Some links and projects from Danielle Bean:

Manual for Marriage by Dan and Danielle Bean

Girlfriends, a weekly podcast by Danielle

Danielle’s books on Amazon

Retreats by Danielle

Have Danielle come speak!

TO LISTEN
Simply hit “play” above!
or subscribe in iTunes
or subscribe in Stitcher
or subscribe in Google Play

Girlfriends is on Patreon! Find out how you can pledge your support for Girlfriends at Patreon.com/Girlfriends

NOTES

What is a Catholic feminist? Is that even a thing? We are talking this week with Claire Swinarski, host of The Catholic Feminist Podcast. Claire shares what her journey has been toward fully embracing her Catholic faith while holding onto feminist ideals. She talks about the struggle of being a Catholic feminist and feeling sometimes caught between two worlds of feminism and faith.

I know you will enjoy the conversation, and afterwards, check out more about Claire and all she does with these links:

The Catholic Feminist Podcast

Claire on Instagram

Claire on Facebook

Claire’s “e-retreat,” 40 days to a Feminist Faith

This week, we also hear from listeners Louise, Brigid, and Tammy about raising Catholic kids, connecting with Girlfriend, and adjusting to an empty nest. Thanks for your feedback! It makes my day!

Episode mentioned in this week’s show:
Episode #035 The Art of Letting Go

SUPPORT
Girlfriends is on Patreon! Thank you to our Patreon supporters! Find out how you can pledge your support for Girlfriends and get an invite to our Girlfriends LIVE session each month!

RETREAT
The You’re Worth It! Retreat for Women
Find out more about bringing this unique event for women to your parish, group, or community. Read more and request more information here.

Or find out more about having me come speak at your parish or conference.

My newest book is available!
You’re Worth It! Change How You Feel About Yourself By Discovering How Jesus Feels About You

Subscribe to Girlfriends in iTunes
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About Danielle Bean
Danielle’s Books on Amazon
Catholic Digest
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Contact:
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Rate and Review Girlfriends in iTunes
Leave voice feedback
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TO LISTEN
Simply hit “play” above!
or subscribe in iTunes
or subscribe in Stitcher
or subscribe in Google Play

Girlfriends is on Patreon! Find out how you can pledge your support for Girlfriends at Patreon.com/Girlfriends

NOTES

Happy new Year! In this episode, we are talking about some doable ideas for goals we should all think about setting in 2017. Even if you are not a resolution-making kind of person (I’m not), we can all benefit from a prompting to look back at the year that has passed and look forward to the future with an eye to what we might like to happen.

I challenge you to join me in setting some do-able goals in each of the following categories:

1) Set a spiritual goal.

2) Set a professional goal.

3) Set a relationship goal.

4) Set a health goal.

After you have decided what you might like your goals to be, let’s break them down into some smaller steps that you can take action on right away. For example, if you have a health goal of running a 5K in the spring, you can begin today by researching and starting a run/walk program of training to get you there. Or if you have a relationship goal of spending more time with your elderly aunt, call her up today and commit to a time this week that you can go visit her. Whatever your goals, make sure you move toward making them a reality right away.

Let me know what your goals are for 2017 and how we can help support you in achieving them!

This week, I also share a belated voicemail from listener David about taking kids to Midnight Mass. Let me know what you think!

SUPPORT
Girlfriends is on Patreon! Find out how you can pledge your support for Girlfriends at Patreon.com/Girlfriends

My newest book is available!
You’re Worth It! Change How You Feel About Yourself By Discovering How Jesus Feels About You

Subscribe to Girlfriends in iTunes
Subscribe to Girlfriends in Stitcher
About Danielle Bean
Danielle’s Books on Amazon
Catholic Digest
Subscribe to the Danielle Bean newsletter

Contact:
Email Danielle Bean
Rate and Review Girlfriends in iTunes
Leave voice feedback
Girlfriends on Facebook
Danielle Bean on Facebook
Danielle Bean on Twitter
Danielle Bean on Instagram

“Mama! Mama! Ma-maaaaa!” whined four-year-old Raphael as I changed his little brother’s diaper and quizzed his older sister on her spelling words.

“What?” I answered him hastily. “I’m listening.”

“No,” he pouted. “I want you to listen with your eyes.”

Oh. That.

Ever have a moment when you feel like someone has taken hold of your shoulders and given you a good old-fashioned shaking? When you feel like you have just been ordered to take notice of your life? I guess I had one then.

My children are good at giving me moments like these. Not all of them are reprimands, though. Some are more pleasant encounters where they simply invite me to pause and pay attention.

Once, when Raphael was still very young, we spent a long day visiting friends and returned home after dark. It was a frigid January night, and so I bundled little him in a blanket and carried him swiftly through the cold toward the house. I might have been in a hurry, but this child certainly wasn’t.

He gazed up at the sky and sighed. “Stars,” he said dreamily.

I looked up. And took a breath.

Have you ever seen the sky on a clear January night in the middle of Nowheresville, New Hampshire? Thousands of brilliant white stars twinkled against a black velvet sky. I’m not sure I knew there were that many stars. They winked and blinked and seemed almost to dance from where they hung in that enormous dome of black.

I hugged my bundled boy close and the two of us spent a moment breathing the icy air and gazing through the darkness at the twinkling sky. I found it hard to believe that without my son’s invitation, I would have missed all this beauty.

Thank you God, I found myself praying, for this glimpse of heaven. In my arms and in the sky. Thank you for the cold that makes us seek warmth. For the darkness that makes us seek light. And for small people who remind us to stop once in a while and look upward. With wonder.

A friend of mine, a mother of seven children, recently told me of a time when she went to adoration but, once there, found herself so distracted and exhausted that she could not concentrate on prayer.

“I can’t keep up with my life,” my friend sighed in the end. “How will I ever have a relationship with God if I have to chase Him down first?”

What I think busy mothers – and distracted people of all kinds – sometimes don’t realize is that we never have to hunt God down. He’s here with us. Right here, right now. It’s just that we sometimes need to peel back the layers of our lives that we have piled on top of God before we’ll recognize His presence.

Kids are very good at helping us do that. One night not too long ago, six-year-old Gabrielle got out of bed. She stood in the dark, at the foot of my bed, and did her very best to sound confident.

“I don’t know why I can’t sleep,” she said. “But I just can’t.”
Her voice was tight and just a tiny bit trembling. In it, I heard more, “I’m scared and alone in the dark” than my growing-up girl was prepared to admit.

I took her by the hand and led her back to her bed. I pulled up her covers and then knelt on the floor beside her.

“Let’s talk about lovely things to think about as you are falling asleep,” I said.

We made a list: Tiny fairies with flowers in their hair. Ice skating on a frozen lake. Ruffled pink skirts that swirl when you spin. Hot cocoa with candy canes. Angel wings. Easter eggs hiding in small patches of snow. Babies’ first kisses. Cinnamon toast breakfast by the wood stove.

Soon Gabby had no more suggestions. Her breathing grew slow and deep.

Even after she fell asleep, though, I remained there, listening to her steady breathing and completing our list in my head. I spoke to God now, and thanked Him for the blessings He has given us. Every moment of our days should be so peaceful and pleasurable as this one, I dared to tell Him.

But then I thought that maybe they all are – beneath the noise and commotion, under the clutter and the pressures of daily living. Maybe we just need to slow down enough to dig deep, see that those moments are there, and treasure them for what they are – glimpses of God.

This is an old column of mine that originally appeared at InsideCatholic.

Are you ready for Lent 2016?

It’s by planning ahead and setting goals that we make progress, whether it’s in our professional lives, our family lives, or our spiritual lives. So let’s do this. Together.

Thousands of subscribers enjoyed receiving daily email messages from me, with prompts Think, Pray & Act, throughout Advent 2015, and now I am offering a similar service for Lent 2016.

Are you ready to commit to growing closer to Jesus, one small, do-able step at a time, during Lent 2016?

Just $7 will get you over 40 days of reflections and prayer support, delivered straight to your inbox, every morning, for the entire season of Lent in 2016.

Use the button below to guarantee your subscription to this unique service for Lent this year.

 Just like my Advent series, these Lenten daily emails will be quick and simple, totally do-able prayers, reflections, and action items for every day of the season.

We’ve been in this together, so let’s stay in this together!

Together, let’s grow closer to Jesus, 5 minutes at a time, during Lent 2016. Thanks for considering joining me, and I’ll see you in your inbox!

The first pregnancy test I ever took was three weeks after my wedding day. It was positive. I started vomiting pretty much right then and there.

In the following weeks, as I struggled to adjust to my newly married state while waiting tables at a seafood restaurant and battling morning sickness, I lost some weight. My doctor assured me that first-trimester weight loss was not a threat to the baby’s health, but my gaunt frame certainly succeeded in making me look young, miserable, and pathetic.

Upon hearing the news of my pregnancy, one of my coworkers at the restaurant – a young man who played in a band part time – grew concerned. “Oh no,” he whispered to me, “Do you have a … boyfriend … or anything?”

Well yes, I have something rather like that, I told him. It’s called a husband.

Truth be told, though, that word “husband” still felt foreign in my mouth. I was 22 years old, but I look back at photos taken during those early years and see myself for the child I really was.

I survived the vomitous first four months of that pregnancy by alternately ingesting and then, er, rejecting a delicately balanced diet of ginger ale, handfuls of almonds, frozen vanilla yogurt, and Little Debbie Swiss Cake Rolls. Then, right about the time I received a new job offer and was bidding farewell to the waitressing job with its nausea-inducing platters of shrimp scampi, my husband surprised me. With two tickets to Antigua.

This trip would be our last hurrah, my earnest man explained – maybe our last chance to get away together without a child in tow for many years to come.

After my tumultuous introduction to marriage and family life, at the ripe old age of 22, I felt like the hurrahs were already over. I didn’t think I could stomach much more. Literally.

But the trip was important to Dan, and he convinced me we should go. So we two kids – and our gestating baby – boarded a plane early one morning and landed in a tropical paradise. It was there, in the sun-drenched streets of Antigua, that I lost my gray pallor and came alive.

We rented a jeep and cruised the island’s back roads with youthful enthusiasm. We spent our days exploring gardens and sitting in the surf; we ate peanut butter sandwiches in our room and saved our pennies for one big splurge – dinner at an expensive outdoor restaurant. It had tables on the beach, candlelight, live music, and dancing. I would wear my favorite sun dress.

I suppose the dinner was lovely, though I don’t remember much of it. What I do remember was that after we ate, we played in the water while the nearby music still lingered in our ears. I had never felt such a forceful tide before. Again and again, wild waves crashed the two of us laughingly onto the beach.

When we grew tired, we sat, soaked and panting, in the sand. The setting sun streaked the sky with orange, pink, and purple. I breathed the scent of salty water as the sound of music and the distant dancers filled my ears. I took it all in and then closed my eyes to affix it in my memory.

It was as I sat there, with a nascent marriage and a fluttering baby growing inside, that I first felt the comforting strength and security of God’s hand as it closed around us.

God calls us to big things sometimes, I realized. Bigger than we would ever choose for ourselves. Again and again, He might allow us to be tossed about and thrown helplessly onto the shore. But our job is not to control the waves – only to ride them. To trust. To let go. And to know that through it all, He holds us.

I think back to that girl on the beach and I want to tell her that she was glimpsing only a tiny bit of what waves could be like, but also only a shadow of God’s mercy and grace.

But then, I know she will figure all of that out in good time. She’s still figuring it out.

One recent sunshine-soaked afternoon, Dan and I packed our smallish motor boat with the eight life-jacketed bodies of our growing children.

When we were all settled, I looked to my husband at the wheel.

“Where to?” he asked.

“Anywhere’s good,” I answered. And I meant it.

This is an old column of mine that originally appeared at InsideCatholic.