Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 735 ｜ WE’RE BACK! The Secret to Happiness for Women

00:00:00.000 Happy New Year, relatable family. We're back. Well, motherhood makes you happy. That's what

00:00:06.140 the data says. And white women above 45 are most likely to be on long-term depressants. We'll look

00:00:14.920 at some recent data and analyze why that is. Also, a church disinvited me from their conference,

00:00:23.580 and I will explain why at the end of this episode. But we'll start with some thoughts

00:00:28.180 and encouragement around the new year, and then we will get into the rest. I've got nothing to say

00:00:35.920 about any advertiser at the top of this show, so we'll just play the music and then get into the

00:00:41.280 episode. Hey, guys. Welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday, January 9th, 2023. This is our first

00:00:58.060 new show of the year. I'm so excited to be back. It's always really hard being away and not being

00:01:06.120 able to talk about all of the things that I want to talk about. I know we did have some new episodes

00:01:10.960 come out over the past few weeks, but we had pre-recorded those, so my team and I could take

00:01:16.000 a nice long break, and that's exactly what we did. It was some much-needed rest and reprieve from the

00:01:22.920 craziness of the world. I really wasn't online that much. I didn't even really use that as an

00:01:28.620 outlet to talk about the things going on. A lot of you have been asking, for example,

00:01:34.200 what's going on with the whole Speaker of the House thing? Dude, I am just now kind of catching up with

00:01:41.400 that. Kevin McCarthy is Speaker of the House. I kind of was just like, you know what? Just wake me up

00:01:47.300 when we find out what exactly is going on, what the demands were to make him Speaker of the House,

00:01:53.140 all that stuff. I just wasn't in the mood to wade into the complexities and the chaos of that,

00:01:59.940 but now we're here, and this show, as ever, is going to help you make sense of the chaos and

00:02:07.560 the craziness of the world. That's what Relatable is about. That's what you guys love about Relatable.

00:02:13.460 I did have a lot of time over the past few weeks talking to so many of you who love Relatable

00:02:19.080 and who, by the grace of God, have been influenced and impacted and whose minds and hearts have changed

00:02:24.300 because of what God has done through Relatable. That is just reinvigorating and re-inspiring for me

00:02:31.360 to make sure that we are a place of, yes, relatability, of course, as I am navigating with

00:02:37.200 you all of the craziness in the world, but also a place, hopefully, of clarity. Now, today, I am not

00:02:44.880 going to get into the Speaker of the House thing. We will be talking politics this week and some of

00:02:49.580 the news stories, but I kind of just want to reorient us and give us some perspective for the start of the

00:02:56.240 new year, at least starting out in this episode. I had some thoughts about New Year's resolutions the

00:03:02.820 other day. There's some discourse, I don't know if you have seen this, heard this, within the kind of

00:03:09.980 Christian online world about New Year's resolutions. Should Christians be making New Year's resolutions? 0.98

00:03:15.720 Is that really what we should be focusing on? Should we be making these fitness goals at the start of the

00:03:21.400 year, professional goals? Should we have a list of potential successes, accomplishments that we want to

00:03:28.200 reach? Or should we just be resting in God's sovereignty, His goodness, and simply commit by

00:03:35.060 His grace to pursuing Him and glorifying Him in all that we do? And it's kind of presented sometimes

00:03:42.800 as a binary, as what I think is a false choice between making goals and making resolutions and

00:03:49.780 simply resting in the Lord and being content in Him, what He's done for you, and being sanctified by the

00:03:56.980 Holy Spirit. I don't think that there's anything wrong—this is my opinion, so take that as it is—I

00:04:04.760 don't think there's anything wrong with setting goals and making resolutions. I know that people say

00:04:10.180 there's nothing magical about January 1st, and that's true. It is just as any other day. It is a

00:04:15.920 day that the Lord has made. We are to rejoice and be glad in it, just like any other day. We are to simply

00:04:21.960 do the next right thing in faith with excellence and for the glory of God. All you have to do today,

00:04:28.580 as Elizabeth Elliott says or said, and as I take comfort in often, all you have to do today is

00:04:35.380 the will of God. And that is simply the next right thing in faith with excellence and for the glory of

00:04:41.940 God. So all of that is true, that a new year isn't any different than the last year. And yet,

00:04:46.740 I think that God made humans to need that turn of the calendar, that change in the year,

00:04:55.280 that fresh start. I think we inherently long for, crave, and even need the change that comes with

00:05:06.300 dawn, that comes with days, that comes with weeks, that comes with seasons, that comes with holidays,

00:05:12.480 that comes with the new year. Even if there is no magic and all of the ideas about the new year

00:05:21.260 giving you some kind of fresh opportunity or a little bit superstitious, I do think God created us

00:05:28.420 to need renewal, to need rejuvenation, and to need change. One of the most demoralizing parts of COVID

00:05:36.480 was the monotony that came with being locked inside, not being able to enjoy the things that

00:05:45.840 we enjoy around the holidays, around summertime, or the ceremonies that came with graduation and prom

00:05:52.220 and all of that. We look forward to those things because I think that God actually created us to need

00:05:57.780 them. Like we need those mile markers. Sometimes we need those things to look forward to.

00:06:02.420 And monotony and sameness really has a way of discouraging us. Like think about the employee

00:06:11.300 in a dead-end job, the cubicle guy that doesn't see any light at the end of the tunnel, doesn't see

00:06:18.040 any kind of new opportunity on the horizon, how he just kind of gets dejected and loses not only

00:06:26.920 a sense of purpose, but just a sense of self in his place in the world. Or think about the animals

00:06:34.400 in Narnia, how they were stuck in this perpetual winter without any hope of Christmas. That kind of

00:06:40.740 monotony, that kind of sameness really has a way at harming us. It has a way at discouraging us.

00:06:49.660 So I think that God knows that we need something new. So I think it's okay if we look at a new year

00:06:56.260 or a new month or a Monday with renewed hope to say, you know what, this is the day that I'm going

00:07:04.060 to make a different commitment. This is the start of something new for me. That doesn't mean there's

00:07:09.000 magic or superstition behind it. That doesn't mean that there's any guarantee that you're going to be

00:07:13.720 able to reach your goals. It doesn't mean that we make those goals idols. But I do think it's okay

00:07:18.580 for us to kind of tap into the nature that we have as human beings to need change. But here's

00:07:24.820 the other thing, is that human beings also need security. We also need stability. We also do need

00:07:30.580 routine. And we also do need some sameness. I mean, you see this especially with kids. Kids need that

00:07:38.400 kind of predictability. When you throw their lives into constant instability, when they're going from

00:07:43.940 home to home, from place to place, from caregiver to caregiver, and they don't have anything that they

00:07:49.700 can expect the next day, they don't have any kind of person that they can really rely on, that's called

00:07:55.920 trauma. And that negatively impacts them for the rest of their life. And that's also, I know I talked

00:08:01.940 about the monotony with COVID, but the chaos of the immorality of this world that is constantly

00:08:08.060 undulating and in some ways completely unpredictable. That also has a negative impact, I think, not just

00:08:15.320 on our kids, but on us too. Human beings do not dwell, do not, do not deal well, rather, with

00:08:23.680 anarchy. Like we need some kind of order. We don't do well with disorder. And so I think that the longing

00:08:31.640 that we all have both for newness and for freshness and for renewal, rejuvenation, and stability and

00:08:38.280 security, I think those are parts of being made in God's image. And really, whether it's a new year or

00:08:44.520 a new week or just any day of the year, the only place truly that we can find the perfect wedding of

00:08:52.040 those things is in God himself. I mean, this is a God who, in Hebrews 13, 8, says that he is the same

00:08:58.200 yesterday, today, and forever. He also tells us in Lamentations 3, 22-23, that his mercies are new

00:09:07.320 every morning. So I think that is like the perfect depiction of God's sameness and security, but also

00:09:14.320 showing us our need for renewal. So his mercies are new every morning. His faithfulness is the same,

00:09:23.020 never waxes or wanes. He doesn't love us any more or any less based on what we do. And yet that mercy

00:09:30.920 that he offers us is actually renewing every day. This is the God who never changes, who never shifts,

00:09:40.300 and who never evolves, yet changes the times and the seasons, Daniel 2, 21. And so I don't think that

00:09:48.820 we need to kind of present this false choice as Christians. Do I make these goals? Do I try to be 0.99

00:09:53.800 a quote-unquote better person, whether that's more organized or whether that's texting people back or

00:09:59.180 whether that's having a better routine or spending more time with your kids, less time on your phone,

00:10:04.640 and on the other hand, simply just resting in the security and the sovereignty and the stability of

00:10:10.640 the Lord. We do both of those things because that's how God created us, all for the glory of God,

00:10:16.200 knowing that ultimately God is in control and that our goals don't make or break us. But I do think

00:10:23.840 it's totally okay to use this opportunity to have new goals. I do. I have some goals this year. Not

00:10:31.380 very many, but I have a few goals. One of them, as I talked about a couple weeks ago, to get better

00:10:35.360 at responding to people. And so I think that's okay. I don't think Christians necessarily need to

00:10:41.680 run from that. So all that to say, Happy New Year and praise God that Jesus Christ is the same

00:10:50.100 yesterday, today, and forever. And with all the craziness that this year will bring, because it

00:10:55.420 will be a lot of craziness, we know that that one thing is for sure. We can handle the change,

00:11:01.700 though. We can handle the craziness by God's grace because God created us to kind of endure that

00:11:06.980 change. And he offers us the stability that we are longing for. All right. Now, I've got a sponsor

00:11:13.620 to read. Also, oh, I didn't even mention. I didn't even mention, if you're watching this, I know I said

00:11:19.440 I was going to be on a different temporary set today, but I'm not. I'm on this set. Also, we are

00:11:25.420 building a new set. We are building a new set. Isn't that exciting? I know this set is great. I love

00:11:31.720 this set. The set is super cute and very us, but we're going to have an even cooler set. It's going

00:11:37.300 to be even more casual. The biggest thing I'm excited about is we're going to have some lighting

00:11:42.340 changes that we've been talking about for a long time, which is going to be awesome. And you guys

00:11:47.200 are going to love it. But I think tomorrow we are going to be on a temporary set that is not very

00:11:51.440 relatable brand, but that's okay. We got to wait until the other set is built and good to go. And

00:11:57.180 then we'll be back on that. Also, if you're watching this, I am wearing my UGA t-shirt.

00:12:01.140 I'm sorry, all you TCU fans out there. I'm sure there's a lot of TCU fans out there. But as we're

00:12:07.000 recording this, it's before the national championship game tonight, UGA, TCU. I'm from DFW area, but

00:12:17.560 I've lived in Georgia and my husband went to UGA. I went to little old Furman. I don't think anyone is

00:12:24.700 worried about the threat that the Paladins posed to any football team out there. Sorry. So I am a

00:12:32.260 UGA fan because of my husband. So I am rooting for the dogs tonight. Go dogs. I think a lot of

00:12:40.580 people are rooting for TCU because I think TCU is the underdog. But just remember that UGA did not

00:12:45.620 win a national championship for like 40 years before last year. And so they can still be considered the

00:12:50.940 underdog, even as they are the top dog, as it were. And make sure that you tune in tonight to Twitter

00:12:58.000 and Instagram. I will be giving what is always extremely insightful football commentary. And by

00:13:04.520 extremely insightful, I mean, I will give commentary as someone who knows absolutely nothing about

00:13:09.560 football, but who wants to be there to support my husband. And so make sure to tune into that. All right.

00:13:20.940 Before we get into a segment about mothers and happiness and women and things like that, I just

00:13:33.340 wanted to ask a little question to my team over there. And I can answer it first. What was, this is my

00:13:42.740 question, and all of you listening and watching, you can answer it too. What was the best thing that you

00:13:48.060 ate over Christmas slash New Year break? I will say, I think that my favorite thing, it's really

00:13:58.120 difficult. It's really tough. It's really tough. But I think that my favorite thing was probably

00:14:04.760 my aunt makes something called, it's either, there's some tension in our family about what it's called,

00:14:10.860 chocolate delight or Mississippi mud. And it's like a graham cracker crust and then chocolate and then

00:14:16.980 like a whipped cream thing on top. And it's not a pie. It's like a, almost like a casserole type

00:14:22.780 thing. Oh my gosh, it is so, so good. That's the first thing that came to mind when I thought about

00:14:29.480 the best thing that I ate. And now my stomach is growling. Um, Brie, what was the best thing that

00:14:35.180 you ate over your break? Okay. So my mom makes breakfast casserole on Christmas morning and it's

00:14:40.960 like really simple. It's like you put potatoes at the bottom and then it sounds so good already.

00:14:46.760 Just potatoes. You got me like tater tots or hash browns at the bottom. Um, and then you like fill

00:14:54.200 it with egg, like scrambled egg mixture and then you put bacon on top and then you put cheese on top

00:15:00.120 and it all kind of melts together and it comes out as a casserole and it's so good. And we, we have it

00:15:05.220 every year, but only on Christmas. So we like build up the hype. That sounds amazing. Have you ever tried to

00:15:10.040 make it yourself? No, I mean, I could, but I, I save it for Christmas and she just makes it. 0.94

00:15:15.840 It's a treat. Oh, that sounds so good. Kayla. Um, so on Christmas day we had people over and

00:15:23.120 hosted everyone at the house and I roasted duck for the first time. Wow. Yeah. So I made two ducks and,

00:15:29.560 um, it, they turned out really, really well. I mean, I think everyone, everyone ate it. There

00:15:33.920 were no, there was no duck left. So what did you put on it? Um, so I did like, I found a recipe

00:15:39.420 that was like a honey, um, glaze, like honey, soy, lemon juice, olive oil glaze. And so I just like

00:15:49.900 roasted it with, um, onions and garlic and lemon inside the cavity. And then, uh, like in the last

00:15:56.620 45 minutes you pour over the, like the honey, you know, glaze and then bake it for the last 45 and

00:16:03.480 it comes out like really crispy and beautiful. I'm so impressed. Yeah. Did you know when you

00:16:08.100 cook duck, you have to flip it? I've never cooked duck, so I did not know. You have to flip it twice.

00:16:13.480 Oh, wow. Okay. Good to know. That sounds good. Dylan. My mom makes cinnamon rolls every Christmas

00:16:21.060 day. So that was far and away the best thing I ate. Is it like from scratch or does she have a

00:16:24.540 special recipe? No, they're just store-bought ones, but they're still the best thing. Oh,

00:16:29.120 okay. Gotcha. Sounds good. All right. I just wanted to, um, hear from you guys on that. I'm

00:16:36.260 obsessed with food and none of my resolutions this year have to do with eating any differently than I

00:16:42.920 do because I just love food too much. I love food too much. Um, all right, let's get into this next

00:16:51.060 segment about this story that I saw tweeted by Brad Wilcox. Brad Wilcox is the professor and director

00:16:58.580 of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia. I've done an episode with him before

00:17:04.680 about this family diversity theory that he just completely debunks. The family diversity theory

00:17:11.080 says that no matter what people make up your family, as long as the kid feels loved, then they're

00:17:16.580 totally fine. The data does not show that that's true. Kids thrive most in, uh, with their mother and,

00:17:24.340 uh, their father. So, uh, go back and listen to that episode with him. So he's tweeting a lot of

00:17:30.300 different, um, statistics and studies and stories about marriage and the impact of marriage and the

00:17:37.580 impact of the formation of the family on society. And he wrote this article in the Atlantic with

00:17:44.800 Wendy Wang called The Married Mom Advantage. And I thought that this article and its findings were so

00:17:51.380 interesting because it bucks against everything that we hear about motherhood these days. We've

00:17:58.340 talked a lot about toxic mommy culture, uh, moms complaining about kids, which I'll talk a little

00:18:03.720 bit more about in a second. But the findings that they summarize in this article are completely

00:18:10.820 opposed to that. They actually show that motherhood multiplies joy and satisfaction in women a great

00:18:19.180 deal. So they started out talking about kind of the toxic mommy culture that we referred to in this

00:18:24.340 article. They say, judging by its press since COVID began, you might think that married motherhood is a

00:18:30.140 pathway to misery and immiseration. Married heterosexual motherhood in America, especially in the past two 1.00

00:18:35.980 years, is a game no one wins, wrote Amy Schoen in one of many New York Times op-eds about the

00:18:41.700 difficulties of marriage in the time of COVID. Moms are not okay. Pandemic triples anxiety and depression 0.97

00:18:47.280 symptoms in new mothers. Read a headline in Forbes. Bloomberg went so far as to suggest that family

00:18:52.100 life was a financial dead end for women. In an article headlined, women who stay single and don't 1.00

00:18:58.200 have kids are getting richer. So toxic mommy culture. For those of you who don't know, I wrote about this

00:19:05.240 in my book, You're Not Enough, and that's okay. Escaping the toxic culture of self-love. It is a culture of

00:19:11.140 negativity surrounding motherhood, especially by mothers referring to kids as brats and burdens or

00:19:18.340 even worse. It's different from just honestly and transparently talking about the struggles and the

00:19:26.000 difficulties of motherhood. I think that can be very good. But this is really depicting yourself as a

00:19:32.180 constant victim of motherhood. Complaining about kids, especially as a joke, just to get a laugh.

00:19:37.600 They'll say, oh my gosh, I'm just kidding around. Learn to lighten up or whatever. But really,

00:19:44.980 they are denigrating their children publicly for the affirmation of strangers. So on social media

00:19:52.580 for likes. That is part of what toxic mommy culture is. But so are some of the headlines that they are

00:19:58.240 listing here. They go on to say, as tough as motherhood was during COVID, mothers were both happier

00:20:04.240 and more financially secure than childless women during the pandemic. This gap existed before COVID,

00:20:09.680 but it continued during the worst days of the pandemic and has remained since then.

00:20:13.280 This phenomenon is especially noteworthy because moms and parents more generally

00:20:17.260 used to be less happy than childless adults as recently as the 2000s. That's interesting.

00:20:23.880 That is an interesting change. That doesn't really surprise me that much. I do think our society has become

00:20:28.800 more isolated, more individualized, and lonelier than it was 20 plus years ago. And so our sense of community

00:20:35.900 is just not as strong as it was decades ago. And so the people that have kind of built-in community

00:20:44.040 with children, with husbands, with family are going to feel happier probably than the people who feel

00:20:49.500 like they're just wading through the world by themselves. In 2020, they go on to say,

00:20:53.980 69% of mothers ages 18 to 55 were completely or somewhat satisfied with their life compared to

00:21:00.680 61% of childless women at the same age. I also appreciate that they are using the word childless. 0.96

00:21:07.100 I've heard the word child free a lot recently to try to really, I don't know, paint parenthood as

00:21:16.920 something that is a trap or something that you need to be liberated from. They say women saw their 0.98

00:21:23.720 happiness dip from 2019 to 2020 as COVID set in, but this dip was more acute among childless women,

00:21:29.840 according to the survey. Challenging as they were to care for while many schools were closed,

00:21:34.540 kids seem to have brought a sense of direction, connection, and joy to the average mother's

00:21:39.180 life during the pandemic at a time when so many other social ties were cut off. So that kind of

00:21:44.920 speaks to what I was saying. As other social ties are cut off, the ones that are built in

00:21:49.180 can be really helpful and joy inducing. They say, and despite all the media coverage discounting or

00:21:56.400 minimizing the importance of marriage during COVID, mothers with partners were generally happier.

00:22:01.400 In 2020, 75% of married mothers were somewhat or completely satisfied with their lives versus 58%

00:22:08.160 of their unmarried peers. They also say that class plays a big role here. Unmarried moms are more likely

00:22:14.620 to be poor. If you're poor, you're more likely to be unhappy. That's what the data says. Unhappy

00:22:19.760 because they're poor. Unhappy because they're statistically, again, according to the data of

00:22:26.360 lonelier, there's little support system there. And so all of that can contribute to discontentment.

00:22:33.500 They say, they conclude this way, which I think is really poignant. If the data tell us anything,

00:22:38.520 it's that at least for most American women, the pathway to happiness runs through married motherhood, 1.00

00:22:46.600 not away from it. The pathway to happiness statistically runs through married motherhood, 0.96

00:22:54.380 not away from it. Wow. That is the opposite of what we hear from the secular world. We hear that kids

00:23:02.180 take away your identity, that they make you lose sight of who you really are. You lose yourself.

00:23:07.660 They get in the way of your goals. They ruin your body. They're bad for the environment. That's why

00:23:13.500 we keep hearing from these Malthusian crazy people. We hear that the key to fulfillment is to just focus 1.00

00:23:21.120 on you. Just travel, just work really hard, just have sex with whoever, do everything you want to do 0.93

00:23:27.880 completely child-free, and then try to satisfy that natural drive that you have for nurturing in your

00:23:35.900 pets and your plants. And it's a lie. It's a lie that this is going to be, that that is going to be

00:23:43.540 the exclusive or the best path to happiness. I'm not saying that you cannot have happiness outside

00:23:51.080 of motherhood. Of course, I know that there's a lot of you out there who want to be mothers,

00:23:55.260 and you're not yet. You can't yet. You just haven't been given that opportunity yet. So don't hear me say

00:24:01.200 that there is no happiness outside of motherhood. But I am trying to combat this secular cultural 0.97

00:24:07.520 narrative that motherhood diminishes happiness. That's a lie. Yes, motherhood is hard. Yes,

00:24:14.680 your body changes. Yes, your schedule is completely thrown for a loop. You're tired. You sleep a lot less.

00:24:21.300 You've got a lot more responsibility, a lot more people, and a lot more things to think about.

00:24:25.760 You are changed and stretched in ways that you would never have chosen for yourself. You would

00:24:32.140 have never done those things voluntarily before kids. But here's the thing, and here's why I think

00:24:37.860 happiness is maybe, I don't know, ironically in some ways intertwined with all of those things,

00:24:46.540 because human beings were not actually made. We were not built for ease and self-service.

00:24:52.960 We were not made to just travel and sip lattes and binge Netflix. We might enjoy those things. They

00:24:59.760 might feel good, but we don't actually function well long-term on them. Just like your body

00:25:06.880 might feel nice in the moment sitting on the couch, your muscles weren't actually just made to sit on

00:25:14.680 the couch all day. They were made to move. They were made to stretch. They were made to lift heavy

00:25:19.600 things and to endure a degree of pain that builds strength. That is actually what they are for.

00:25:26.140 And if your muscles, if your body is not used and stretched and strengthened, your muscles atrophy,

00:25:32.720 they deteriorate, they become unusable. And I think that's what happens to humans in general,

00:25:38.220 the human spirit, if you want to call it that. Like when we are not stretched and pulled and challenged

00:25:43.980 and made to carry weight heavier than we previously thought that we could, it is what we are for.

00:25:50.520 We were actually made to work and to work hard. Like think in the Genesis creation account.

00:25:57.720 Even before the fall, before sin entered the world, Adam is placed in the garden by God to what?

00:26:04.680 To work and to keep it. Hard work is not a result of the fall. It is not a consequence of sin. It is

00:26:12.160 actually a part of God's perfect plan. And motherhood is work. And work that God has ordained

00:26:20.800 is good. And we know that this is work that God has ordained because also before the fall,

00:26:26.400 God tells Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply. So children are a gift. We don't have a right to them.

00:26:32.940 We don't have a guarantee that God will give them to us. They are not necessary to glorify God,

00:26:38.960 to be a Christian, or to be a fulfilled woman. Because married or not, mother or not, 0.95

00:26:45.020 our satisfaction can only ever be multiplied by children and our husband. But our source of joy,

00:26:53.200 the author and initiator of it is always Christ, who loves us unconditionally, no matter what,

00:26:59.120 no matter how many children we have, no matter our marital status. But the point is, is that children,

00:27:06.740 contrary to what the world says, they are not burdens. They are not deterrents to our happiness.

00:27:12.420 They are purposeful gifts with the capacity to multiply our joy and our fulfillment. And once again,

00:27:20.540 once again, the data proves what God has always already said is true. Isn't that amazing how it works

00:27:28.880 out like that? It's almost like the creator of the universe knows what he's talking about.

00:27:43.340 Okay. I wanted to highlight this study that I saw tweeted recently by Nancy Piercy. She's an amazing

00:27:49.160 professor and author. She wrote the book, Love Thy Body. I've had her on too, a couple of years ago.

00:27:53.980 Highly recommend that book if you haven't read it already. So she tweeted this study, which as it

00:28:00.680 turns out is actually from 2018. And it's from a New York Times article. And if you're listening to

00:28:07.440 this, I'll explain it. Demographics of long-term antidepressants. Older white women account for 58% 1.00

00:28:15.000 of adults who have used antidepressants for at least five years. So white women over the age of 45

00:28:23.800 take the lion's share of the people who take antidepressants for a long period of time. Second is white 0.93

00:28:33.180 men over the age of 45. And then it's younger adults. And then under that, it's minority women, 45 plus. 0.58

00:28:39.960 And then under that is minority men, 45 plus. But man, there are millions. And this was actually

00:28:47.080 the latest year that they have is 2014. So I would guess that that's probably a lot higher. It's like

00:28:54.660 millions and millions of white women taking these long-term antidepressants far more than white men,

00:29:03.160 younger adults, any other demographic. White women over the age of 45, millions and millions of them

00:29:10.660 taking antidepressants long-term. And I just wonder, I thought about for a little bit, like,

00:29:16.440 what is the reason for this discrepancy? I mean, we could analyze why all different kinds of people

00:29:22.240 take antidepressants. And I think the reasons are multifaceted and they can change obviously from

00:29:28.940 person to person. But if we are just to look in general at this, and here's my amateur assessment,

00:29:35.560 all right? My assessment is that the older, white, liberal, childless woman or older, white, 1.00

00:29:45.920 liberal mother who has come to resent motherhood is the least likely to be happy. Doesn't mean that 1.00

00:29:54.720 they're all unhappy. I'm not saying that. It certainly doesn't mean that other kinds of women 0.99

00:29:58.740 are not also unhappy. I mean, there are plenty of young, conservative mothers who also may be on

00:30:05.240 antidepressants. So I'm not saying that. But in my assessment, the reason for this discrepancy,

00:30:11.100 why it is so high among this demographic, is probably that a lot of these women are childless or 1.00

00:30:18.360 they resent their station or they, and they're liberal. And I think that there are a lot of

00:30:25.680 reasons why this particular group is the least happy. There are lots of reasons, but I wonder

00:30:35.520 if at least one of them is the kind of messages that are shoved in white women's faces constantly, 1.00

00:30:43.240 in particular, the liberal white woman that breeds discontentment. So on the one hand, 1.00

00:30:50.440 you're a Karen. You're suffering from internalized white supremacy that you will never, no matter how

00:30:57.140 many Robin DiAngelo books you read, can be sanctified from. And if you are, you politically lean left,

00:31:06.180 you actually care about this. This is the last thing that you want to be or that you want to be seen as.

00:31:11.820 Your cast is a school marm, as a nag, and of course, as a natural racist. And you have so 0.97

00:31:19.060 much pressure to prove yourself as cool, as with it, as woke, as down with the cause to make sure

00:31:27.820 people don't demonize you as a Karen, make sure that people don't think that you're racist. And so

00:31:32.920 you're constantly striving to do the work, as it were, and to be seen as an ally. Wow, that's a lot of

00:31:41.880 pressure. And you're basically told to like, deny your skin color, deny your age, deny your gender, so you

00:31:49.040 won't be seen as a Karen. That's a lot of pressure. So you're simultaneously told on the one hand that who you

00:31:56.740 are is naturally bad and something that needs to be changed fundamentally. And on the other hand,

00:32:04.200 you are the target demographic for people like Glennon Doyle and Brene Brown and Rachel Hollis,

00:32:10.740 who are constantly telling you that actually deep inside you is a perfect goddess that can be unleashed

00:32:18.060 if you just love yourself enough, if you just go to enough therapy, if you work through enough trauma

00:32:22.580 and read enough of their books. And really, there's no such thing as sin. And all shame that you might

00:32:28.580 feel is bad. And your fulfillment and your happiness is all found deep inside you. You're perfect the way

00:32:33.920 you are. You just have to realize that. And you'll finally find all the things that you're looking for

00:32:38.740 opposing messages. You're inherently racist, and you're actually perfect. Of course, neither of these 0.97

00:32:47.920 things are true, which is why they lead to such poor and sad and discontent outcomes, in my opinion.

00:32:56.200 And they're certainly not biblical because you're not perfect. So you're a sinner. That much is true. 1.00

00:33:01.860 You are a sinner. And you do need a savior. But also, you're not automatically racist just because 0.93

00:33:10.720 you're white. The work that needs to be done is an anti-racist work, which is based on lies,

00:33:17.060 actually, which we've talked about many times. Nor is it just loving yourself, but is rather the

00:33:21.660 sanctification that can only be found through Christ and his word. And in order to be justified,

00:33:27.040 to then be sanctified, you can actually do nothing because the faith that you need for that salvation

00:33:37.640 is a gift of grace, as we read in Ephesians 2, 8 through 10. You want to know the truth about who you

00:33:43.160 are, your identity, and the problems that you face, and the work that needs to be done. Read Ephesians 2,

00:33:48.820 8 through 10. Do not read Robin DiAngelo or Ibra Max Kendi or Brene Brown or Rachel Hollis because they're

00:33:54.960 sending you opposing messages. Sometimes the same people are sending opposing messages that send you

00:34:01.220 on this hamster wheel of exhaustion and discontentment. And yes, I think anxiety, depression, because no matter

00:34:06.980 what, you never really know who you are and why you're here. I mean, this demographic, the white 0.99

00:34:13.800 woman above the age of 45, they are the prime target of these toxic, untrue, contradictory messages,

00:34:20.600 in addition to the increased loneliness, the purposelessness that comes with aging in general,

00:34:26.680 with children moving out of the house if they are moms, with not feeling beautiful or valuable or

00:34:32.620 needed anymore. So all of that in any kind of person can cause kind of like a loss of identity and

00:34:38.480 happiness. But then I also wonder not just about the messages that we just talked about, but also

00:34:43.960 about like how much romance novels and trashy TV induce discontentment in this demographic. I want to do a

00:34:52.920 whole episode on trashy romance novels and how I think that they can lead to adultery and depression

00:34:59.580 and anxiety and all kinds of marriage problems. But anyway, if you want joy, which we all do,

00:35:07.140 we're going to have to go outside of ourselves. Like we are not going to find the things that we're

00:35:12.780 looking for. We're not going to find the solutions to our problems in the same place where our problems

00:35:17.580 lie, which is inside of ourselves. So if inside yourself, you find insufficiency, inadequacy,

00:35:25.680 depression, anxiety, you're not going to find the solution to those things in the same place where

00:35:29.400 your problems lie. You're going to have to go outside of yourself. You're going to have to find

00:35:34.980 your identity and your purpose, which all humans since the beginning of time have wanted to find,

00:35:42.060 have longed to find. And these things are only found in the God who made you. So he is the source

00:35:50.800 of that purpose, of that identity. And as we said at the beginning, isn't it great that he never

00:35:55.640 changes, that his mercies are new every morning? What is more joy inducing than that? And may God

00:36:02.760 give us the grace to believe that no matter what your demographic, your marital status or your motherhood

00:36:08.200 status is. All right, quick update on clown world, because we didn't get into too many news stories

00:36:27.460 today. I just wanted to, some people, a lot of people appreciated this on Twitter. And so I wanted

00:36:32.580 to offer my services of translator of gender nonsense to you as well, because maybe you saw this

00:36:40.800 headline and you had no idea what this meant. And you just threw your phone across the room and you

00:36:47.380 were like, I am done. I understand. Unfortunately, and I mean that sincerely, I am so familiar with the

00:36:56.220 language of stupidity that is inherent in progressivism that I understand usually what 0.99

00:37:05.160 they're saying and I can see, I can interpret it. So let me read you this headline. All right, 1.00

00:37:11.080 this is from the Daily Mirror. Transgender man gives birth to non-binary partner's baby with female

00:37:18.620 sperm donor. All right, what does this mean? Let me tell you what this means. So a transgender man

00:37:33.880 is a woman. The non-binary partner's is also a woman because everything is non-binary with female sperm 0.96

00:37:44.620 donor. That is just a man. So here's what happened. Two lesbian women used a sperm donor to have a baby. 1.00

00:37:52.160 One woman used her eggs. The other used her womb. Now, of course, you guys know what I think about 1.00

00:37:58.300 surrogacy and sperm donation and egg donation. You can go back and listen to some previous episodes.

00:38:04.820 So even without this gender confusion, I have ethical and moral qualms with this. But the confusion and the 1.00

00:38:11.120 chaos that these parents are bringing their child into is just heartbreaking. Like as we said at the

00:38:20.120 beginning, like humans need order. We actually need definitions. As James Lindsay said on this podcast,

00:38:24.640 all understanding lies and distinctions. Like it's very important for kids to be able to make sense of

00:38:30.000 the world, to be able to tell the difference between male and female, mom and dad, aunt and uncle,

00:38:34.640 grandma and grandpa themselves, what they are. All of this is so important for us to orient ourselves in the

00:38:39.620 world. And when you throw humans into a state of anarchy, personal anarchy, familial anarchy,

00:38:45.920 they don't do well. As I've said before, these chickens have not come home to roost. Like we think

00:38:52.580 that this is as bad as it can get. Wait till the children that are growing up in homes like this,

00:38:57.640 which are homes that are basically built not on seeking the best interest of a child, but seeking

00:39:03.340 validation and affirmation from the existence of that child by adults, which is perverse.

00:39:11.540 When those children grow up, they are going to have problems that we don't even have the words to

00:39:18.880 diagnose the issues that are going to come from this. Remember, as Christians, whenever something

00:39:27.240 goes from what is natural to what is possible through technology, through cultural change or

00:39:32.460 whatever, we always have the obligation to say, hang on, hang on a second. And really that's as

00:39:38.400 conservatives, that's what conservatives essentially believe too, but especially as Christians, when

00:39:42.100 people, when things go from what God made to what man can make, sometimes that transition is fine.

00:39:47.880 There are no moral qualms with it, but a lot of times there are. And we need to ask ourselves,

00:39:53.300 okay, what is the impact of this? This, we know what the impact is going to be. Brad Wilcox, as I

00:40:00.260 said, has done the family diversity theory debunking for a very long time. No, kids don't just need

00:40:06.720 parents, three, five, two parents that love them. They need a mom and a dad. Ideally, ideally, they need

00:40:13.780 a mom and a dad. And every policy, in every effort, of course, that we have as Christians should be

00:40:19.960 toward that end, to making that as easy as possible, to making it as difficult as possible for kids not

00:40:27.880 to have that ideal situation of a mom and a dad. All right. Just wanted to give a little update on

00:40:37.100 clown world. We have to continue to be a beacon of clarity and of courage, not playing the pronoun

00:40:45.520 game, not sacrificing truth to accommodate people's feelings, because that's really the

00:40:50.820 most loving thing we can do. All right. I just wanted to end this in a little quick announcement

00:40:54.740 to end this episode. And I've thought about how I am going to say this in a way that is simply

00:41:04.680 getting my point across without throwing anyone under the bus or causing any kind of drama or anything

00:41:11.220 like that. But I feel like it's important to talk about because I know some of you were excited to

00:41:16.260 see me here. So there is a church, and I think I just won't say the name of the church because I

00:41:21.940 don't want there to be any calls from the audience to this church or complaints. I don't want to get in

00:41:28.500 the way of what can be of good things that can still come from this conference and that will come

00:41:35.920 from this conference. So there's a church conference in Lexington, Kentucky that is happening

00:41:40.820 in February. And a few of you have sent me a message saying, you know, you attend this church

00:41:45.840 or you heard that I was going to be here speaking and that you were excited about this. And I just

00:41:52.120 wanted to let you know that I will no longer be there. And it's not because I flaked out. It's not

00:41:56.540 because I canceled, but I actually had my invitation rescinded, which has never happened before. I've never

00:42:02.740 been invited to speak anywhere, whether it's a church or a political event, and then got my

00:42:06.600 invitation rescinded. And I had been invited to this church event since 2021, which is pretty far

00:42:12.940 in advance for someone to book me at an event. It's typically six months or something like that,

00:42:18.880 sometimes even less. But this is a long time. So we've been planning for this and excited for this

00:42:24.780 and all of that. There were some other great women who were going to be speaking there. And then we

00:42:30.820 heard right before Christmas that they're actually rescinding my invitation. This is, as I said,

00:42:35.940 a church conference. I speak at a lot of these kinds of conferences. I know I talk a lot about

00:42:40.100 politics, but churches will invite me to come in to speak to their, to women to talk about the

00:42:44.840 importance of what biblical justice versus social justice looks like, or the me-ology that we see from

00:42:52.920 the Rachel Hollis's versus the real, you know, self-denying theology that we see in scripture. So I talk

00:42:59.240 about lots of different things, sometimes politics, sometimes not, when it comes to these groups.

00:43:03.180 Talk to a lot of pro-life organizations that aren't really political about the importance of

00:43:08.900 defending children inside the womb. So anyway, I speak to a lot of these different kinds of groups.

00:43:14.400 But unfortunately, this church decided a few weeks ago that the satire that I do is

00:43:23.380 not something that they want, I guess, represented at the church. And the words used were that it was

00:43:33.260 a distraction, that the satire videos that I do making in front of the Democrats and some of the

00:43:41.820 ridiculous agenda items that they have, that it was a distraction from the purpose of the conference,

00:43:51.160 or, I don't know, the message of the gospel. Even though I've been doing those since 2017,

00:44:01.880 apparently this was just too much at this point. And, you know, it just got me thinking. I thought

00:44:09.980 that it was really unfortunate. And my personal opinion is that it is the wrong decision. And I think

00:44:18.460 satire is a really important tool when done well to highlight points that can't be highlighted through

00:44:28.040 literalism. And just to comfort you all, in case you're wondering, am I going to stop my satirical

00:44:34.020 videos? No, I'm not. Because I think that they're really important. Like, I can't tell you how many

00:44:39.740 pro-life pregnancy centers, the directors, the volunteers have reached out to me and said,

00:44:45.260 and this sounds crazy. This sounds crazy, but it's not. Like, how much the Elizabeth Warren

00:44:51.000 video has meant to them. Because in that video, where, yeah, I was making fun of Elizabeth Warren,

00:44:57.720 but more so I was highlighting the amazing work that pregnancy centers do, that they felt that,

00:45:04.120 okay, someone else gets it. Like, someone else is on our side. Like, someone is willing to take shots

00:45:10.140 at this powerful politician who was threatening to shut down pro-life pregnancy centers and is

00:45:15.460 simultaneously highlighting the love and amazing service that we do in a way that is different

00:45:20.740 than me just visiting a pregnancy center and saying, hey, this is what pregnancy centers do. 1.00

00:45:26.040 It makes a different and even a better and more effective point. And these are not necessarily like

00:45:31.880 Republican women reaching out to me. These are just women saying, yes, we do this work. And thanks 0.96

00:45:36.120 for highlighting that in a way that made us laugh and made us be able to kind of like make fun of

00:45:41.900 Elizabeth Warren too, instead of being so scared of her. And I'm like, yes, and amen. Because look,

00:45:47.660 and I'm not, I don't say this in like a braggadocious way. I say this in like a very grateful way.

00:45:52.000 There's not very many people that do satire. There's not very many people that can. And we like have a

00:45:59.500 lot of creative people here. And sometimes like our satire videos are better than others. That's just

00:46:03.920 how it goes. But I think, I honestly believe that it is a tool that God has given me, has given us

00:46:10.240 to make important points, to convey them in a way that is even more effective than me just telling you,

00:46:17.420 hey, X, Y, X, Y, Z. Like when I'm making fun of the Democratic Party and the things, I'm literally

00:46:25.040 making fun of evil. I am, I, of evil. I am trying to show people in a way that I hope

00:46:32.900 is convincing because it kind of makes you laugh that, hey, changing a child's gender or trying to

00:46:40.700 is evil. It's evil. Abortion is evil. It is hypocritical. These immigration policies, they are

00:46:49.300 evil. And I've told you that a million times straight faced and literally. So let me try to

00:46:55.020 do it in a way that makes you laugh. And we've been doing that since 2017, 2018. And that's not,

00:47:02.280 you know, that's not going to stop. Now, that is, it is every church's and organization's right to

00:47:08.320 decide, you know, kind of what they want to represent and what is a distraction and what is not.

00:47:16.680 Like it, it's just like a bummer to me that, okay, making light of these legitimately, objectively,

00:47:22.960 not even politically, but biblically evil things for the purpose of convincing people that they're 0.78

00:47:28.680 evil. Like that's the thing that's too much. Like that's the thing. That's the distraction.

00:47:34.840 That's just a bummer. But, you know, that's okay. I understand that I am kind of like in this

00:47:40.620 intersection that I am, we are at this show, like sometimes too political

00:47:47.700 for those who just consider themselves in the religious camp. And we are too religious,

00:47:55.560 too theological for those in the political camp. I understand us talking about the gospel the way

00:48:00.820 that we do, us talking about the difference between gospels and false gospels is really hard

00:48:06.780 for people. A lot of times on the right who are just like, let's just focus on the politics and the

00:48:11.960 culture wars and not talk about any of that stuff. And then talking about the policies and the policy

00:48:17.180 positions and the politicians and the parties and the differences between the two and like,

00:48:24.040 like what is evil and what is not when it comes to politics is really uncomfortable for a lot of

00:48:30.480 Christians. But here I stand, I can do no other. And I will, you know, I will fail a million times in 0.96

00:48:36.720 how I do it. Sometimes I am too harsh. Sometimes I'm too sarcastic. Sometimes how I choose to explain

00:48:41.340 something is not effective. And I thought it was going to be and I've made mistakes. And we talk about

00:48:46.620 those on here. But all that to say, like, I'm thankful for all of you who are in this difficult

00:48:53.200 intersection with me, who are, you're trying to navigate it all you're trying to navigate the

00:48:58.740 chaos and the craziness of this world with a little bit of humor. And with as much grace as

00:49:04.960 you possibly can, and with a whole lot of truth, and we're doing it imperfectly, but we're trying,

00:49:09.400 which is why the show is called relatable. And I'm just I know the show isn't for everyone.

00:49:14.020 It's not. But it is for 1000s and 1000s of you out there. And I know I'm biased, but I think that

00:49:22.000 I've got the best and smartest and most fun audience in the world. In this sometimes very

00:49:30.460 difficult combination and intersection in space of culture, politics, and theology. But we're here,

00:49:41.020 we're here and we're going to stay here. And 2023 is going to be an amazingly eventful year that I am

00:49:48.760 sure of there's one thing that we can guarantee is that things are not going to be boring. And we've

00:49:55.240 got a lot of fun plans for this year. So thanks for sticking with us. Share the show with your friends

00:50:00.500 like I would love your friends who you think would like relatable. Or maybe who would, maybe you don't

00:50:06.100 know if they would agree with me yet. Maybe they're Christian friends that you haven't quite convinced to 1.00

00:50:09.620 care about this stuff, but they eventually will. I love that person. We bring them in and then we make

00:50:15.060 them care about all this craziness. Share this leave a five star review. If you would like to wherever

00:50:22.360 you listen, subscribe on YouTube if you haven't already, and we will see you back here tomorrow.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - January 09, 2023

Ep 735 ｜ WE’RE BACK! The Secret to Happiness for Women

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