The Confident Woman Podcast

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Have you ever felt God calling you toward something, but you kept questioning whether you were the right person, whether you were ready, or whether you had what it would take to follow through?

What happens when obedience requires you to move forward before you have all the answers?

In this episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, Rachel Brooks sits down with Dr. LaTonya Jones, pastor, retired U.S. Army combat veteran, leader of Fishers of Men World Ministries, and founder of The Altar Call Tent Revival, for a powerful conversation about faith, fear, obedience, and surrender.

Dr. LaTonya shares how her journey from street ministry and community outreach led to a vision for large tent revivals, including God's instruction not to build a stage because the gatherings were never meant to be about recognition, but about serving Him and bringing people back to Jesus.

As their conversation unfolds, Rachel shares her own experience of resisting the call to write her first book, the fear she felt before stepping onto a stage in Beverly Hills, and the unexpected encounter with one woman that changed how she understood the purpose behind showing up.

Together, they explore what it means to trust God when you don't feel prepared, why the seasons when nobody sees what God is doing still matter, and how surrender often begins when we recognize we've been trying to carry everything in our own strength.

What we get into

• How Dr. LaTonya's vision for The Altar Call Tent Revival began and why she was instructed not to build a stage
• What obedience looks like when you're afraid, uncertain, or questioning whether you're qualified
• What Moses, Gideon, and Jeremiah teach us about God's calling and our perceived limitations
• Rachel's personal experience of saying yes to writing her book and discovering the impact of sharing her story
• Why seasons of obscurity, preparation, and transformation matter, even when nobody else sees what's happening
• What surrender can look like when you're exhausted, trying to control the outcome, and learning to bring everything before God in honest prayer

A question to carry with you this week

What have you been waiting to feel fully prepared for before taking the next step God has placed on your heart?

Join the conversation

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Create Your Own Story

Rachel continues sharing her personal journey through faith, identity, healing, confidence, and becoming in Create Your Own Story. Join the conversation as she writes about the experiences, questions, and lessons shaping this season of her life.

Subscribe to Create Your Own Story

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Connect with Dr. LaTonya Jones

Learn more about Fishers of Men World Ministries, The Altar Call Tent Revival, and Dr. LaTonya's work.

Website: https://www.fishersofmenwm.com/

Connect with Rachel Brooks

Instagram: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

Have you ever finally sat down to relax, only to feel guilty about everything you should be doing instead? Maybe it's answering emails, cleaning the house, preparing dinner, working on your business, or tackling another task on a list that never seems to end.

In this solo episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, Rachel Brooks explores why slowing down can feel so uncomfortable, especially when you've spent years identifying as a high achiever, a hard worker, or the person who always gets things done.

As Rachel reflects on her own becoming journey, she shares how perfectionism can shift from our appearance and achievements into our everyday productivity, until what we accomplish becomes the way we measure our worth.

Through an honest conversation about ambition, faith, responsibility, and rest, Rachel examines the difference between godly diligence and self-reliant hustle, what happens when we begin treating peace as something we have to earn, and the invitation Jesus gives us in Matthew 11:28–30.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Why resting can trigger guilt, anxiety, and the feeling that you should be doing something.
• How productivity can become another form of perfectionism.
• The difference between stewarding your gifts and trying to prove your worth through your work.
• Why unfinished tasks don't have to determine whether you've had a good day.
• Three practical shifts to help separate your identity from your accomplishments and begin practicing rest without guilt.

A question to carry with you this week:

If you accomplished absolutely nothing today, what would you say and believe about yourself?

Mentioned in this episode

The Permission Slip: A free resource to help you give yourself permission to pause and stop measuring your worth by what you accomplish.

Download The Permission Slip

Scripture: Matthew 11:28–30

Thank you for listening to The Confident Woman Podcast. If this conversation resonated with you, share it with a woman who may need to hear it, and follow the show for more conversations about faith, identity, confidence, purpose, and becoming.

Connect with Rachel Brooks at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

Have you spent so long being the woman everyone depends on that you don’t know who you are outside of what you do for them?

You can be capable, independent, and successful while realizing the life you’ve built no longer reflects what matters to you.

In this episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, Rachel Brooks joins mother, author, and board-certified family nurse practitioner Chelsea Ann O’Brien to explore identity, inherited expectations, and redefining success.

Chelsea shares how divorce and motherhood challenged her priorities, drawing from her books, The Feminine Effect and The Feminine Frequency, to discuss feminine nature and receiving support. Rachel shares how grief challenged her identity, why she walked away from a working relationship, and how faith helped her open the heart she’d closed to protect herself.

What we get into

• How family beliefs shape who you think you have to be
• Why independence can be both a strength and a form of protection
• Chelsea’s perspective on reconnecting with feminine nature
• Defining your values and setting boundaries without proving your worth
• Rachel’s “just because I could doesn’t mean I should” realization
• Feeling safe, seen, and secure while learning to receive support

If you heard yourself in this

Asking, “Who am I without all the roles I know how to perform?” The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal gives you somewhere to separate who you are from what you do and get honest about what still belongs in this season.

Begin The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal

Create Your Own Story

Rachel continues exploring faith, identity, and the cost of proving your worth in Create Your Own Story. Subscribe for her writing on questioning the life you’ve built and deciding what comes next.

Subscribe to Create Your Own Story

New here? Start here

Connect with Chelsea Ann O’Brien

Explore The Feminine Effect, The Feminine Frequency, and Chelsea’s work: Website | Books and resources | Instagram

Connect with Rachel Brooks

Instagram

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

The nutrition or exercise routine that worked years ago may not feel right in midlife. How do you take care of your health when your energy, body, and everyday responsibilities have changed?

In this episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, Rachel Brooks sits down with Meridan Zerner, an award-winning registered dietitian nutritionist and wellness professional with more than 30 years of experience in preventive health. Meridan shares her approach to midlife wellness and explains why she believes a sustainable health routine should fit the person and the life she’s actually living.

Rachel and Meridan talk about how hormonal changes can affect women’s midlife experience, the place of sleep, nutrition, movement, stress management, and connection in overall wellness, and why learning what to do is only part of making a lasting change. When Rachel asks how a woman can create her own recipe for health, Meridan begins with a surprisingly practical question:

What is already going well?

IN THIS CONVERSATION

• How to reassess your habits when what used to work no longer fits
• Why Meridan recommends starting with the supportive habits you already have
• How one or two small changes can be tested and adjusted within an ordinary week
• Why rest, social connection, and asking for support belong in a fuller conversation about health
• What Meridan’s The Thoughtful 30 offers as a framework for considering new wellness habits
• How to advocate for yourself, ask questions, and collaborate with qualified health professionals

YOUR NEXT STEP

Notice one thing you’re already doing that supports your health, then consider one small change you can realistically try this week. Give yourself room to see whether it fits before adding more.

THIS EPISODE IS SPONSORED BY BENEVE

Beneve is a wellness brand Rachel uses as part of taking care of her health, energy, strength, and body in midlife.

See what Rachel is using → BENEVE

ABOUT OUR GUEST

Meridan Zerner, MS, RDN, CSSD, LD, CHWC, is a registered dietitian nutritionist, wellness coach, speaker, and creator of The Thoughtful 30: 30-Day Reset for Midlife and Beyond.

Learn more about Meridan and find her free Thoughtful 30 get-started resources: https://www.meridanzernernutrition.com

CONTINUE THE CONVERSATION

This conversation doesn’t end with the episode. Rachel’s companion Create Your Own Story feature explores what happens when the way you’ve been taking care of yourself no longer fits the woman or the life you’re living now.

Subscribe and read the latest edition: https://iamrachelbrooks.substack.com

New here and not sure where to begin? START HERE →

Hosted by Rachel Brooks, author of Chasing Perfection and host of The Confident Woman Podcast.

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

This episode is a general educational conversation and is not individualized healthcare guidance. Discuss personal symptoms or changes to treatment with your own qualified healthcare professional.

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

Are you paying the price to prove your worth?

Have you spent years working toward success, trying to meet everyone's expectations, or proving how much you can handle, only to realize that the life you're working so hard to create is costing you the very things that matter most?

Maybe you're building a career or business to create more freedom, but you barely have time to enjoy the people you love. Maybe you've become the person everyone depends on, and you're exhausted from carrying responsibilities you never consciously chose. Or perhaps you're navigating a season of change, trying to figure out who you are when your life no longer looks the way you thought it would.

In this episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, Rachel Brooks invites you into a conversation about knowing your worth, finding your voice, and what happens when you begin making decisions from the belief that your value isn't determined by what you accomplish, how much money you make, or how much you're willing to sacrifice for others.

Together, we're exploring how the pursuit of success can become tied to our identity, the difference between making necessary sacrifices and compromising ourselves in the process, and why becoming the woman God created you to be doesn't require spending another chapter of your life trying to prove you're worthy.

Inside This Conversation:

• Why knowing your worth and actually living from that belief are two different things.
• How success, productivity, and being needed can become tied to your identity and self-worth.
• Recognizing when your responsibilities and ambitions are costing you the freedom, peace, and relationships you were working so hard to create.
• The difference between making necessary sacrifices and compromising your dignity or self-respect.
• How to begin reconsidering what you're carrying and what you want to make room for in this season of becoming.
• What Colossians 3:23 reminds us about working wholeheartedly without allowing our work or someone else's approval to determine our worth.

This conversation isn't about giving up on your dreams, walking away from your responsibilities, or pretending that difficult circumstances don't exist. It's about getting honest with yourself about what you're pursuing, why you're pursuing it, and whether the way you're living actually reflects what matters most to you.

As you navigate your own messy middle of becoming, consider the question Rachel leaves you with this week:

Are you paying the price to prove your worth? And when you look at what it's actually costing you, is that a price you still want to keep paying?

Continue the Conversation

Read the companion essay, Are You Paying the Price to Prove Your Worth?, and join Rachel inside Create Your Own Story for weekly conversations about faith, identity, grief, ambition, and finding your way back to who God created you to be.

Read & subscribe to Create Your Own Story →

New here? Discover the writing, podcast, and where to begin.

START HERE →

Scripture referenced: Colossians 3:23–24

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

What do you do when being able to handle something has made you forget to ask whether it still belongs to you?

There comes a point when being the person who can figure it out, step in, solve the problem, or keep things moving starts to feel less like a strength you choose to use and more like a responsibility you automatically carry. You know you can do it, so somewhere along the way, “I can” starts sounding a lot like “I should.”

In this episode of The Confident Woman, Rachel Brooks opens up a conversation about overcommitting, self-worth, usefulness, and the difference between being able to do something and knowing whether it is actually yours to carry.

The conversation grew out of something Rachel noticed in herself after seeing a gap she knew how to fill and almost immediately making herself responsible for it. No one had assigned it to her. She simply knew she could help. That moment raised a bigger question about how often we confuse ability with assignment, especially when being useful, dependable, strong, or needed has become part of how we measure our value.

In this episode:

• How “I can” quietly becomes “I should”
• Why being good at something does not automatically make it yours to carry
• Why work that comes naturally to you is still real work and still carries a cost
• How usefulness and being needed can become tangled up with self-worth
• Why naming what something costs does not erase the love, meaning, or value inside it
• The difference between asking “Can I do this?” and asking “Is this mine?”
• What 1 Corinthians 10:23 reveals about the difference between what is possible and what is actually beneficial
• How Philippians 4:7 and 2 Corinthians 10:5 connect peace, discernment, and the stories we keep telling ourselves

This isn’t about becoming less generous, refusing to help people, or treating every hard responsibility like something you should walk away from. Some things are worth the cost. Some seasons ask more of us because we love someone, believe in something, or know the responsibility is ours.

The shift is noticing this: ability and assignment are not the same thing. “Can I do this?” tells you what is possible. “Is this mine?” asks you to discern whether it actually belongs to you in this season.

The question to sit with this week is:

What are you still saying yes to simply because you know you can, and what is that yes costing you?

Continue the Conversation:

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Read the companion essay on Create Your Own Story and subscribe to continue the weekly conversation: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/substack

Scripture referenced: 1 Corinthians 10:23, Philippians 4:7, 2 Corinthians 10:5

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

What do you do when the life you’re living looks nothing like the one you thought you would have by now?

There comes a point when you can look around and realize that some of the things you thought would be settled aren’t, certain plans didn’t unfold the way you expected, and parts of the life you spent years building don’t feel the same anymore. It can leave you trying to make sense of the distance between where you thought you would be and where you actually are.

In this episode of The Confident Woman, Rachel Brooks opens up a conversation about unexpected life changes, midlife transitions, feeling stuck, and what happens when you don’t know exactly what comes next but you’re beginning to believe there could still be another way.

The conversation grew out of something Rachel noticed while walking and thinking through the transitions women around her have been talking about: divorce, empty nesting, grief, changing careers, changing bodies, relationships, identity, burnout, isolation, purpose and fulfillment. The circumstances may be different, but the question underneath so many of them is familiar: What do I do when this isn’t the life I thought I would be living?

In this episode:

• Why unmet expectations can carry their own form of grief
• What happens when today’s circumstances start feeling permanent
• Why not knowing how something will change doesn’t mean it never can
• The difference between solving your entire future and allowing yourself to imagine one again
• How women can lose sight of possibility during long seasons of survival and uncertainty
• What Proverbs 16:9 reminds us about making plans while trusting God with the steps we cannot see yet

This isn’t about blowing up your life or pretending starting over is easy. Sometimes the circumstances keeping us where we are are very real, and there may not be an immediate answer.

The shift Rachel is noticing is much smaller: she is beginning to see options again, and right now, options are hope.

The question to sit with this week is:

What have you stopped allowing yourself to imagine because somewhere along the way you started believing this is simply how your life is going to be?

Continue the Conversation:

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Read the companion essay on Create Your Own Story and subscribe to continue the weekly conversation. https://iamrachelbrooks.com/substack

Scripture referenced: Proverbs 16:9

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

Why does resting feel uncomfortable even when you finally have time to slow down?

You can close the laptop, finish what needed to be done, and finally have an open afternoon in front of you, yet still feel like you should be doing something. When so much of life has been measured by what gets finished, fixed, created, earned, or moved forward, rest can start to feel less like freedom and more like time you should be using better.

In this episode of The Confident Woman, Rachel Brooks opens up a conversation about rest guilt, productivity, pressure, and what happens when we become so focused on making a living, building a life, and preparing for what comes next that we forget how to experience the life already happening in front of us.

The conversation begins with an ordinary Sunday afternoon and a spontaneous trip to the library after Rachel realized she couldn’t remember the last time she had picked up a novel simply because she wanted to read it. What seemed insignificant became a reminder of how easily the things we once enjoyed can disappear beneath responsibility, urgency, and the constant feeling that there is always something else we should be doing.

In this episode:

• Why stopping work doesn’t automatically shut off the mental to-do list
• How productivity can become tied to success, progress, and whether time feels “well spent”
• What happens when creativity, hobbies, and ordinary enjoyment start needing an outcome
• Why advice to “slow down and be present” can feel disconnected from the responsibilities women are actually carrying
• How to care about your future without mentally living there all day
• What Matthew 6:33–34 reminds us about living the day God has actually given us

This isn’t a conversation about dropping your responsibilities or pretending the pressure isn’t real. It’s about noticing when being responsible for your life has quietly turned into never allowing yourself to experience it.

Rachel leaves you with one question to sit with this week: What part of your life have you quietly postponed until everything else gets figured out?

If this episode has you questioning how you're living, and whether the life you're building still reflects what matters most, The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal gives you somewhere to slow down and work through it instead of rushing into the next thing simply because you believe you should be doing more.

The Becoming… is an undated, year-long identity planner and journal designed to help you look honestly at where you're, reconnect with who you're and whose you're, and make intentional decisions about the life you're actually building.

Start The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal

Continue the Conversation:

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Read the companion essay, “I Think I Forgot How to Just Live,” on Create Your Own Story, and subscribe to continue the weekly conversation. https://iamrachelbrooks.com/substack

Listen, subscribe, and share this episode with the woman who feels guilty for resting and has forgotten how to find joy and meaning in the ordinary.

SCRIPTURE REFERENCED

Matthew 6:33–34

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

How do you know if you're faithfully stewarding your God-given purpose or simply putting more pressure on yourself to make it bigger?

We hear things like “your pain becomes your purpose” and “your mess becomes your message,” and sometimes that is exactly what God does. He redeems parts of our stories we once wished we could erase and uses them to help someone else feel seen, understood, and less alone. The harder question comes later, when the message starts reaching people, opportunities begin opening, and something that began in obedience becomes something you feel responsible for growing.

In this episode of The Confident Woman, Rachel Brooks opens up a deeper conversation about God-given purpose, biblical stewardship, ambition, impact, and what can happen when a calling that is genuinely meaningful slowly becomes tangled with pressure to do more with it.

Because wanting to reach more people isn't automatically ego. Wanting your work to grow isn't automatically wrong. The calling can be real, the motive can be good, and you can still reach a point where bigger starts feeling like proof that you're stewarding it well.

Rachel explores the difference between playing small and living faithfully, why her perspective changed over the years,

In this episode:

• Why pain-to-purpose and mess-to-message can be true without requiring every part of your story to become bigger, public, or productive

• How a real calling can quietly become pressure when growth, reach, visibility, and opportunity become the way you measure whether you're doing enough

• The difference between playing small and recognizing that something doesn't have to become enormous to be significant

• Why Rachel hears Josh Wilson's Dream Small differently now than she did when she was first learning to stop shrinking herself

• What biblical stewardship changes when you stop asking how big you can make something and start asking what God is actually asking you to do with it

• How 1 Peter 4:10 and Matthew 6:33 bring purpose back underneath faithfulness, obedience, and relationship with God

One question sits underneath the entire conversation:

What does faithful stewardship of what God gave me look like in this season?

Because maybe the answer isn't automatically more. Maybe the calling doesn't need to become smaller, but your definition of faithfulness may need to become more honest about what God is actually asking of you now.

If this episode has you looking at your own purpose, the pressure surrounding it, and whether the life you're building still reflects what matters most, The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal gives you somewhere to slow down and work through it instead of rushing into the next thing simply because you believe you should be doing more.

The Becoming… is an undated, year-long identity planner and journal designed to help you look honestly at where you're, reconnect with who you're and whose you're, and make intentional decisions about the life you're actually building.

Start The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal

Continue the Conversation:

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/instagram

Join Create Your Own Story on Substack: https://iamrachelbrooks.com/substack

Listen, subscribe, and share this episode with the woman who knows she has purpose but may be carrying the pressure to constantly prove, grow, or maximize it.

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

What happens when you know you’ve changed, the life that used to fit you doesn’t anymore, and you don’t know where this version of you belongs?

It can be hard to explain because nothing necessarily had to go wrong. The things that once lit you up may not anymore. Conversations feel different. Relationships change. Dreams you once worked toward can suddenly feel exhausting, and you find yourself somewhere between missing what was and not knowing what comes next.

In this episode of The Confident Woman, Rachel Brooks opens up a deeper conversation about identity, grief, belonging, faith, and the loneliness of becoming somebody different when there isn’t one obvious ending you can point to and say, “That’s what happened.”

Because sometimes grief isn’t only about losing a person. You can grieve the relationship, the role you played, the life you knew, the future you expected, and even the version of yourself who existed when all of it still felt familiar.

But there’s another layer to this when you realize: I know who I am, but I don’t know what I do anymore.

In this episode:

• Why becoming someone different can feel incredibly lonely even when nothing obviously “ended”
• How grief can change your relationship with yourself, your identity, and the life you once knew
• Why the things you once wanted may stop feeling like they belong to you
• What happens when you know who you are but no longer know how to answer, “What do you do?”
• Why some relationships survive change while others depended on the role you were playing inside them
• What it means when your soul starts longing for home, safety, belonging, rest, and something softer
• Why being weary changed the way Rachel understands Matthew 11:28
• What trusting God can look like when you don’t know what comes next

One question sits underneath the entire conversation:

What do you do when the old life doesn’t feel like home anymore, but the new one hasn’t fully taken shape yet?

Because maybe you don’t need to force yourself back into a version of your life that no longer fits just because it’s familiar. Maybe part of becoming is getting honest about what has changed, what you’re longing for now, and who you are becoming in the middle of it.

If this episode helps you recognize that you’re somewhere in that in-between, The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal gives you somewhere to keep working through it instead of having another realization that gets buried underneath everything else tomorrow.

It’s an undated, year-long identity planner and journal designed to help you get honest about where you are, what no longer fits, what matters to you now, and who you’re becoming as you decide what comes next.

Start with The Becoming… Identity Planner & Journal

Continue the Conversation:

Follow Rachel at @iamrachelbrooks and join us inside Create Your Own Story on Substack for deeper personal essays, honest conversations, and the stories behind the work.

Listen, subscribe, and share this episode with the woman who may be looking around at her life wondering why the things that used to feel like home don’t fit her anymore.

Scripture referenced: Matthew 11:28