Candace Nassar (00:01.082)
Well, welcome, MomQ family. I’m so excited and honored to have Sandra Stanley and her daughter, Allie Stanley Kootenay on our show today. Sandra and Allie together have written this beautiful God-centered book called Meet Me in the Middle. And it’s gonna help moms, aunts, and grandmothers, and more, have those crucial faith conversations with preteen girls and the teenaged women in their lives.
So I’m really excited for them to share their wisdom with you guys today. So welcome Allie and Sandra.
Sandra (00:33.518)
Thank you. Thanks for having us. We’ve been looking forward to it, Candace.
Candace Nassar (00:37.576)
Thank you so much. Me too. So Sandra and I just found out that we both went to the same college. So that’s pretty cool. We have that in common. And I also know that she has three children, two boys and a girl as do I. And so that’s really neat. And then I found out too from reading her book that neither of us like dark chocolate. Sandra (00:59.524)
Okay. I finally came. Good to know. I finally confessed.
Candace Nassar (01:07.278)
Yeah, not a dark chocolate fan, but boy, some good milk chocolate, you better get out of the way. So that’s so fun. But way more important than having those things in common is that we share a passion for children and families and helping them become grounded in the Lord. And I just love the format of the book, ladies. I really wish I had it with my daughter. She’s now 32. But when she was that age, you know, I just…
Sandra (01:08.836)
bring it. Yes, yes.
Candace Nassar (01:36.09)
I felt like I was winging it. So it would have been really helpful to have this book. And it’s just so neat how you each write complimentary chapters for mothers and daughters with discussion prompts and activities in the middle for the mothers and daughters to read together. So I guess that’s where the title came from.
Sandra (01:37.64)
Yeah.
Sandra (01:52.203)
Yeah!
Sandra (01:57.455)
That’s right. It sure is. That’s right.
Candace Nassar (02:00.022)
Yep, I love it. And I can’t wait to get into the meat of the book. But first, how about you guys introduce yourselves and just give us a little bit of background on your family, your ministry, that sort of thing.
Sandra (02:12.909)
All right, you want to go first? Yeah, so I’m Allie and I grew up in Atlanta. My dad is a pastor, so grew up in a Christian home, was a small group leader as I was growing up for younger girls and I absolutely loved it. Then I went to Auburn University and got really plugged into Young Life there where I continued to pour into a group of high school girls and then got really involved in my church where I once again was in student ministry. So I’ve been doing student ministry. It overlapped with pretty much the moment I was no longer a student. So that’s great. Then I moved back to Atlanta to do seminary and work at our local church and met my husband Clay and have been working in middle school and high school ministry pretty much ever since and then about two years ago I had our first baby girl, Haven. She’ll be one on November 11th. So don’t know when this podcast is out in the world, but she’s gonna be two really
really soon. So I have such a heart for specifically middle school and high school aged girls and seeing them really step into their identity of who God says they are and also make as wise of choices as they can through these middle and high school years so that they can get to the other side with as little regret as possible and with a really strong relationship with the Lord and then also ideally a strong relationship with their mom.
Candace Nassar (03:37.764)
Yes, so good.
Sandra (03:42.577)
Yeah, yeah. Well and my story-I’m a Georgia
native. Grew up in middle Georgia. Moved to Atlanta to go to Georgia Tech and met Andy my husband when I was a junior and so we’ve been married 36 years. We’ve got three kids as you mentioned. Andrew is 32 and married to Anna. Garrett is 30 married to Danielle and then Allie is 28 married to Clay and two grandchildren. So Allie has our two-year-old, our first granddaughter and then Garrett and Danielle have an eight-month-old little girl as well. So two granddaughters.
Candace Nassar (04:16.464)
So it’s fun.
Sandra (04:18.39)
Grandparenting has become just one of my favorite things in the whole wide world. Yeah. Yeah.
Candace Nassar (04:20.26)
Yes, I’m waiting. I have a married child that is talking about it. So I can’t wait. Not gonna be long. Not gonna be long. Yes.
Sandra (04:26.263)
Yep, yep, that’s close. You don’t know-it could happen any minute. That’s so fun. That’s so fun. Then, ministry-wise, I just also have a lot of deep roots into student ministry. When I married Andy, he was youth pastor at First Baptist Atlanta. And so I dove deep into youth ministry then. I have done student ministry off and on since then. And then doing this book with Allie. I’ve had a heart for moms for a long time.
And especially once our children kind of launched, just finding opportunities to pour into younger moms has been a big heartbeat for me. And this project with Allie just felt like perfect timing to take that to just a little bit of a different direction. But still, my heart behind this project is setting up moms to engage and build their relationship with their daughter and help their daughters lay a foundation of faith from which to make all their life decisions for the rest of their lives and just invest in that relationship because it’s been such a meaningful relationship for Allie and me. So that’s where we are.
Candace Nassar (05:35.491)
That’s so great. and it’s it’s I haven’t seen anything like it. So I love the prompts and everything and I think it’s just a really important book and very very timely as we dive into what you guys have talked about. So throughout the book you focus on one of my very favorite passages of Scripture Philippians 4:4-9.
So why did you choose those verses? Why is that so applicable to the topic of this book?
Sandra (06:05.219)
Yeah, so we kind of sat down and brainstormed what we would want to talk about, what we would want to do and throughout all of our conversations we kind of led back to this specific passage of scripture. In one of our first chapters we talk about identity and our points are, “Hey you gotta remind yourself who you are and then you need to walk out your identity.” And we realized that Philippians 4, specifically 4 through 9 are very applicable ways to walk out your identity, you know.
Rejoicing even when you don’t feel like it. Understanding that God is with you. Not being anxious, but being thankful and having gratitude and praying and then fixing your eyes on what is true and noble and right and pure and lovely. And then at the end, Paul says, put it all into practice. And so we kind of realized as we were going through the topics that we would want to talk about, this passage just really lined up really, really well with what we were wanting to say. And they really are really practical ways of living out who God created you to be. That’s right. That’s right. And it really was, it was so funny. We had brainstormed on what are some of the biggest things that girls are struggling with as they are, you know, middle school, early to, you know, even getting toward late high school. What are some of the big things that would be important conversations for moms and daughters to have? And as we brainstormed what those were, which then became our chapters,
Allie said it just lined up so perfectly with this scripture and so we just felt like that was a nudge from God to say, Hey use this as a little bit of an outline for these conversations with these moms and daughters because what we know is what we dwell on, what we think about, what we give our attention to. All of that impacts our emotions and our actions. just like our girls, just like when we were their age, they tend to make decisions based on their emotions, not necessarily on truth. And we want to help them transition….
Sandra (08:08.087)
to truth and this passage of scripture does that so beautifully and sort of outlines that for us. And one thing too that I want to point out. While I was growing up, we became really attached to the word “lovely”. So, I’d be having drama at school. My mom would always be like, “Okay. Let’s talk about what the lovely thing to do is.” or, “Was that really a lovely thing that you just said to your brother?”
Candace Nassar (08:13.456)
Good day.
Sandra (08:37.953)
That was the kind of language that we used as I was growing up. And so obviously that comes from Philippians 4:8. And so that was another little cute thing that we love because this passage of scripture is really kind of the biggest one that played into our relationship growing up of even just that word “lovely”. So we tried to figure out how to make our book title bubbly, but it didn’t work out. That’s okay. Meet Me in the Middle works better.
Candace Nassar (09:03.812)
Well, don’t you love how God just brings all that stuff together when you’re seeking Him?
Sandra (09:09.772)
Yes, on our best day we can’t engineer things the way He can. So that has been a fun piece of this to watch.
Candace Nassar (09:13.982)
out.
Yes, I bet, I bet. And one of the things I like is that you both start your chapters, because you each write on the same thing, but from your own perspectives, you start your chapters with theology to lay the foundation of faith. So why do you think this is so important for both moms and daughters?
Sandra (09:36.847)
Yeah, I think, you know, we didn’t want to just have a cute little self-help book and hope that maybe you’ll see Jesus along the way. We wanted it to be very straightforward.
If you don’t get this, then honestly the rest of our chapters are not gonna really make a lot of sense because we are working under the assumption that you understand what Jesus did for you on the cross. Because, specifically, just a couple, actually pretty much all of them, we talk about identity and you have to know what Jesus did for you to understand your identity. We talk about comparison, which kind of goes into the identity. You have to know that because of what Jesus did for you, you are enough and you don’t have to compare. We talk a lot about fear
and stress and all of those things have this underlying understanding that “Hey you’re valuable and God is with you.” He proved that to us by going to the cross and so we really wanted to be very straightforward at the beginning of our book saying “This is what we’re talking about and this is what we believe and this is what we hope you believe.” I think we even kind of offer a chance to put your faith in Jesus and the mom section of this is what we’re doing. We’re not trying to hide. We’re not trying to trick you. We’re not trying to manipulate you. This is what we’re talking about. And so we wanted to really be upfront about that. And having been in student ministry, both of us, we know there are so many moms who want to have these conversations with their daughters, even about this foundation of faith and what that is and what that means and how to have a relationship with Jesus. But there are a lot of moms who aren’t equipped. Not everybody really even knows how to lead someone else to faith in Christ. Not everybody knows or understands who God is and who Jesus is and the role of the Holy Spirit in their lives. So we didn’t make it complicated.
Sandra (11:31.213)
As much as possible, we wanted to give these moms, especially, a little tool and a little training, theological training, you know, to be able to have the lens through which making all these other decisions, like Allie said, actually makes sense. And so we feel like it’s an equipping thing for moms on some of the basics of Christianity and then also taking that and allowing that to be the lens through which we look at identity and stress and fears and decision making and you know all of the topics that we then touch on throughout the book.
Candace Nassar (12:06.318)
Yeah, that’s really good. And just giving them that opportunity too, because I know we hear a lot that moms are just not confident in these types of conversations. So starting from ground zero, I love that you guys did that. That’s really good. So let’s talk, you mentioned identity several times and it’s interesting because you guys start there and that is actually the very first message in the momQ curriculum that we have. It’s on identity as well.
Sandra (12:14.905)
Right.
Candace Nassar (12:33.668)
I totally agree, that’s the foundation. So why don’t you, how are grasping these truths able to change the fabric of a young girl’s life? Let’s dive into that.
Sandra (12:44.813)
Yeah, well I am very passionate about this. I think that that is a big part of my heart too because like you said, it’s kind of the first thing you need to talk about because I truly believe that what you think about yourself affects everything about your life. You know, it affects your relationships, it affects your self-esteem, it affects your confidence, it affects how hard you try for girls, it affects how hard they try in school and sports and all the things. And so I think it’s so essential to start there because if we can get these middle school and high school girls to understand, “Hey, you’re not trying to gain love from other people, you’re not trying to gain approval, you’re not trying to gain being important, that’s not the reason behind the things you’re doing. You can actually do all of these things because you are loved and because you are important and because you are valuable.” If they can get that, I think we’re probably all still trying to get that, but if we can start at 13, 14, 15 realizing, “Hey, I don’t actually have to make this decision in order to get this group of people to like me because I’m already loved by God. Like I don’t have to, you know, strive and try so hard to be the best at this sport because I’m already good enough in the eyes of God.” I think that just kind of takes so much pressure off of these girls, but also helps them to walk in a way that is comfortable.
But also walking away where they’re making good decisions because they’re not trying to prove anything. They’re not trying to gain anything. They’re not trying to change themselves in order to be someone but understanding “Hey you are a loved chosen child of God.” That really sets up their whole life to walk in a way that is pleasing to God but also in a way that’s confident and joy-filled and peace-filled. So I mean I could talk about that forever.
It’s so important. That’s right. Well, and also, if you start researching even scratching the surface of what some of our students, boys and girls, in middle school and high school are dealing with, the stress and the load that they’re carrying right now, I think is unprecedented, as you compare it to previous generations and this is the only thing….
Sandra (15:14.839)
that alleviates that at all.
And to Ali’s point, there’s no more striving. It takes the pressure off for the striving that our kids are seemingly getting pushed toward from every direction, whether it’s school, whether it’s sports, whether it’s the college they’re gonna get into, or friends or being liked or fearing being left out and they’re looking at social media all day every day and some of the negative messages are being reinforced. if they can pin their identity on the fact that Jesus went to the cross for them, loved them so much that he died for them, that’s a game changer and that’s the foundation we wanted to start with. So we start with our little theology kind of intro and then we go right into “identity” in chapter one. And again, you alluded to the way the book is laid out. I write eight chapters to the moms, Allie writes a corresponding eight chapters to the girls, and then they come together in the middle. And even that “meet me in the middle section” in talking about identity is such a powerful conversation for a mom,
and for moms to be able to be there to remind their daughters or grandmothers or mentors or whoever’s going through this with the young lady, to be able to remind them in those difficult moments, “Hey, just remember your acceptance and your…
Sandra (16:40.874)
being good enough has already been established. You do not have to hang that on whether you make the team or whether you get into this school or whatever it is.” So that’s just such an important thing foundationally.
Candace Nassar (16:53.208)
It is. I actually taught middle school and high school for about 10 years, so I can attest to the incredible anxiety that they’re feeling and the pressures. I completely agree. Just to have that understanding, don’t have that anything else can define them. It’s God’s love that defines them. That is so freeing. And so I love that. It’s so good. And another topic that you addressed that I saw when I was teaching as well.
Sandra (16:57.486)
wow.
Sandra (17:01.89)
Yes. Yeah.
Sandra (17:11.101)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (17:21.72)
I read about it all the time is that, and its effect on moms and young girls, which is how the book is so great. But the comparison trap, I mean, social media you just mentioned is a huge part of that. Yeah. But, you speak about avoiding the comparison trap by doing two things. So tell our listeners what those are.
Sandra (17:32.301)
Yeah.
Sandra (17:36.866)
Contributor. Yeah.
Sandra (17:46.915)
Well, the first thing we talk about, we talk about several things. One of the things that Allie says in this chapter, she wrote the comparison chapter first, and that’s how we did when we were writing. Either I would write a chapter first and hand it off to her, and she would create the one for the daughter, or she would do the daughter one first, and then I would create. And one of the things that she said to the girls in her chapter that I thought was so powerful is, and I’m gonna read it, because I wanna quote it exactly the way
she wrote it, “Your value doesn’t come from how other people see you or from how you measure up to others. Your value comes because Jesus went to the cross for you”, which goes back to that identity thing. But then she says, “Comparison says fix your eyes on the people around you. Culture says fix your eyes on yourself.”
Candace Nassar (18:33.029)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra (18:36.899)
God says, fix your eyes on Jesus. And that’s the foundation of the comparison chapter. And so we talk about the two things. The first thing is to celebrate what God has given others. And we talk about some practical ways, especially in the “meet me in the middle section”, some very practical ways to celebrate when everything on the inside of you does, there’s nothing in you that wants to celebrate when somebody else has just won,
accomplished, or gotten. Maybe this is a particular person they feel jealous about or jealous of more frequently or something. So celebrating what God has given to others and to your point, Candace, this is not just a teenage girl thing. This is an “everybody thing” and one of the things that we want moms and daughters to do is to be transparent in their conversation and for moms to go, hey here’s where I’m struggling with this and here’s someone that I need you to help me learn how to celebrate, and you both help each other with that in the “Meet Me in the Middle section” because we all have people that we resist celebrating. And so first we’ll celebrate what God has given others and then leverage what God has given you. I think one of the fastest ways that we can get rid of the jealousy and the envy and all of that stuff is celebrating other people but then looking and going, “Okay, so how has God….
Candace Nassar (19:42.704)
That’s great.
Sandra (20:02.111)
How has he gifted me and what am I to do with what he’s given me?” So those two things, celebrate what God has given others and leverage what God has given you.
Candace Nassar (20:10.02)
That’s so good. And you know, I just keep thinking about these conversations that this is all driving between mothers and daughters and, and how when mothers open up and are honest and vulnerable, you know, that, that then opens the daughter’s heart. And so those conversations can just flow. And that’s, I’m just, I’m so excited about it. I’m sure you guys are hearing great things.
Sandra (20:20.179)
Yes.
Sandra (20:32.749)
Yeah, it has been fun. One of the things with girls, I think there’s a natural tendency when they start getting to middle school and high school to start pulling away from their mom rather than moving toward their mom. And this is a big way for that to reverse and for girls to look at their moms and go, “My goodness, I didn’t know that you ever struggled with anything or at least you weren’t gonna admit it.” And it’s just a wonderful opportunity for humility and connection. And if moms handle it that way,
Candace Nassar (20:43.503)
Yes.
Sandra (21:02.625)
then it’s gonna go so far in enriching that relationship. Totally, yeah, this is not a book where moms are teaching their daughters. This is a book where they’re both are leaning into each other, honestly learning from each other and both bringing themselves to the table instead of just a mom being like, “Okay, bring yourself to the table.” So we’re excited. And we like the idea that if a school or high school girl thinks that this is dumb, we’re the bad guy, you know….
Candace Nassar (21:11.952)
Hmm.
Sandra (21:33.589)
We’re dumb and that’s fun, you know, so we’re happy to do that and be that so yeah. That’s right.
Candace Nassar (21:39.386)
Yeah, I can see that. I can see that. So, Allie, you tell us about your rules for high school. I love that. And you wrote those in high school.
Sandra (21:48.202)
I did, I did. So, so funny, you should ask. I led a group of middle school girls when I was in high school. And so they were actually going with an adult leader. A few, two adult leaders. But sometimes I felt like I was on my own. Sometimes.
So I, as they were going into high school, I was going into college. So I was about to move away and they were about to go to high school. And so I just was like, there’s some things I want to write down. A lot of them were kind of inside jokes, but a lot of them were like, “Hey, if you can remember these things and do these things and follow these rules, then you will get to the end of high school and you will be just fine.” And so I wrote them all down and gave them to my girls. They loved them. It was super fun.
And then I want you to pause one second because I want to tell you up to that point what my my
relationship with this event was. Allie had been at school this particular day and I had noticed that her room was a little bit messy and as it normally was. So she’s in her room. It’s after school. She’s in her room and I’m kind of gearing up to go upstairs and say, “Hey it is room cleanup time And so I’m sort of standing, you know going up the stairs slowly kind of dreading whatever she was already doing. I was gonna interrupt because I was actually a little bit mad and so I’m walking up the stairs. I’m kind of you know bracing myself
to have this conversation and I stopped at her room door and she doesn’t even see me because she’s so focused on something and she’s sitting on the floor in the middle of a pile of things and clothes and shoes. You have to remember that wrong. right. So I looked down and I’m about to say something to her and she looks up and she goes, “Mom, I’m so glad you came up here.” She said, “I’m writing Allie’s rules for high school.” And she then tells me, she said, “You know, my girls are getting ready to go to high school. I’m leaving. There’s some things they need to know.
Sandra (23:39.667)
let me read these to you.” So she starts reading me this list of things that she wants to say to her girls and you know she’s two things in and three things in and four things in and I have forgotten all about her room and I’ve got tears. I’m just so extraordinarily proud of her and amazed at what she’s doing and I thought Sandra don’t…
you know, okay, there’s a messy room. This pales in importance compared to this extraordinary other thing that she’s got going on. And so it was just one of those learning moments for me to go, “Hey, just chill about the room.”
I mean, you know, that can be a conversation, certainly. We don’t just ignore, you know, good parenting. But at the same time, there are things way more important. And so it was sort of a wake-up call for me. And now you can pick the story back up. Okay, go ahead. No, you got it. Well, so she writes this thing.
During this season of my life, I was blogging. And so I thought, I’m gonna write a blog post about this. Okay, now you pick it up. So cute. Cute little mom blog.
And people loved it and it really exploded and it went all over the place. Yeah. Had a gazillion hits. It was crazy. And I was at that point, by the time it had kind of gotten big, I was at Auburn. I was going through sorority recruitment, which, if you know, your listeners know anything about that, you’re just literally trying to get people to like you. That’s the whole thing. And so I was in recruitment and then I would get out and I would have all these texts and all these things.
Candace Nassar (24:51.79)
not surprised.
Sandra (25:13.919)
Okay, hey guys, this is happening. Do you guys want me to start already? Because people liked what I wrote. So it was funny and it was a big deal. And it’s funny now looking at it because if I knew that I was writing for the world, it would have looked so different. It would have been a little bit more polished. Which made it perfect. I probably wouldn’t have used the word rule. There’s just a lot of things I think I would have changed, but it ended up being what it was and helping. It was sweet. Through the years we’ve had so many people say, we printed out Allie’s rules for high school and this was laminated in my daughter’s bathroom mirror and all of that, so many times over the years, but it was kind….
Candace Nassar (25:46.564)
in.
Candace Nassar (26:00.367)
I think.
Sandra (26:00.398)
of a funny story. Kind of a funny family story. Thank you. Thank you. So we include those in the book. Yeah, we do. Yeah.
Candace Nassar (26:04.058)
So wise, really so wise. I appreciate it. Yes, I’m glad you did. I’m glad. So, okay. So Sandra, let’s talk about, you mentioned just a little bit ago, the family dynamics between mom and daughter and how sometimes they move away, moms and daughters move apart during these teen years. And then the mom has the safest and most consistent relationship in her daughter’s life, which
can lead to tension for sure. So how can mom, well, first of all, why is that? And then how can moms take a biblical approach to the interaction with their daughters?
Sandra (26:44.14)
Yeah, you know, I tell this story in the book about before I was pregnant with Andrew actually. So my first child and I took my middle school girl and my high school girls on a little beach trip and they were so sweet. You know, they were all maybe 11th, 10th, 11th grade. I can’t remember exactly now, but we were having a great time just, eating all the food, spending time on the beach, doing all the things. And they were all just kind of fun and funny. And all of a sudden I heard one of my girls on the phone with her mom and it was this just awful tone of voice. She was being so disrespectful to her mom and she was like, you know, just clicking her tongue and doing all the things that teenage girls, you know, sometimes do when it’s their mom. So she hung up. I was like, “Hey, wow, that was an interesting tone of voice you were using with your mom.” And she goes, “It was just my mom.”
And I’ve thought about that sentence so many times. I was pregnant with Andrew, who actually at the time I thought was a girl. Ultrasounds were not as good then as they are now. And so I thought I was having a girl. And I thought, my goodness, is this daughter that I’m about to have?
Is she gonna treat me this way when they treat everybody else respectfully and kindly and all of that. I just remember thinking, “That’s not fair. That sounds awful.” So it was this wake up call to the fact that so often middle school, high school girls just kind of put their moms in a category of one, and apart from everybody else in the world. And I think there’s just a natural tendency, and I think it’s because that is the one person, the one earthly person, who is going to love them unconditionally for the rest of their lives. And they know that. It’s their safest relationship. It’s the place where they can show their “yuckiness” and still be loved. So that just typically happens. One of the purposes, again, behind doing this project is to help undo that a little bit, to help girls see their moms differently and see their moms as a human and see their moms in a different way and bridge that gap relationally.
Sandra (28:59.696)
But as it relates to moms and they know kind of modeling a biblical approach to everything with their daughters. In Philippians there’s a passage Philippians 2:5 that says in your relationships you have the same mindset as Christ Jesus and you know while we are modeling for our kids what a relationship with God looks like, we have to, you know, it’s just important to remember that that’s what we’re modeling. And so, you know, we love them so much. We’re trying to raise them right and all of that. There just has to often be a little bit of extra grace.
Candace Nassar (29:27.886)
Right.
Candace Nassar (29:38.541)
Yes, instead of getting that fence that we want to take to it, right? But that’s good. A little extra grace. I love that.
Sandra (29:43.533)
Yes.
Sandra (29:47.775)
Little extra grace there in remembering that it really does get better. They mature and get a full frontal lobe brain and their relationship gets better.
Candace Nassar (29:57.552)
Yes, it’s temporary. It’s temporary for sure. Okay, so, Ali, let’s talk a little bit about relationships in high school. And there are three potential relationship stages that you talk about. Can those help, understanding those, help girls navigate relationships with friends and boys?
Sandra (30:08.78)
Mm-hmm.
Sandra (30:13.922)
Yes.
Sandra (30:19.513)
Yeah, so we talk about in the book the three stages. This is not crazy rocket science, but you know before you get close or get into a relationship or become really close friends during the relationship, during being really close friends. And then I think something that girls often don’t think about or we don’t really talk about is the post. You know the breakup or the friendship breakup or the just like simple growing apart. And we talk about how in each season of a relationship you are called to love.
And the definition of love, I think, can, you know, we think one thing, especially middle school and high school girls think like love means just like, you know, feeling good or doing whatever they want to make them feel good. And the reality is loving people unconditionally the way that Jesus loved us, but also asking the really hard questions because it is so true that, especially in middle school, well, even now in adulthood, the people you surround yourself with impact who you become.
They impact the direction of your life. so being really, really picky with the people that you decide to really let in. So asking the questions of do I want to be like this person? Do I like the qualities that they have? And before you really get close with them, is this someone that you want to be more like? Do they show the characteristics of love that Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 13? Patience and kindness and self-control, all of those things.
Does this person show those characteristics and do I want to be more like that person? And then we ask a question in the…
Sandra (32:00.331)
section of being close, and it’s somewhere along the lines of, we don’t want to let someone who’s not going to be in our future dictate our future. You know, so we don’t want to allow someone who we’re not even sure this relationship is gonna go to call it, you know, like we might want to leave them behind or we don’t necessarily feel like this romantic relationship, whatever that looks like, is something that’s gonna be in our life forever. So why would we make decisions right now that would actually impact our future because of that person. So these are all questions that take a lot of intentionality. I don’t think we naturally think this way. And so kind of putting these questions in the face of our girls, our middle school and high school girls, to just help them think a little bit critically of, I know that this is fun and I know that this is something that makes you feel good about yourself, but are we allowing someone to have….
Candace Nassar (32:33.722)
So careful.
Candace Nassar (32:39.28)
Yes.
Sandra (33:00.144)
too much influence in our life. And then the last section which really goes into how do we love people even when they’re no longer in our life. It looks like not saying bad things about them behind their back even if they deserve it. Even if they did things that you want to tell other people. What does it look like to love someone that is no longer in your life? And I think that’s something I know that I was caught up in when there’s a friendship breakup or a regular breakup all of a sudden
Candace Nassar (33:11.277)
in.
Sandra (33:30.064)
You’re like, “Okay, I’m supposed to be really mean to that person, I’m supposed to say really mean things about that person.” And the reality is that even when the relationship is over, you’re still called to love. And so talking through what that looks like I think is something that we don’t really talk about.
Candace Nassar (33:47.696)
No, and I can see that just beginning to think that way, that’s a lifelong pattern, right? So, very.
Sandra (33:53.63)
Mm-hmm. It is. Totally. Well as adults, even, you know, if you are married, you have friendships that come in and out of your life, and do we want to be like that person? Do we want to be the type of mom that that mom is to their kid? Do we want to admire that marriage or are they always talking bad about their husband? There’s so many things that relate to momhood as friendships that I think we still struggle with and still think about. Yeah, that’s true. You know, one of the things that I remember is Andy actually having this conversation with Allie.
Candace Nassar (34:21.86)
Yeah, so wise. Gosh.
Sandra (34:30.41)
It’s so important for us as parents to be students of our kids and to understand what their tendencies are and as we watch them in relationships we can learn a lot about what their tendencies are with friendships and with dating relationships. So one of the things that we discovered early about Allie is that she had unusual wisdom, beyond her years. She had this unusual wisdom. It’s amazing. And she also loves to help people.
Candace Nassar (34:53.444)
I can see that.
Sandra (35:00.624)
And so while those are two extraordinary things they can also work against her in relationships and I remember Andy having a conversation with Ali at one point saying, “Hey we see these things about you and they are so amazing but the flip side is something that we just want you to be aware of as you’re making decisions about friendships and dating and all of that is that you could be drawn in to a friendship or that becomes unhealthy because you have wisdom and a desire to help people and to share your wisdom with them. And that can easily draw you into a relationship in a different way than you need to be in it.” And so I think for moms, and for parents in general, being students of our kids and having some of those conversations ahead of time is so powerful because then later when we start seeing it happen or maybe they start seeing it happen, they see it for what it is and they can say, “Wow, this is that thing my dad was telling me about. I feel myself getting drawn into this relationship. It’s not gonna be a healthy relationship and I’m in it because I want to help them.” And then you get drawn in, you know, romantically or into a friendship. So I remember that conversation. I was little, it was before I was dating and that was kind of his…
you know. It was probably like fifth or sixth grade. Yeah. Of, “Hey, I do”. It was, I remember taking it well, even though it was weird. This is a weird thing that we’re talking about. What’s going on? But I remember him being like, “You are so compassionate and you love helping people. And I love that about you. And I want to protect that. I don’t want people to take advantage of that. I don’t want you to see a guy who likes you and needs help and you end up dating him.” He was very clear and I really do remember that conversation being like, “Yeah, I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to be in a relationship with a guy that doesn’t sound like something I would want.” So no, I think that that was really, really helpful to me growing up for sure. Yeah. That’s right.
Candace Nassar (37:12.238)
Yeah. It’s such a, and to come from your father too. There’s such power in the, in the father’s words.
Sandra (37:21.184)
Yes. And really, having these mother-daughter conversations will give mom some things to talk to the dad about to say, “Hey, here’s something that I’m seeing in these conversations with her and I think this would be a great thing for you to address or for you to spend some time with her and talk about.” So there can be some advantages there as well.
Candace Nassar (37:29.509)
Yeah.
Candace Nassar (37:38.884)
Yes, very good. Yeah, very good. Well, so before we wrap up, I just have one more question, Sandra, about how moms can identify their own fears, because we have so many fears as moms, how can that help our daughters?
Sandra (37:57.516)
Yeah.
You know, it’s so funny because we talk about some very specific fears in the fear chapter. And the mom fears are not, they’re often the same fears that their daughters are having. It just looks different in a different season of life. And so again, one of the beauties of having these conversations with their daughters is to say, here’s something that scares me. And then talking about that together.
Cool things in the “meet me the middle section” on fears is we start talking about funny fears like “What are some of your phobias? Kind of breaking the ice with some funny stuff like my sister chased me around with a purple plastic worm when we were little and it scared me to death and I still don’t like anything that’s squiggly and reptile-ish, or whatever. So starting off that way but I think when moms are transparent about, “Hey here are some things that I fear,”
Candace Nassar (38:35.205)
Hmm.
Sandra (38:59.373)
their daughters are gonna open up in the same way. So I think sharing our fears and recognizing that they really are some of the same ones. We’re all fearful of missing out. We’re all fearful of being embarrassed. We’re all fearful of failing at something or being left out, all the things, or losing somebody that we love. And when we talk about those, it just makes us so relatable to our daughters, so it’s so important.
Candace Nassar (39:24.538)
Very good. Wow, well, this has been a great conversation and I’m just so excited that you guys have written this book and what God’s gonna do with it and I’m excited for our listeners to be introduced to it. So how can people learn more about the book?
Sandra (39:41.646)
Yeah, you can follow us on Instagram. You can go to sandristandle.com. It’s on Amazon. It’s at Barnes and Noble. Yep, it’s available pretty much everywhere. Anywhere you buy your books, you’ll find it.
Candace Nassar (39:54.704)
Great, that’s super. Well, I thank you guys so much for your time and for writing this book and I wish you well.
Sandra (39:58.232)
Thank you.
Sandra (40:03.0)
Thank you so much, Candace.
Candace Nassar (40:05.242)
Mm-hmm.