Welcome back to Season 3 of the Divine Worth Podcast! In this episode, Karen shares a personal update on her summer of writing and growth, then dives into a powerful lesson on self worth through the story of Eve. If you’ve ever struggled with self-editing, rumination, or shame after making a mistake, this episode is for you.
Karen unpacks Eve’s story from Moses chapter 5, showing how the very first woman on earth — with no mortal mother to guide her — modeled a journey of failure, grief, and redemption that speaks directly to self worth for LDS women today. From the fall in the Garden of Eden to the heartbreak of losing her son Abel, Eve’s life reminds us that mistakes are not the end of our story — they’re part of God’s plan for growth.
Karen also introduces the practice of free writing as a tool for processing difficult emotions, and issues a challenge: what if you aimed to fail more, not less, in pursuit of doing what’s right? This episode is a gentle, faith-filled invitation for LDS women to release shame, embrace imperfection, and rebuild self worth through the Savior’s grace.
In this episode:
* Karen’s summer update: writing, homeschooling, and starting a Substack
* Free writing as a tool for processing grief, anxiety, and depression
* Eve’s story and what it teaches us about self worth
* How Eve’s loss of her son Abel speaks to grief and rumination
* The “40 fails a month” mindset shift
* A simple 3-step process for moving past mistakes: acknowledge, get curious, remember it’s not the end
Paid subscribers on substack, your journaling prompts for this episode are waiting for you at the bottom of the page — a companion to help you sit with Eve’s story and reflect on your own journey toward self worth.
Full Transcript
Welcome Back to Season 3
Welcome to the Divine Worth Podcast. I am so, so happy to be able to be here with you today and be able to start Season 3 of the Divine Worth Podcast. We’ve had a little bit of a break, and in that time I’ve been focusing more on writing and stepping outside my comfort zone in that way. I started a Substack to hold myself accountable to this new goal I have of improving my writing.
On there I share more about Divine Worth and seeing what God sees in you. I’ve been writing these “Letters to the One” — letters that are about helping you to feel seen, to feel heard, to recognize that God loves you. There are also letters of things that I want my kids to know. I’ve been writing these letters to the one, and also just doing writing exercises and sharing the things that I am writing so that I can learn and grow and get better — because the only way I’m going to get better at my writing is by actually taking that action and writing. That’s what I’ve been doing over the summer, in addition to spending more time with my kids and enjoying that they’ve been home. They’re back at school now, except for my eldest, who I’m homeschooling, and that has been a fun experience so far as well.
So that’s a little update on what’s going on with me. But I am excited for this season of the Divine Worth Podcast.
Free Writing as a Release
One of the things I’ve been doing with my Substack is a free write. What that is, is I just take time — I grab my writing notebook and I write whatever comes to my mind without really censoring what it is that’s coming out. This can be a really beneficial exercise to do when you’re feeling depressed or anxious, or if you’re feeling grief — to just be able to write out the emotions you’re feeling. The interesting thing about doing that is it is a huge release, because that part of ourselves that is feeling these unresolved emotions begins to feel seen and heard. We’re no longer hiding or trying to hide those emotions or act like we don’t have them — we’re actually acknowledging and experiencing them so that we can process them and ultimately move forward in the ways we want to move forward.
So that’s something I’ve been doing with my Substack — writing out whatever comes to my mind, whatever I’m feeling, and then processing those emotions through my writing. Sometimes it can be hard to do that, because inside there’s this desire to want to edit myself, to edit the things I’m saying. Yet the most powerful writing happens as we just let it all out.
If you’re someone who finds yourself editing yourself throughout your day — keeping you from trying something new because you’re afraid to fail, or maybe you have trouble beginning a conversation with someone else because you’ve got all these ways you’re editing yourself before you even open your mouth — or maybe you’re someone who replays things over and over again in your mind. That’s something I have really struggled with in the past — just ruminating, even after a conversation or a mistake I made, replaying it over and over again. I’ve come a long way as I’ve learned some of these tools, such as this free writing.
Or maybe you feel stuck in shame anytime you make a mistake, and you struggle to really let go of those mistakes. Eve’s story is something I feel is really helpful in relation to all of this, for those of us who do tend to edit ourselves. So let’s learn a little bit more about Eve.
Eve: The First Woman
Eve was the first woman on Earth. That is something that can seem so unfathomable to me, because sometimes in our lives we feel alone. Sometimes, as a mom myself, I can feel at such a loss for what to do for my kids and for those I love — not even just my kids, but for anyone we’re called to serve, we can feel at a loss and not really know how to move forward. So I can only imagine what Eve must have experienced and been feeling, being someone who really was the first one, paving the way for all the other women who would come after her.
She did not have a mortal mother to help her know how to nurse her babies, or to know when to push them to step outside their comfort zones and when to rein them in, and to guide them in the different things they did. She was someone who we know made mistakes, and yet we also know there was wisdom within her mistakes.
Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden. They were told not to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. When Satan came tempting Eve, she desired to be able to know good from evil, and so she partook of the fruit. Then she goes and gets Adam to partake of the fruit. What happens is they’re kicked out of the Garden of Eden because of this transgression they chose. But they still believe in God, they still follow Him, and they make sacrifices to Him, and they know that He is there and that He will guide them.
What Moses Chapter 5 Teaches Us
So I want to go into Moses chapter 5, because there’s something very interesting said within these verses. They’ve been cast out, and it says: after many days an angel of the Lord appears unto Adam, saying, “Why dost thou offer sacrifices unto the Lord?” And Adam said unto him, “I know not, save the Lord commanded me.” So they are still putting their faith and trust in the Lord, and they understand that they made a decision that caused them to be kicked out of the Garden of Eden, and they are accepting of the Lord’s decision in that.
Then the angel says unto them: “This thing is the similitude of the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth. Wherefore thou shalt do all that thou doest in the name of the Son, and thou shalt repent and call upon God in the name of the Son forevermore.” So here they’re talking about — you have been asked to do these sacrifices because they are reminding you what the Savior does for you. And yes, you made this choice, yes, you have fallen because of this choice, but there is a way for you to overcome.
“And in that day the Holy Ghost fell upon Adam, which beareth record of the Father and the Son, saying: I am the Only Begotten of the Father from the beginning, henceforth and forever, that as thou hast fallen thou mayest be redeemed, and all mankind, even as many as will.”
And in verse 10: “And in that day Adam blessed God and was filled, and began to prophesy concerning all the families of the earth, saying: Blessed be the name of God, for because of my transgression my eyes are opened, and in this life I shall have joy, and again in the flesh I shall see God.”
And verse 11: “And Eve, his wife, heard all these things and was glad, saying: Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.”
This beautiful understanding comes over them — that this was actually part of the plan. That we would come here, that we would make mistakes, and that we would have a Savior to help us overcome those mistakes, to learn from them, to know and understand good and evil, and to understand the joy that comes from repentance, and to move forward — multiplying, replenishing the earth, teaching others, bringing them unto this great knowledge as well.
Seeing God’s Love Through Eve
Eve’s story teaches us something beautiful — that mistakes are part of this process here on earth, and we have a Savior to help us overcome each one of those mistakes. We can see God’s love through Eve, because of this experience where she made a decision, and because of that decision she fell — and allowed us to be able to come to this earth.
I imagine that as the first woman, as the first mother on this earth, there were many times Eve felt like she was not doing a very good job — where she was making a mistake, where she did not know how to overcome those weaknesses. And yet she was given the Savior to help her overcome, time and time again.
Eve’s Grief: Cain and Abel
Another example from Eve that I don’t think we actually think of from her perspective is that her sons Cain and Abel — Cain was her son, and he killed his brother Abel. Just imagine the heartache Eve must have felt in learning about that, in the grief of having not only lost her son, but having lost Abel because of the action of another one of her sons. Just the heartache — Eve felt it all too.
Eve knows what it’s like to go through hard things, and she also knows what it’s like to continue to move forward, and just the courage she must have had to be able to have kids after that as well — being able to give birth to Seth and raise him and teach him to follow God’s path, even after having, I’m sure, felt like she had failed in some way or another.
Eve’s story is a story of redemption. It’s a story of helping our weaknesses become strengths. And I’m not saying that Cain’s actions were a result of anything Eve did or did not do, because Cain had his agency, and Satan was there tempting him, and his choices were on him. However, as a mom, as someone who knows what it’s like to wonder, “What if I did this?” or “What if I did that?” and start ruminating on all of those mistakes and things I could have possibly done, wondering if that would have made a difference — I imagine Eve probably felt some of those things as well.
We can learn from Eve and from her story, because the Lord was there for her, and He helped her understand that joy of redemption. He helped her have the strength to have more kids even after that, and sometimes that can be really hard to think — “Am I really going to go through this again?” — for someone who had struggled with infertility toward the beginning of my marriage and had a miscarriage, and just the pain that each month would bring. To have the courage to continue in such a journey of having lost and yet trying again is something we can also learn from Eve, right? It takes courage, it takes strength.
The beautiful thing about Eve’s story is that you actually do see that God was there with her throughout her story. We learn about God’s plan from Eve — that we are here to be tested, that we will make mistakes, yet God has given us this beautiful plan of having the Savior to help us overcome these mistakes, to rise, and to be able to make our weaknesses become strengths.
So for those of you who do struggle with ruminating, for those of you who do struggle with feeling like you shouldn’t be making mistakes — remember Eve, and remember how she overcame, and the joy that she found from her redemption. Remember that you are as Eve.
Weakness Made Strong
In Ether 12:27, the Lord tells us that He gives weaknesses to us that we may be humble, and as we put our faith and trust in Him, He will make those weaknesses become strong.
I remember hearing a story of a person who would try to get 40 fails in one month, and he would keep track of all the times he failed. But because he was willing to fail, he was able to overcome and become really successful. By failing, I’m not saying that you purposely go out and sin and make bad decisions — what this means is that you are willing to step outside your comfort zone, that you are willing to try to do what it is the Lord is asking of you, even if that means you are willing to make a mistake in the process of doing the right thing.
So what if you purposely aimed to fail? What if your goal was to get as many failures as possible while trying to succeed — giving it your all, yet at the same time acknowledging, “Hey, I failed. That means I am trying.” Just shifting that perspective of what failure actually means. What if you let go of having a picture-perfect life? What if you embraced both the ups and the downs? How would you learn and grow? How would you connect with others?
What if you moved forward — not purposely making mistakes or sinning, but doing what you can with the knowledge that you have — and when those mistakes happen, understanding that the Lord will help you overcome them, learn, and grow from them. Rather than getting stuck in that shame, you embrace the acknowledgement, the guilt, understanding, and then embrace the Atonement of the Lord into your life.
Moving Forward in Love
Allow yourself to be free. We do that by first acknowledging that what we did was a mistake. Then get curious. Then remind yourself that it’s not the end. Just because you made a mistake doesn’t mean you have to give up. Just because you made a mistake doesn’t mean you can’t make things right again — or if it’s something you really can’t go back and fix, remember that the Lord loves you even as you are, and He can help heal those places that seem impossible to heal.
In those moments of grief and pain and loss, the Lord can help us receive the strength and comfort that we need. Instead of looking at our failures and mistakes as things that never should have happened, let us see them as ways that we can grow and learn — helping to build empathy within ourselves for others as we learn to embrace God’s love into our lives, healing those wounds that have been created, and allowing us to move forward in that love.
I will see you next week on the Divine Worth Podcast.
*For paid subscribers on Substack, I’ve included journaling prompts as a companion to this episode. You can download the pdf for those below.
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