248 - When You Miss the Sunrise, Here’s How to Still Fill Your Morning With Hope
Ripple-Effect Faith with Twyla Franz
Release Date: 04/07/2026
Ripple-Effect Faith with Twyla Franz
Maybe there’s a similarly pesky voice of perfectionism following you around inside your head, telling you that you should be able to get incrementally better. Every. Single. Day. It’s relentless. You’re worn out from all your undue try-hard. But also, maybe you carry a bit of shame around with your perfectionism. You’re told you worry too much. Focus on the wrong things. Care too much about your work. Can we talk about you? How you can be a perfectionist and have peace of mind? How you don’t have to turn off your desire to do your best? How your perfectionism can be an...
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Self-doubt surfaces quickly when it’s thinly veiled behind borrowed confidence and temperamental self-esteem. Maybe this is your story. To others, you appear secure, but you feel deeply insufficient inside. You can take the lead, finish the work, maintain a high standard of excellence, and pass as having it together. But you can’t outrun the voice that whispers, If only they knew how little you know, how long you’ve been in this role, or how lost you feel . . . If only they knew how un-brave and undeserving you actually are . . . If only they knew how meticulously you mask the...
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To you, Googling “how to be a better person.” You, longing to be the sort of neighbor who effortlessly welcomes others into your home, leans into conversations with sincerity and delight, and spills over with hopefulness. You, with your burgeoning summer calendar and dwindling blank space. You, feeling squeezed between ideals and actual life. You don’t need an out-of-reach plan, additional demands on your time, or an annoying voice filling your head with “shoulds.” So here are some simple summertime tips that will fill you up rather than deplete you. Links mentioned: If baby...
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I sign up on a whim. One half-marathon for Saturday, through hilly horse country. My calves are still tight from three runs the same morning, because my impetuous mind decided to run to the start line of a community 5k, which also meant I had to get home on foot after the race. Honestly, my only hope of non-stop running for the half is contingent on keeping a slow, steady pace. And resting. Funny how sometimes the best way to prepare is literally to take a break. To slow to a walk. To sit in the sun. To stretch. To strengthen with pilates. Fear tells me to cram-train, to sprint up...
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Sometimes you are doing too much, and you know it from the tumble of thoughts burying the task that truly needs your attention. You find yourself making slow progress in several areas simultaneously. At every spin, you find more before you that could be straightened, sorted, or scheduled. Oh friend, I get it. I admit I mostly (okay, only) wipe out the interior of my fridge when I should be packing for a trip. I tidy the pantry and put wheels to a wild whim of an idea when I have barely enough margin for the minimum. I make spontaneous updates to pages on my website that don’t need to be...
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Sometimes I can get stuck in my routine. I start my morning the same way every day I can. I fall into a rhythm with school and gymnastics and church. I even put plates a certain way in the dishwasher–every time. In the midst of the repetition, faith can begin to feel a bit monotonous. Perhaps you’ve experienced this. You might feel like you’re on autopilot, mudding through the motions, willing your heart to be in it. Maybe you’re struggling to keep up with the minimum because the needs that take your time? Well, they keep multiplying. Links mentioned: Turn Your Loneliness...
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It feels like summer, and I sit on the step with Seph Schlueter singing through my portable speaker. Funny how you can play worship songs on repeat, but they move you forward, rather than in circles. Yes, you are essentially listening on loop, but the lyrics unravel your reservations and amplify your expectancy with every replay. Links mentioned: playlist. Turn Your Loneliness into Ripple-Effect Faith in 5 Days Read the written version of this episode
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Perhaps it’s grief, your physical health, or some other life disruption that makes the ground gallop beneath you. And it’s all you can do right now to keep putting one foot forward at a time. Here are three truths that will steady you when life feels unstable. Links mentioned: Turn Your Loneliness into Ripple-Effect Faith in 5 Days Read the written version of this episode
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“Did you see what I wrote on the mirror?” He’s giddy insistent. First, he points to words I don’t even see in the disappearing, post-shower stream. God is good. God is great. Bless his 9-year-old heart, reminding me that even when we can’t see how, God’s steadiness writes a never-ending story. Links mentioned: Turn Your Loneliness into Ripple-Effect Faith in 5 Days Read the written version of this episode
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It sounded like a prank call, but I promise we were serious. Seriously set on seeing the sunrise in a city where we’d spend spring break. This was before the days of smartphones to check the weather app. So we did what made most sense to our college student brains—call local numbers in the phone book to ask when the sun rises. I think of it now as radiant pink entrances us en route to school. These sunrise spottings almost make me like Daylight Savings. Almost. Since I started running, I catch every sunrise I can. I time my runs down to the minute so I can capture the colors from...
info_outlineIt sounded like a prank call, but I promise we were serious. Seriously set on seeing the sunrise in a city where we’d spend spring break. This was before the days of smartphones to check the weather app. So we did what made most sense to our college student brains—call local numbers in the phone book to ask when the sun rises.
I think of it now as radiant pink entrances us en route to school. These sunrise spottings almost make me like Daylight Savings. Almost.
Since I started running, I catch every sunrise I can. I time my runs down to the minute so I can capture the colors from the church at the crest of the hill. But on school days, I usually miss the sun breaking through the night . . . except when Daylight Savings aligns the time.
A sunrise feels like a God-hug in the middle of the rush to get to school. A splash of His endless creativity. The visible evidence that He is always watching over us.
Or, as Jennifer Dukes Lee writes in her book How to Love Your Morning, that He is watching with us. In her captivating story-telling style, she paints a picture of a God pointing our eyes to the sunrise He created for us. I don’t want to spoil it for you, so you just might need to read the book yourself! (This story is in chapter two.)
Links mentioned:
- How to Love Your Morning by Jennifer Dukes Lee
- FREE, 5-Day Email Course: Turn Your Loneliness into Ripple-Effect Faith in 5 Days
- Read the written version of this episode HERE.