Welcome to The Brave Collective
We are women of faith who believe in a holy God who has a very holy purpose placed on our lives.
We are driven leaders and want to develop our voice of influence in the workplace and beyond.
And we are here for you – to remind you that your voice matters. We believe in your great power of influence and know that your voice is needed in the space you occupy. Because of that, we want to encourage, empower, and equip you to live into the God-given potential that is already yours.
We want to remind you of your worth.
Sometimes we get lost in it all. Of course the bigger challenges take our attention, but even the regularity of everyday life can create distraction, pull us down, or cause loss of perspective.
We walk through the mundane practices and rhythms of our days and nights –– the work grind, get-it-done days; the messy bun, hot-mess-mom days; the emotionally fragile, yet strength-required, makeup-or-bust days because you feel you better not let them see you cry.
This has so many layers. Some of it is the distraction of busyness. Because of the depth of this reality, we can find ourselves looking up one day to our circumstances wondering, How did I even get here? Just look at the everyday, stereotypical working mom. You probably know her, live next door to her… or maybe you are her.
the woman who needs this as much as we do
She is committed four nights of the week to her children’s activities, sometimes having multiple lessons, practices, or games on a single night. She’s working late on that project or side hustle because she wants to reserve time for her husband the one night a week they get to spend together. So she stays up past midnight putting in time on that thing because she can’t get that time anywhere else.
She forgot she promised to bring grapes to her 2nd grader’s school party so she’s rushing out the door, late as usual, on her way to the store. And it’s cold that morning but her daughter refuses to wear pants and she just doesn’t have time to argue. So she’s trying desperately to avoid the glaringly obvious judgmental looks she’s getting as she rushes through the grocery store with her kid who’s wearing shorts on a 28 degree day.
The one night the kids don’t have a commitment also happens to be the meeting night for the weekly church group to which she and her husband are committed. They don’t want to cancel again because they weren’t able to make the last two weeks due to everyone in the house being sick.
On weekends, time gets filled with the inevitable dinner at her parents’ house, someone’s birthday party, and of course, church, which they definitely can’t miss – again. She and her husband both desire regular date nights but she realizes it’s been several weeks since she’s made one happen and the guilt starts to set in.
Daycare has been rough on her youngest child. Every single morning, her screaming preschooler reaches his arms out to her as if to say, “Don’t leave me in this God-forsaken place again!” And the guilt… it’s heavy. It’s almost more than she can bear. And the toll it takes on her – emotionally, mentally, physically – is sucking the life from her bones.
She goes into the office and it’s all she can do to switch from mom-brain to manager-brain. Her boss is in one of those moods and wants to see her in his office in ten minutes. She swallows back the emotions, drying her almost lifeless eyes without rubbing too hard (because she can’t let them see she was crying). She tells herself to suck it up and get in the game.
She’s completely in love with her children. She also loves her work, and she’s good at it, too. But somewhere along the way, she lost herself and she’s not sure why she feels tired all the time. Why does it feel like the days are long but time is still flying by? She’s there, but she’s missing so much.
It’s almost as if life is happening but she’s not really living it.
We’ve been there and you probably have, too. Maybe you’re still there.
We’re caught up in busyness like the churning of dirty clothes in a broken washing machine. We’re working hard, just like that washing machine, but we’re not gaining ground because we’re not actually completing the job we were created to do. There’s a malfunction.
We don’t need more clothes, water, and soap. We don’t need to run another cycle. We need to repair the machine. We need to remove it from its never-ending cycle of chaos so it runs properly, efficiently, and performs its intended purpose.
This is dangerous. This cycle of aimless busyness is destructive and dangerous.
When we live our lives this way, we’re missing out on so much that God has for us. By doing more and consuming more, we’re actually experiencing less. We’re distracted and missing out.
Have you ever considered that perhaps we’re obsessed with the doing because we’ve connected the doing with our worth?
When we start placing our value in the things we do for ourselves and for others, we begin to experience disappointment because our efforts never measure up to our own expectations, let alone the expectations of others.
This performance-based living leads to emptiness. You see, we’ll never measure up. We are not machines but human beings. We were made to experience a rich, full life that’s rooted in the love of our Creator. We were made for purpose.
You see, we crave value. We have been designed with an ingrained desire to offer something of worth – to be needed, wanted, valued. And dear soul, that’s in all of us. We are all desperate to be worth something to someone. To have a voice that makes an impact. And to know how to use that voice in ways that will inspire and impress. This is how God created us – just as we are – and it’s a wonderful, miraculous thing.
But somewhere along the line, we’ve missed the point completely. We’ve missed the Source. The very thing of value that we have to offer isn’t what we do, it’s who we are and it comes from knowing Whom we belong to.
Knowing your value starts with discovering who you are which is rooted in who God says you are. This is important because if you don’t base your identity in Jesus, then you will always miss the mark. You will always be drowning in a sea of dirty clothes, stuck in the same spot, wearing masks to cover up your true feelings.
But don’t you want to live a life that’s free? One that declares,
“I am made in the image of God. He calls me good. He delights in me. He sings over me. He has created me for a massive purpose for such a time as this. I will NOT be ashamed of the person I am. I will not shy away from my feelings. I don’t need to mask my pain, sorrow, or even joy. I will live into the purpose He’s laid out for me because there’s a reason I’m here. And when I walk in His purpose for me, I will walk in joy and freedom!”
Yeah, that’s the life we want for you, too! And if you stick around with us, our prayer is that you will move toward the purpose He has for you.
Because you’re worth it. And we need you here.
