving would help the patient to remain hopeful, to have faith and not feel so frustrated because his healing process seems to be progressing very slowly. 

And it's interesting because God is looking at working with us holistically. Our physical body, our emotions, and even our thoughts and mindsets...these are all interconnected with each other. If we are to pray for healing, then God will start to help us improve in many of these areas. So really what I see is that praying for healing and getting medical care really goes hand in hand.  

To be honest, whenever I ask somebody if they would like me to pray for them, no one ever said no. I think everyone always welcomes that when they're going through illnesses or sickness. I always tell them, "hey, what do we have to lose, right?"  And every time we prayed for people, we've always had more insights and even breakthroughs in the situation. 

So if you ever wonder, well, how do I learn to pray for healing? Just start. The best way is to start by praying for yourself. Next time you have a cold or if you have a headache, start small. Allergies... Pray for yourself, pray for your family, and just pay attention to see how God leads you in the process. 

And that's it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. You can find resources and transcript at sabbathcafe.substack.com. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to Sabbath Cafe Podcast on Apple or Spotify.  And we are now available on YouTube also. Have a wonderful week, and we'll see you next time. 

The book mentioned in this episode is Dopamine Nation by Dr. Anna Lembke.

Here's a fun 20 minute presentation by Dr. Lembke. You can also find longer and more in-depth interviews with Dr. Lambke on Youtube.

For transcripts and more, visit sabbathcafe.substack.com.

Hi everyone, this is Michele. We have an important update for you. We're making some changes behind the scene at Sabbath Cafe Podcast.

If you're listening to us from Apple Podcast or Spotify, or if you're on our mailing list, the change should be really smooth for you. You will continue to get all of the updates.

But if you're listening to us through another platform, please consider subscribing through Apple Podcast or Spotify so you won't miss a single episode.

And you can always find us at SabbathCafeBlog.com.

We're slowly migrating everything over, so please bear with us during the transition.

There will be a new episode dropping in a few weeks, and you should be seeing that episode automatically through iTunes or Spotify.

Thank you so much for listening. You have been a great encouragement to me and I'm excited about this move. We will see you soon and have a wonderful week.

You can continue to find Sabbath Cafe Podcast at:

Hi everyone!  

This is Michele.  We have an important update for you. We are making some changes behind the scenes at Sabbath Café Podcast. If you’re listening to us from Apple Podcast or Spotify or if you’re on our mailing list, the change should be really smooth for you. You will continue to get all of the updates.    

But, if you’re listening to us through another platform, please consider subscribing through Apple Podcast or Spotify, so you won’t miss a single episode. And you can always find us at http://www.sabbathcafeblog.com. ;

 We’re slowly migrating everything over, so please bear with us during the transition. There will be a new episode dropping in a few weeks. And you should be seeing that episode automatically through Apple Podcast and Spotify.   

 Thank you so much for listening. You have been a great encouragement to me, and I’m excited about this move. We’ll see you soon, and have a wonderful week!