The Year God Rebuilt Me: An Honest Reflection from The Compass Chronicles

Start with a blank screen, a knot in your chest, and a whisper that says try again. That’s where our year truly began—not with a viral theory or a perfect outline, but with a fragile step of obedience that reshaped everything that followed. What unfolded wasn’t a highlight reel. It was the rarely told middle: long nights, quiet doubts, the grind of responsibility, and the slow, steady voice of God teaching us to trade performance for presence.

We walk through the in‑between where faith builds muscle. Think Peter casting the net again, Elijah hearing a whisper instead of a whirlwind, and John 15 reframing creativity as connection: abide, don’t strive. Themes we planned became mirrors we had to face—responsibility when life piled up, healing when old wounds resurfaced, perseverance when quitting felt easier. We share how vulnerability became a bridge to our community and how honesty turned polished lessons into real conversations that met listeners where they live.

Relationships did their refining work. We talk missteps, apologies that cost something, and learning to see people as image bearers rather than obstacles. Then we name the pressure we carried without being asked to—perfectionism masquerading as faithfulness—and the relief that followed when we embraced a lighter yoke. Renewal arrived like a slow thaw: ideas returned, peace grew, and the unseen guide showed His fingerprints in every imperfect episode. Looking back, we see that God wasn’t just building a podcast; He was building a person.

If you’ve felt stretched thin, unsure, or unseen while trying to do meaningful work, this conversation offers language, solidarity, and a way forward. Listen, share with a friend who needs the whisper over the whirlwind, and if the journey resonates, subscribe, leave a review, and tell us: what are you laying down before the next chapter?

Chapters

• 0:00 A Different Kind Of Episode
• 3:14 The Blank Screen And A Whisper
• 5:59 Entering The In‑Between
• 11:56 Quiet Reminders Over Loud Signs
• 16:56 Themes Turn Into Mirrors
• 23:26 Weakness, Grace, And Honesty
• 29:26 Relationships As Refinement
• 35:26 Laying Down The Pressure
• 41:26 A Slow, Steady Renewal

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:59

What's up everyone, this is Javier and welcome back to the Compass Chronicles, where fandom meets faith. Before we dive into anything else, I need to be honest with you. This episode, it is different. This chapter is not about analyzing a show, or breaking down a character arc, or connecting some pop culture moment to scripture. This one is personal. This is me looking back at everything that happened this year, not just with the podcast, but in my own walk with God. The struggles, the growth, the moments where I questioned everything. So if you are looking for theories or hot takes, this is not that episode. This is for you if you've ever felt like you're trying to build something bigger than you can handle, wondered if God is still with you in the mess, or needed to hear that it's okay to not have it all figured out. This is my year in review. It isn't a highlight reel, it's the real story, the one that rarely gets told unless you are willing to be honest about the parts that do not look pretty. Before any episode was recorded or outlined, there was this moment that keeps replaying in my mind. It was late at night. Silence filled the room in a way that made everything feel heavier. I sat at my desk, staring at a blank screen. I sat there with nothing, no title, no theme, and definitely no clever connection between fandom and faith. Just me, worn out and unsure, wondering what God wanted from me next. I kept thinking of Peter Parker holding the mast before deciding to step into his responsibility as Spider-Man. That pause before everything starts. The moment where the character feels caught between who they have been and who they might become. That exact tension lived in my chest, standing at the edge of something without knowing what it was, but knowing I could not turn back. People hear an episode, but they never see the emotional weight behind it, the doubts that creep in at 2 in the morning. When you hit publish, you often find yourself second-guessing yourself, the feeling that maybe you are trying to build something bigger than you have the strength for. That night, the silence forced me to be honest. I was not questioning the podcast, I was questioning myself, wondering if I was still called to this, if my voice mattered, or if I had anything left to say that would actually reach someone sitting in their own silence somewhere else. In that honesty, something rose up inside me. It felt more like a gentle push than a big revelation. Try again, start now, trust me. It reminded me of that moment in Luke chapter 5, where Jesus tells Simon to cast the net again, after a long night of catching nothing. Simon Peter answered and said to him, Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing. Nevertheless, at your word I will let down the net. Simon is worn down, frustrated, and exhausted from failure. And yet, Jesus does not start with purpose or mission. He starts with reassurance. Do not be afraid. Those four words hit me in a way I did not even expect, because fear was exactly what I was carrying. I was terrified that I had nothing left, that the well had run dry, or that I had misread the call in the first place. So, I did something simple. I typed one line. It wasn't a title or a big concept, just a beginning. It felt shaky, but real. That one act became a shift in my spirit, because it made me realize something I had forgotten. God never asked me to have everything figured out. He just asked me to move. One step, one line, one episode at a time. Trusting that if I showed up, he would make something out of it. Even if I showed up empty, he would fill it. If I showed up uncertain, he would provide direction. That night was not the start of a season, it was the start of something internal. A sense that God was calling me to be willing instead of strong, present instead of perfect, obedient instead of confident. Looking back now, I see how that beginning quietly set the foundation for everything that followed. It did not resolve all my doubts or fix my exhaustion, but it gave me enough direction to take the next step. And that step led me directly into the real tension of the year, the part where the excitement of starting something new collided with the weight of everything happening behind the scenes. This was the period where I had to grapple with the challenge of continuing to create, maintain trust, and continue to grow, despite the unrelenting pace and complexity of life around me. The thing about beginnings is that they feel clear for a moment. You get that spark, that sense of direction, the confirmation that you are not walking alone. But once you take those first steps, you enter a space nobody likes to talk about, the in-between, the middle stretch. Right after that night at my desk, life did not suddenly get easier. If anything, things got heavier. Responsibilities piled up, old insecurities resurfaced. I felt stretched thin in ways I did not expect. Suddenly the work did not feel like a fresh start. It felt like a weight I was trying to balance while the ground underneath me kept shifting. New pressures at work, tension in relationships that I did not see coming, physical exhaustion that made even the simplest tasks feel monumental. It reminded me of those training arcs in anime where the hero climbs mountains or endures brutal conditioning. Everyone loves the power-up, the glowing aura, and the transformation moment when the character unlocks their next level. But those scenes before the breakthrough, the ones where they are exhausted, bleeding, doubting themselves, and questioning if they even have what it takes, those are the parts people skip past. Yet that is where the real growth happens. Halfway up the mountain, sweating, stumbling, unsure if the climb is even worth it, wondering if maybe they were not cut out for this after all. That is what early season recording felt like. They were striving to uphold God's honor, maintain consistency, and produce something truly meaningful. But inside, I was dealing with thoughts I could not always shake. Am I still called to this? Is this reaching anyone? Is this helping? Or am I filling space because I do not know what else to do? Some episodes were born from confidence, others from exhaustion, some from clarity, others from confusion. I would outline a topic about sacrifice or strength or responsibility, and while writing it, I would be battling my own doubts about whether I was living those truths myself. It felt hypocritical some days, like I was pointing others toward a standard I could barely reach. Right in the middle of that tension is where God kept doing something subtle. He did not give me easy answers, he did not send some miraculous sign that everything was fine. He did not pull back the curtain and show me the master plan. Instead, he kept bringing reminders I almost missed, a verse here that felt like it was written for that exact moment, a moment of unexpected peace there when I should have been anxious, a passing thought that felt lighter than the rest, like a whisper cutting through the noise, little pieces of comfort that showed up exactly when the pressure felt like too much. There is a moment in 1 Kings chapter 19 where Elijah is drained, worn out, feeling like he is carrying everything alone. He has just witnessed a massive victory on Mount Carmel, fire falling from heaven and the prophets of Baal defeated, and yet, right after that high, he crashes hard. He runs into the wilderness and cries out to God, even asking to die because he feels so isolated and exhausted. And instead of a dramatic display of power, God comes to him in a low whisper. The scripture says, And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the boy, but the Lord was not in the wind, and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake, and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire, and after the fire, a still small voice. That story became a lens for me this year, because I was not hearing God in big ways. I was not experiencing burning bush moments or audible voices or dramatic confirmations, but I was hearing him, in the whisper, in the nudges that felt almost imperceptible, in the reminders to breathe when my chest got tight, in the sense that I did not have to pretend to be strong in order to keep going, that maybe strength was not the point at all. Maybe faithfulness was. The in-between is not punishment, it is formation. The middle ground is where faith builds muscle, where purpose becomes clearer, and where you learn to trust God because he is steady even when you are not. The episodes that came out of that period felt deeper because they were not built from strength, they were built from surrender. I was honest about the challenges I was facing and trusted that God could use those struggles to help others. From admitting that I did not have it all together, and maybe that was exactly where he wanted me, as I kept recording, week after week, something began to shift inside me. The change came slowly, like seasons transitioning without you noticing the exact moment summer became fall. One day you look up and the leaves are different colors, and you realize something fundamental has changed. The doubts did not disappear, but they stopped controlling my steps. The weight did not vanish, but it stopped feeling impossible to carry. The pressure did not go away, but it stopped drowning out the truth that God was still guiding me, still present, still working even when I could not see. The in-between became the classroom, where I learned to rely on him in a way I never would have if everything had been easy. Without realizing it, those weeks of uncertainty and pushing through exhaustion shaped the foundation for what the rest of the year would become. A year marked by persistence rather than perfection, by trust rather than certainty, by a willingness to show up even when my heart felt unsteady and my mind felt clouded. I discovered that obedience doesn't necessitate clarity, but simply involves moving in the direction that God is guiding. That willingness opened the door to something I did not expect. Because as the season moved forward, the challenges did not just come from my own internal struggles. They also came from the way life itself started pressing in, forcing me to confront truths I had pushed aside and shaping the way I approached the stories I was trying to tell. It was like God was no longer just dealing with my thoughts and fears. Now he was dealing with my circumstances, my reactions, and my character in real time. The in-between had already stretched me, but the middle of the year brought something I was not ready for. Life stopped being background noise and started stepping right into the center of what I was creating. It felt like every time I picked a theme for an episode, something personal happened that made me confront that theme in a deeper way than I planned. Not in a theoretical way, in a visceral, unavoidable, right in front of my face kind of way. There was a week where I sat down to talk about responsibility. I was not thinking about it in the Spider-Man way, where it feels inspiring and heroic, but in the everyday way, where you are trying to show up for people, keep promises, and manage all the things that pull at you without dropping any of the plates you are spinning. Right in that same week, I felt overwhelmed by things at home, at work, and in my heart. Deadlines I could not meet, conversations I did not handle well, commitments I almost forgot. It was as if Div 1, new forces took the script I was composing and declared, here, live this. He was not punishing me or adding pressure just to be cruel, he was training me, shaping me in the exact areas I was trying to teach others about, making sure I was not just talking about responsibility, but actually learning what it costs to carry it with integrity. To show up even when you are tired, to follow through even when it is inconvenient, to honor your word, even when circumstances make it difficult. This kept happening. I would plan an episode about healing, and suddenly an old wound I thought was long closed would flare back up. Something from my past I thought I had dealt with would resurface and force me to realize I had buried it instead of actually healing it. I would pick a topic about doubt, and within days I would feel that ache of wondering what God was doing, questioning if he was still listening, battling thoughts I thought I had outgrown years ago. I would outline a conversation about perseverance, and then life would hand me three reasons to want to quit. Financial pressure, relational tension, creative burnout, all at once. The themes became mirrors. It reminded me of those arcs and stories where a character has to face a version of themselves they have been ignoring. They are not fighting a villain or battling a monster from the outside. They are confronting their own heart, their own fear, and their own shadow. The parts of themselves they pretend do not exist because acknowledging them would be too painful. They want to win the fight with strength, but God uses that moment to build honesty. That was me this year. Facing the parts of myself I pushed aside because I was too focused on moving forward, too busy creating content to deal with the condition of my own heart. There was one night when I had almost convinced myself to take a break from the podcast. I did not want to step away because I did not love it. I loved it more than almost anything I had ever created. I stepped back because everything around me felt heavy and complicated, and I did not want to half-heart anything that had God's name in it. I remember sitting there thinking, maybe it would be better if I stepped back and came back when life felt clearer, when I had more energy, when I felt more spiritually grounded, when I could give it the attention it deserved instead of scraping together episodes from whatever I had left at the end of exhausting days. But clarity was not the promise, presence was. God kept bringing me back to Paul in 2 Corinthians chapter 12, talking about how God's power shines in weakness, and he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Paul does not say he got stronger first and then God used him. He says God's strength showed up right in the fragile parts, right in the broken places, right where Paul felt least capable. That word weakness is something we hate admitting, especially when we are leading anything or putting ourselves out there publicly. We want to project strength, confidence, and capability. But it was the exact place God kept meeting me, in my weakness, in my insufficiency, in the moments where I had absolutely nothing left to give on my own. So, instead of quitting, I decided to be honest. Honest in my writing, honest in my recording, honest in the places where I did not have everything figured out, honest about the fact that some weeks I was teaching truths, I was still learning myself, that some episodes came from a place of struggle rather than victory, that I was not always the expert, just a fellow traveler trying to point toward the one who actually has all the answers. When I did that, I noticed something shift. Episodes stopped sounding like polished lessons delivered from a place of arrival. They sounded like conversations, like two people walking through things together, wrestling with the same questions, leaning on the same savior. That is where the heart of Compass Chronicles started getting clearer. It was never about teaching from perfection, it was about sharing from reality, about creating a space where people did not have to pretend they had it all together, because I was not pretending either. Life kept talking back to me through the rest of the year, through stress that felt unrelenting, through unexpected changes that forced me to adapt faster than I was comfortable with. Trials tested my patience and my trust in God in ways I had never experienced before. But those trials also shaped the episodes that carried the deepest meaning for me, the ones that came from tears shed in private, the ones that came from long nights where I wrestled with God like Jacob at Peniel, refusing to let go until he blessed me. These were the real questions I was posing to God in private. In my prayer closet, in my journal, and during quiet moments when no one else was present. Those experiences created a shift in how I saw my own story. I was not a hero on some epic quest. I was not a commentator standing on the sidelines analyzing everyone else's journey. I was someone God was actively shaping while he was shaping the message. The medium and the messenger were being refined at the same time. That understanding made me approach the next phase of the year differently because the challenges did not stop. They changed. They got more personal, they dug deeper. Suddenly, I was not just talking about faith inside fandom stories. I was seeing God start revealing things in my own life that forced me to grow in ways I did not expect, and honestly, did not always want. Life has a way of reflecting back to you, but God has a way of serving as a mirror. One challenges your routine, the other challenges your heart. Life talking back might mean your plans get disrupted, but God holding up a mirror means he is showing you who you actually are beneath all the roles you play. And sometimes, what you see in that mirror is uncomfortable. It became something that exposed parts of me I did not know needed attention, parts I had been successfully avoiding for years. It started without fanfare. I would be preparing an episode about character development, thinking about how characters and stories grow and change and become better versions of themselves. And suddenly I would notice areas where my own character needed work, patience that was thinner than I wanted to admit, frustration that I was carrying from past hurts that I had never fully processed, pride slipped in without me noticing, making me think I was further along spiritually than I actually was. I was not trying to preach to myself, but the word kept finding its way into the parts of me I kept tucked away, hidden and unexamined. Then there were the weeks when I felt myself slipping spiritually. I was not backsliding in some dramatic way where I walked away from God or stopped believing. I was just drifting, getting tired in my spirit, getting distracted by things that did not matter, going through motions without feeling grounded or connected. My prayers felt rote, my Bible reading felt mechanical, my worship felt empty. I was doing all the right things externally while something internally was growing cold. Instead of letting me hide it or fake my way through, God used the episodes I was writing to bring those things to the surface, to force me to deal with them. One moment stands out more than the others. I was outlining an episode about discernment, pondering the dangers of deception and the importance of guarding your heart against lies and half-truths and subtle compromises. In the middle of my research, I felt this sharp conviction that I had not been guarding mine. I had let little things get inside. Old lies I thought I had rejected, but had actually just buried. Old insecurities that still whispered in the background, old frustrations that colored the way I saw certain situations. Nothing catastrophic or obvious, but enough to cloud my peace and dull my focus. Enough to make me hesitate in places I should have trusted God without question. It was one of those turning points where the main character in a story has to face their own flaws before they can grow into who they are meant to be. The moment was not dramatic or loud, no thunderbolt from heaven, no audible voice, just honest. A realization that if I wanted to lead people toward truth in these episodes, I first had to let God lead me back into it. I had to deal with the compromises I had made in my own heart before I could speak with any real authority to anyone else. The mirror hit hardest because it was tied to real life, not just abstract concepts, relationships that needed more grace than I was giving, conversations I avoided because they would require vulnerability I did not want to offer. Emotions I buried because dealing with them felt too exhausting. Responsibilities I downplayed because acknowledging them would mean I had to change. All of it sat in front of me while I was trying to talk about faith with clarity and conviction, and the dissonance between what I was saying and how I was living became impossible to ignore. I kept contemplating Psalm 139, where David asked God to search him. He doesn't want God to check his work, schedule, to-do list, or public image, his heart, the hidden place, the part no one else sees. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my anxieties, and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way. That request takes courage. When God searches you, he does not simply point out your mistakes, he shows what needs healing, what needs surrender, what requires a complete reconstruction. He does not shame you, but he does not let you off the hook either. He loves you too much to let you stay comfortable in patterns that are slowly killing you. That is exactly what he did with me this year. He searched me, and what he found was not all pretty. Some days the mirror felt heavy. Days when I did not like what I saw. Days when I questioned if I was qualified to speak on anything when I felt like I was still figuring out so much myself. Days when the gap between who I wanted to be and who I actually was felt insurmountable. But God kept reminding me that honesty is an invitation rather than a disqualification. The places where you finally confront your weaknesses, where you stop pretending and start admitting, become the spaces where his strength begins to shape you from within. Not strength you manufacture, strength he provides. Then something unexpected started happening. The episodes born out of those mirror experiences resonated deeper with listeners. They felt less like lessons being taught from a position of authority and more like confessions shared from a position of humility. Less like polished messages delivered with confidence and more like real conversations with people who were walking through their own mirrors too. People started reaching out, saying they felt less alone. That hearing me wrestle with things they were wrestling with gave them permission to be honest about their own struggles. Vulnerability is not a setback, it is a bridge. It connects you to people in ways polished perfection never can. Those personal confrontations became turning points. They softened parts of me that had hardened over time from disappointment and unmet expectations. They humbled me in ways that brought freedom instead of shame, because I was not being humbled to be broken down, but to be rebuilt on a better foundation. They reminded me that the journey with God is never about arriving at perfection. It is about letting Him continue the work in you, even when the process feels uncomfortable. When it exposes things you would rather keep hidden, and even when growth requires you to admit you were wrong about something you have believed for years. Those changes prepared me for the next chapter of the year, because what came next was not just internal work, it was relational. Situations that push me to grow in how I love people, how I respond when I am hurt, how I carry myself when everything around me feels unpredictable, how I extend grace when I feel like I have none left to give. Those lessons shape the direction of the podcast in ways I did not even realize until much later. Because once you deal with your own heart, God almost always moves you toward the hearts of others. When God finishes dealing with the parts of your heart you have been avoiding, he almost always moves you toward the people around you. That is where the lessons deepen and become more complex. Because it is one thing to confront weaknesses in private, in the quiet of your prayer closet where no one else is watching. It is another thing entirely when life places you in real situations where you have to live out what you have been learning, where your growth gets tested in the fires of actual human interaction. This year presented me with experiences that stretched me beyond my expectations and left me genuinely unprepared. Some came from unexpected tension, a conversation that hit harder than I intended, where my words landed wrong and caused hurt I did not mean to inflict. Misunderstandings that lingered longer than they should have because pride made me slow to apologize and clarify. A few disappointments revealed how fragile my patience could be when people did not meet my expectations or follow through on commitments. These were not dramatic fallouts or relationship-ending conflicts. They were the kind of relational friction that forces you to examine who you are becoming, along with how you speak, how you listen, how you assume, and how you judge. I felt myself get defensive, even when I knew I should not, even when I knew the other person had a valid point or a legitimate concern. Frustration bubbled up because communication was not clear, expectations did not match reality, or someone misunderstood my intentions. Instead of letting me brush those experiences aside or justify my reactions, God kept bringing them to my attention, gently but persistently. He was not trying to shame me or make me feel like a failure. He was refining me, teaching me that spiritual maturity is measured just as much in how I treat people, especially when I am stressed or hurt or frustrated, as in how I pray or study scripture or create content. I kept thinking of Paul's words in Romans chapter 12. If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. It is a simple instruction that sounds easy until you actually try to live it out. Because living peaceably requires humility. It requires listening even when you want to defend yourself. It requires taking responsibility for the weight your words carry, even when you did not intend them to hurt. It requires seeing people as image bearers of God instead of interruptions to your plans or obstacles in your path. Some weeks, God made that painfully clear. He showed me how quickly I could slip into seeing people as problems to manage instead of souls to love. I had to apologize multiple times. I am not talking about the quick kind where you say the right words, just to move on and restore the surface peace. I mean the kind where you slow down, reflect, sit with the discomfort of knowing you were wrong, and let God soften your heart enough to mean it. Those experiences humbled me in ways that were uncomfortable but necessary. They revealed how often I let busyness become an excuse for being short with people, how easily I filtered things through my stress instead of slowing down long enough to understand someone else's perspective, and how quickly I could dismiss someone's feelings because I was too focused on my own. Then there were the opposite experiences, the ones that showed me grace I did not deserve. The ones where people showed up for me when I was running on fumes and had nothing left to give. Friends who asked how I was really doing and then actually waited for a real answer instead of accepting the polite deflection. Family who reminded me that I was not walking through this year alone, even when I felt isolated. Listeners reached out with messages expressing how something I shared helped them through a challenging week, provided a language for their emotions, or reassured them that God was still present in their struggles. Those messages hit me harder than I expected because they showed me how God uses people to lift you when you cannot lift yourself, how he orchestrates moments of encouragement exactly when you need them most. How he speaks through others when you have stopped being able to hear his voice clearly on your own. The relationships in my life became like windows this year, each one revealing something different. Some showed areas where I needed growth and sanctification. Some showed grace I did not deserve but desperately needed. Some showed patience I did not earn but was freely given. All of them helped shape the direction of this podcast because they shaped the direction of my heart. As the year went on, I started noticing changes happening in me that I had not consciously worked toward. I was becoming slower to react when someone said something that rubbed me the wrong way, quicker to listen instead of immediately formulating my defense or counter-argument, more aware of how easily I could let stress dictate my tone if I did not stay grounded in God's presence. I became increasingly aware that my words have the ability to either strengthen or weaken relationships, and I take responsibility for the way I use this power. Right alongside those changes came a more profound understanding of how much God values reconciliation, compassion, and humility, how much he cares about the way we treat each other, especially when we are tired or frustrated or under pressure. But the biggest relational lesson did not come from tension or conflict, it came from clarity. Times when God revealed who was meant to walk with me into the next season and who had only been part of a specific chapter. That realization was not painful or dramatic like I expected it to be. It was peaceful, almost gentle. Like God was whispering that growth sometimes means letting certain connections shift so that others can strengthen. That not everyone is meant to go with you into every season, that releasing people with love and gratitude instead of bitterness or regret is a sign of maturity. Those shifts opened the door to another part of my journey, the part where I had to confront how I viewed myself in the middle of all of this, along with my relationships with others. Because right after God refined how I handled people, he began to address the expectations I placed on myself, the pressure I carried like a badge of honor, and the weight of feeling like I had to hold everything together on my own, or else it would all fall apart. That was the next layer he needed to peel back. Once God walked me through the relational parts of the year, he did not stop there. He turned my attention inward again, but this time it was not about flaws or blind spots or sins I needed to confess. It was about the pressure I carried, the silent load I kept picking up without noticing how heavy it had become. The expectations I placed on myself that no one else was asking me to hold, but that I carried anyway because I thought that is what responsibility looked like. Because I thought that is what faithfulness required. I felt like everything depended on me being strong, being consistent, being creative, being clear-headed, being the guy who kept pushing forward no matter what was happening behind the scenes. The guy who never missed a deadline or dropped the ball or admitted he was struggling. Even though no one said those words out loud, I let them settle into my spirit like they were requirements. Like if I failed to meet them, everything would crumble. The podcast would fail, people would be disappointed, God would be disappointed. I would be exposed as a fraud who never should have started this in the first place. The more I tried to meet those expectations, the heavier they became. The bar kept rising. I would sit down to write or record and feel this pressure behind my ribs. A pressure that said, do not mess this up, do not lose momentum, do not disappoint people, do not fall short, do not let anyone see that you are tired or doubting or running on empty. Keep the facade up, keep performing, keep proving that you are capable. Underneath all of that was a deeper fear I did not want to face. The fear of not being enough. The fear of that if people saw the real me, the struggling me, the uncertain me, they would realize I was not worth listening to. I kept thinking of those scenes and stories where the hero tries to carry everything alone. They do not do it because they want to be arrogant or because they are trying to steal glory. They do it because they are scared of letting others down. They take the weight of the world on their shoulders, trying to hold it all together through sheer force of will, and they tell themselves that is what heroes do. That is what strong people do. But eventually the cracks show, the facade crumbles, and that is when the real growth begins. Because they have to learn that strength is not about carrying everything alone. It is about knowing when to ask for help. That was me. Carrying weight I thought was my responsibility. I tried to push through exhaustion and pressure, as if God demanded perfection from me, as if I had to earn his approval through performance, as if the value of the podcast, and by extension, my value, was determined by how flawlessly I executed it. But every time I pushed harder, something inside me felt thinner, like I was stretching myself in a way that was not sustainable. It felt as though I was depleting a limited supply and unsure of how to replenish it. It took time for me to realize that the pressure was not coming from God, it was coming from me. From lies I had believed about what he expected, from wounds I carried from past experiences where my worth had been tied to my performance, from a distorted view of faithfulness that equated it with never struggling, never faltering, and never admitting weakness. God was not the one demanding perfection. I was. There is a verse in Matthew chapter 11 where Jesus says, His yoke is easy and his burden is light. Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. I had heard that verse my whole life, probably hundreds of times, but this year it hit differently, because the burden I was carrying did not feel light. It felt crushing, it felt like it was slowly suffocating me, and the reason it did not feel light was simple. It was not the one Jesus asked me to carry. It was the one I built out of fear, expectation, and the belief that I had to hold everything together on my own. Jesus offers a yoke, a partnership, a shared load. But I had been trying to carry the whole thing myself. God kept reminding me through moments I could have easily missed that I should rely on him for strength. A pause in the middle of a stressful day where I felt his peace wash over me for no reason. A moment of unexpected rest when I did not expect it and probably did not deserve it. A gentle conviction that said, breathe, you are not meant to do this alone. Those reminders were not loud or dramatic. They were steady, persistent, like a drumbeat underneath everything else. They were the difference between running on empty and resting in what God provides. Slowly, I began letting go of the pressure. I did not do it perfectly or instantly. It was not a one-time decision where I suddenly became free. But one piece at a time, one day at a time, I started releasing the weight I was never meant to carry, letting myself admit when I was tired instead of pushing through until I collapsed. Letting myself slow down when life got heavy instead of maintaining the same pace out of stubbornness. I allowed myself to trust that God could work through me, even when I didn't feel strong, when I didn't have perfect clarity, and even when I was operating from a place of weakness instead of confidence. That shift changed the way I approached the podcast. It stopped being something I had to uphold through sheer force of will. It transformed into a responsibility that I was entrusted with as a divine gift. The responsibility was still there, but the pressure was different. I was no longer carrying it alone. I was carrying it in partnership with the one who actually holds all things together. That realization did not erase the challenges, it just changed the way I carried them. I was not fighting to prove myself anymore. I was learning to trust that God had me, even when I did not have clear answers, high energy, or perfectly crafted thoughts. That opened the door to something I did not expect. As the year moved toward its later months, something began to rise inside me that I had not felt in a long time. A sense of renewal. I am not talking about hype or adrenaline or manufactured excitement. I mean something steadier, something grounded. I felt a sense of assurance that God was preparing me for the future, rather than simply guiding me through the present. Renewal does not always show up the way we expect. It does not always feel like a sudden breakthrough or a loud spiritual experience where the heavens open and everything becomes clear. Sometimes it feels like waking up one day and realizing the heaviness in your chest is just a little lighter. The fog that used to sit around your thoughts does not feel as thick. The pressure you kept putting on yourself does not grip you the same way. That is what the last stretch of this year felt like. A gentle rebuilding instead of a dramatic transformation. A slow thaw instead of a sudden spring. I started noticing it in ways that were hard to name at first. Ideas began coming easier. I was not forcing them or scraping the bottom of the barrel. I was not fighting myself anymore. The episodes started feeling more honest. They were not polished in the way that makes everything sound perfect and put together. They were honest in the way that makes people feel less alone. There was a steadiness in my heart that was not there earlier in the year. A growing sense that God was preparing me instead of just testing me, strengthening instead of stripping, healing instead of only exposing wounds. The more I leaned into that renewal, the more I noticed my perspective shifting. Rather than viewing the year as a series of challenges I barely managed to overcome, I began to perceive it as a narrative that God was meticulously crafting with purpose. A story where every difficulty had a purpose I could not see in the moment. Every moment of doubt had a direction it was leading me toward. Every pause had a reason behind it. Every whisper from him had been leading me somewhere deeper than I realized. Somewhere I needed to go but would never have chosen on my own. It reminded me of the closing arcs in the stories we love. I am not talking about the final battle or the climactic showdown. I am talking about the moment right before it, the calm before the storm, the scene where the hero looks around at how far they have come and realizes they are not the same person who started the journey. They have scars now, wisdom they did not have before, strength that came from being broken and rebuilt. They are steadier, clearer, ready for what is next because they have been shaped by everything they walk through along the way, not because they feel powerful or invincible. That described where I found myself in these final months, realizing I had changed. The change was not dramatic or loud. Nobody would make a movie about it, but it was meaningful, it was real. I was carrying myself differently, responding differently to stress and disappointment. I was trusting differently because I had witnessed God's faithfulness in ways that I could not deny. Life did not become easier, but God deepened something inside me that could not be shaken by circumstance. A foundation that was not built on my feelings or my performance, but on his character. As I kept walking through that renewal, something else started rising. A hunger for what comes next. I am not talking about the frantic push to produce more or do more or prove more. I mean a deeper desire to grow, to heal more, to trust more, to walk into the next season with a steadier heart and clearer vision. To see what God wants to do next now that He has done so much foundational work this year. Because renewal is not the end of a story, it is the preparation for the next chapter. This is the phase in which God fortifies your steps to equip you for the upcoming journey, not to exalt the past. As this year in review started coming into focus, I realized that everything God worked on this year was leading to something bigger, something more grounded, something that was not just about creativity or content, but about calling, about purpose, about becoming who He created me to be instead of who I thought I was supposed to be. That sense of preparation began pointing toward one final truth that carried me through the closing months. A truth that shaped the way I saw the entire year. A truth that reminded me who the real center of this story has been the whole time. Because it was never about me, it was never about the podcast, it was always about him. As the year moved toward its closing stretch, the common thread running through everything became impossible to ignore. Every doubt I wrestled with, every episode I created, every conviction or comfort, every place where my strength fell short, all of it pointed back to the same truth. I was not the one holding this story together. I never was. The Savior was, and he always had been. It hit me one morning when I was reviewing a few of the earlier episodes from the year. I expected to hear flaws in the delivery, places where I could have said something better or structured it more clearly, spots where the theology could have been tighter or the application more practical. Sure, those things were there, plenty of them, but what stood out was not the imperfections, it was God's grace woven through every single recording, like a thread holding everything together. Even the episodes created on tired nights when I had nothing left to give still carried something bigger than me. Even the ones born out of confusion and uncertainty still had pieces of truth that were not coming from my own strength or wisdom. Even the ones I recorded while battling doubts about whether I should even continue still somehow reached people and helped them in ways I could not have orchestrated. That kind of fruit does not come from human effort, it comes from divine faithfulness. It reminded me of one of my favorite narrative devices in storytelling, the unseen guide. The mentor who steps in at the right moment. The force working behind the scenes is often unrecognized by the hero until they reflect on their journey and realize that every step was guided, every detour was purposeful, every hard experience was shaping them for something they could not see yet. The savior was that guide in my story this year. He was not working with dramatic interventions or obvious miracles. He was working with steady faithfulness. I felt lost some days, and yet the word still came. I questioned if I should keep going, and yet the direction never disappeared completely. I felt empty some nights, and yet the episodes carried a fullness I knew was not from me. I ran out of ideas, and yet new ones would surface right when I needed them. I wanted to quit, and yet something kept pulling me back. That kind of faithfulness does not come from creativity or discipline or willpower. It comes from God Himself, from His refusal to let go of what He has started. The more I reflected on that, I realized that this entire year was an invitation. It was not an invitation into performance or perfection or proving myself. It was an invitation into deeper dependence, into surrender, into trust. It's an invitation to a faith that doesn't stem from peak experiences, but rather from traversing unchosen valleys and discovering God's unwavering presence at your side. Still hearing his whisper when everything else is screaming, still feeling his hand when you cannot see the path ahead. There is a scene in Scripture in John chapter 15 where Jesus tells his disciples to abide in him, abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. He does not tell them to visit, he does not tell them to check in occasionally, he tells them to abide, stay, remain, live connected, make your home in me. When I looked at this year through that lens, everything made sense. I was not meant to create from my own strength, I was meant to abide, to stay connected to the vine even when I did not feel the connection, to let him guide the episodes even when I thought I knew where they should go, to let him shape my heart even when the shaping was uncomfortable, to let him carry the weight I kept trying to hold on my own. Because branches do not carry themselves, they rest in the vine, they draw life from the vine, they produce fruit because of the vine, not because of their own effort. That realization became the heartbeat of the last few months. It was not that I had done everything right or had everything figured out, far from it. But the Savior had been faithful in every place where I felt unsure. He carried me through the exhaustion, the doubts, the in-between, the mirror experiences, the pressures, and the renewal. Through the places where his voice spoke louder than my fears, even when I felt like giving up, he refused to let me. Even in the seasons when I couldn't see his hand, I could sense his presence. When I finally stepped back and looked at the year as a whole, I saw something I did not recognize at the start. God was not building a podcast, he was building a person, reshaping a heart, refining a life, using every struggle and every step to prepare me for the season ahead. The podcast was just the tool he used to do the deeper work. The content was just the canvas where he painted lessons I needed to learn. That leads into the final truth this entire year revealed. It is not about the episodes or the themes or the listener count or the impact. It is about what God was forming in me all along. Something that carries directly into the next chapter, something I want to speak directly from the heart as we move toward the close of this reflection. Looking back at everything this year held, one truth rises above all the themes, all the lessons, and all the experiences I did not expect. God was not just teaching me how to create better episodes, he was teaching me how to live a more honest, grounded, surrendered life. A life that is not held together by my strength, but by his steady hands. A life that does not depend on my performance, but on his grace. A life that finds its worth not in what I produce, but in whose I am. This year showed me that the journey of faith does not move in a straight line. It moves through real life. Through the nights at the desk when you do not know what to write, through the doubts that come when you least expect them and linger longer than you want them to. Through the conversations that stretch you beyond what feels comfortable, through the mirrors God holds up to your heart that show you things you wish you could unsee. Through the pressures you finally learn to lay down after carrying them for too long. Through the unexpected renewal that rises slowly instead of dramatically. Through the presence of a Savior who refuses to let you walk alone, even when you try to push him away. The episodes we created this year were not just content. They were not just files uploaded to a platform. They were markers of a journey God was taking me on. A journey filled with uncertainty and provision, growth and softening, listening and trusting in ways that stretched me beyond what I thought I was capable of. Through all of it, his faithfulness never wavered, not once, even when mine did, even when I doubted him, even when I questioned if he was still there, he never left, he never let go, he never stopped working. If anything, this year reminded me of the very thing this podcast has always stood for: that the stories we love point to something real, something greater, something eternal. They point to the ultimate story, the one where God is the author and we are the characters being written with intention and purpose and love. Our stories do too. Even the messy ones, even the ones filled with failure and doubt and wrong turns, even the ones we do not fully understand yet. God is writing something in each of us, something meaningful, something purposeful, something shaped by his love and guided by his hand. So as I close out this year, I want to say thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for showing up week after week, even when the episodes were rough around the edges, or I was clearly working through something in real time. Thank you for walking through the highs and lows with me. Thank you for letting me be honest, for letting me grow in public, and for allowing this podcast to be a space where faith and fandom, vulnerability and strength, and reflection and hope all meet in a way that feels real and raw and human. As we step into the next season of life, my prayer is simple. That you continue to see God in your story, that you notice his presence in the experiences you walk through, even the hard ones, that you trust him in the confusing ones, even when nothing makes sense, that you lean into his strength when yours runs low, and it will run low. That you walk forward knowing the Savior is still writing something beautiful in you, even when you cannot see the full picture yet. Even when all you can see is the current chapter and it looks like chaos. Thank you for being part of this journey. Thank you for letting me share my heart with you in ways that sometimes felt too vulnerable, too honest, and too raw. Thank you for reminding me that we are all walking this path together, guided by the one who sees the whole story from beginning to end, the one who knows every plot twist before it happens, the one who is working all things together for good, even when we cannot see it. I am grateful for you. I am hopeful for what is next, and I will see you in the next chapter of the Compass Chronicles.