Setting Intentions and Spiritual Connection

Julie Hilsen (00:06)
Dear God, goddess, creator, thank you for bringing Andrea and I together today in this special space that we’ve created in time. And I just honor, I honor her journey and I thank you for this opportunity. And I ask, I ask my higher self to be present. I ask my guides and my angels. And if Andrea’s are available and willing to collaborate, we can weave our spiritual teams together.

to bring forth a message for the highest good to reach the ears that need to hear and the hearts with wish to soften. thank you for bringing me clarity of message and intensity of signal to reach those, those dear souls and give us these messages that are needed to help us live our highest purpose in our life of love, however it looks.

and respect each journey as it’s a precious addition to the ascension of humanity of this earth which we wish to live in, which brings us forth in our authenticity and safety and just cherishing each life, whether we understand or resonate with choices or not, just being part of this whole.

conglomeration of energies at this time is a gift and I honor each person. I honor people who share these episodes and bring forth all that we can. So thank you, thank you, thank you.

And welcome, dear friends, to another episode of Life of Love, where we gather each Thursday to bring forth a message to help us find our divinity, to remember, to remember how we were put here to share our love. And I was listening to a little YouTube video today, and the man was talking about how, you know, God’s love is in us, and it’s wasted if we don’t show it. If we just

hide our love, if we hide our loving selves. And that resonated with me so much, obviously, because I’m Life of Love. But it’s a special day today because Andrea Johnson is here with us and she’s coming in from Virginia, which is dear to my heart because everyone knows my youngest is there. Not close to you, but in the same state. So gosh, Andrea, thanks for being here on Life of Love.

Introducing Andrea Johnson: A Journey of Empowerment

Andrea Johnson (02:31)
thanks, Julie. I’m excited to be here and I love the intention that you set and I am looking forward to just having a really good conversation that brings to light some of the things that people need to hear.

Julie Hilsen (02:42)
Yeah, well, I mean, I was so impressed with your, I’ll say resume, because you’re professional. You’ve been doing this since I can say resume. Wow, I mean, you have been dedicated to bringing forth women to help them reach their goals and pivoting and being in different arenas of this. And for yourself being in corporate, you know, and in the scholastic arenas is…

Andrea Johnson (03:03)
and

Julie Hilsen (03:07)
you’ve been part of teams and now you’re in this golden, I say golden age of your life where you say, I do exactly what I want. so you’re calling the shots and it’s a lovely place to be. And I know many people would love to.

you know, find out your secrets of how you’re living a dream life in that respect. I mean, you really are. And you’re glowing. You can tell you’re living it.

Andrea Johnson (03:29)
It’s good to be reminded sometimes of the really positive

aspects of entrepreneurship because they’re not always, we don’t always feel like they’re positive, you know? And, you know, just so that people understand, you don’t always feel like you’re calling all the shots. I had a funny thing happen to me this week because I’m working with a local university here, James Madison University, working on a team to put together a leadership certification course.

Julie Hilsen (03:39)
Right?

Mm.

Andrea Johnson (03:55)
for novice and intermediate leaders. And it’s going to be sold. It’s like a combination of the school of education and the school of continuing education. And in order to do that, they needed me to be a part-time employee. And I had forgotten what that whole process was like. I’m like, why do you need my social security card? Why do you need my driver’s license? Why? I have to sign what? It was just, I am so used to calling all the shots.

that and I was telling my friend who will probably never be an entrepreneur and she’s like, why would you even worry about that? I’m like, I don’t know. I haven’t given anybody my driver’s license in ages. I mean, you know, so yeah, there’s beauty to being able to say this is who I am. This is who I help and this is why I do it. And there’s there’s plenty of challenges in that, but I am grateful that I am here and that I get to do that. And being able to

come on shows like this where I get to talk to people like you who care about what it is that we do is an extreme privilege.

Andrea’s Unique Background: Growing Up in Korea

Julie Hilsen (04:58)
Well, I do want to give you a chance to talk about your story a little because I want to celebrate. mean, you have a very unique path and I would love for you to talk about living with your parents in the ministry in Asia. Now, I had it in my head. Was it Japan? Korea. Okay, thank you because I knew I was going to mess that up. You lived in Korea as a child in the mission. ⁓

Andrea Johnson (05:03)
It’s time!

Korea. ⁓

Asia’s a big place. Yes.

Julie Hilsen (05:25)
Wow, I mean, and you were talking about deconstructing and what that meant. You didn’t realize how it added flavor to your soul mission. And so I would love for you to share with the audience your story about, your backstory and what you’ve realized now at this age of what that meant.

Andrea Johnson (05:40)
Okay.

Yeah, I joke with people that I am kind of Southern Baptist minor royalty. know, like not the Prince William and Kate, but like their third cousin or something. I was like, let’s remove. In the sense that I’m generationally Southern Baptist. My grandfather was a deacon. My dad was a pastor and then my parents were missionaries.

I met my husband at a Southern Baptist seminary. a Southern Baptist pastor’s wife. We will be married 30 years in May of this year. Yeah. I have two, well, probably more than two thirds. I have 66 hours towards my masters of divinity. I didn’t finish school because I was putting him through school. I have nearly a 4.0 and, you know, I just, I love theology. I love philosophy. Actually, I’m really more of a philosopher theologian. So I like to look at the philosophical side of things.

Julie Hilsen (06:14)
Wow.

Andrea Johnson (06:35)
But all of that to say, I was raised as a pastor’s kid. My dad was a pastor before I was born and then in Wyoming and then in Seoul, Korea as a missionary. So I was a missionary kid. There were things about that life that were beautiful. And there were things about that life that were really traumatic.

And for anybody who doesn’t know, Southern Baptists have a really robust mission sending agency. We did not have to raise our own funds. We had a house to live in that was on a mission compound. Southern Baptists have, I think other than the Mormons, like the largest mission sending agency. I could be wrong. Check me on that and email me, whatever. It doesn’t matter anymore. But they send a lot of missionaries and they’re very well supported.

And my family still works in that arena. My sister actually helps teach the littles so that they, cause we didn’t have any training when we went, you my mom said, Korean children are always happy. And, which was a stupid thing to say, but you know, it’s like, how do you make your kids want to move overseas? Right. So, two days after we got there on the back balcony of this little apartment that we’re in. And I see this woman walking down the street with her two children and both of them are screaming, crying, you know, and I’m like,

Julie Hilsen (07:30)
you

Andrea Johnson (07:43)
Um, so, you know, so we went in, I’m gonna my age, I’ll be 59 in August. So I was seven when we went in 1974. My sister was only three.

Julie Hilsen (07:44)
Wait, how old were you, Andrea?

Okay.

So you’re still

in the age where you’re forming your beliefs and your subconscious is being created. Okay.

Andrea Johnson (07:58)
⁓ right. Absolutely. yeah,

so I basically grew up there and I have memories of Wyoming. have memories of my parents are from Southeast Texas. I have plenty of memories of my grandparents and that kind of thing. But the way that the mission field is set up, it’s we call all the other missionaries, aunts and uncles. So it was this beautiful, diverse ecumenical kind of like I had.

aunts and uncles that were Lutherans and Presbyterians and Catholics and independent, know, and Methodists and all these different. And then because of during the 70s and 80s, the UN forces were headquartered there. So there was lots of military, big military bases and lots of ambassadors and lots of businesses. So I went to school with kids. I went to an international missionary and international school that is still

quite a very, very good school with kids from 65 different countries. So not only did I grow up in the community that was not mine, right? That’s why we call it third culture, because I was an American living in a little bit of a pod in Seoul, Korea, where I wasn’t Korean, but because I didn’t grow up in the States, I wasn’t really American American either. we called it this third culture. create our own. ⁓

Julie Hilsen (09:11)
Yeah.

Andrea Johnson (09:13)
You know, there’s a lot that they’ve learned since we went about what that’s like for people and the sometimes trauma that it brings. I learned recently that when I moved there, we were under martial law. I didn’t even know it. So I knew that there was curfew at night with tanks rolling down the streets. knew.

12 to 4 a.m. I knew when the North Koreans tried to dig a tunnel under the DMZ. I knew when they sank submarines off the coast. We experienced all these things. It’s a very mountainous country. It’s absolutely stunningly beautiful. If you haven’t looked, it’s called the land of the morning calm. Japan is the land of the rising sun. Korea is the land of the morning calm. So if you think mountainous,

green rice paddies with fog. You know, I mean, it’s just beautiful and they love nature. That’s their historical cultural religion is shamanism and Buddhism. so everything that they do, like with the Korean War, they have planted more trees than we could ever imagine planting because it was very important for them to rebuild that. so being in that culture gave me a different perspective on things.

It gave me a different perspective on age. Your elders are very much respected. True Confessions, I’m a K-drama watcher. And it still surprises me when just because somebody was a year ahead of you in college, they’re your senior and you have to treat them like they’re your senior. It’s an honor-based society. So I grew up watching people…

get up out of their seat when an older woman would get on or an older man would get on the bus, you gave them your seat. And it was very much based on familial honor and that kind of thing. So coming to the States, didn’t quite, it still doesn’t sit well with me when we dishonor those who came before us. That just bothers me a lot. think, you know, they’ve experienced more than we have. We need to listen a little bit. It doesn’t mean they’re always right. So it gave me that kind of perspective. But also going to school with kids from 65 different countries.

Julie Hilsen (10:56)
Mm-hmm.

Andrea Johnson (11:07)
meant that I was going to school with kids who were from Iran during the Iran hostage crisis in the 70s or 80, whatever year that was, late 70s. And so I would walk down the hall and hear French and Israeli and German and just all kinds of different languages. We had a woman who helped us in our home. So she spoke Conglish. It’s like half Korean, half English. So we…

Julie Hilsen (11:18)
Yeah.

Andrea Johnson (11:35)
We learned how to speak a little bit. But because of that as well, I had this really unusual…

What’s the word I want to use? Unrealistic view of what life was really like outside of my little bubble because everything was made there. I grew up on Evan Pacone silk dresses and Nike shoes from the factory and all these things. And when I came home for like less than I would pay here for cotton, when I came home for college, I couldn’t afford a cotton dress at Kmart.

Julie Hilsen (11:47)
you

Andrea Johnson (12:04)
And I couldn’t in Houston, I was in Houston and I couldn’t wear my silk dresses in my little car that had no air conditioning because that’s all we could afford. So it was a big reality shift. We had a beach that we went to on the West Coast every year. We had a cabin down there and it was, I shared with you before we started recording that we just recently went to Lake Hartwell. And I told my husband, this is most like the beach of any place I’ve ever been because it’s these mountains, these hills. If you’ve ever been to that

Georgia, South Carolina border, it’s very hilly and the hills go straight down to the lake. Ours were hills like that with piney woods that went straight down to the beach with one of the longest or deepest or whatever you call it, tides in the world. And it was like being in the Adirondacks or something. It was totally unrealistic. We went down there for six or eight weeks and I mean, we had our own church services, our own Sunday school. We had a lodge where we did like musicals every summer.

Julie Hilsen (12:50)
⁓ gosh.

Andrea Johnson (12:56)
I was a lifeguard. None of these things were even remotely realistic for bringing me home, home to the United States, to Texas in 1984. And so there are ways in which it was really helpful and ways in which it was just hard. And I learned early on that telling people that I grew up internationally didn’t always go over well. It just didn’t, especially in Texas. It just did not go over well at all. And so I got to where I pushed all it down.

And I didn’t pay attention and I looked for ways to fit in. And so I became very much a product of where I was. like the way to fit in, in Houston was to be a college Republican and to go to a Southern Baptist church because I’m a Southern Baptist, you know, minor royalty, right? And so, yeah, well, but so, and quite honestly, then my parents came home to the States too. That’s how we got to Virginia is cause the international mission board is here in Richmond and

Julie Hilsen (13:28)
Hmm.

You had that going for you.

Andrea Johnson (13:52)
My dad came to work there and then my mother worked there. They both retired from there. But because my dad handled volunteer trips for Asia and the Pacific, almost anytime I met a pastor anywhere I went and I said, I am Bob McKeechran’s daughter, they would say, I know Bob. So, you know, was just kind of one of those weird things, but it kind of set me up for not expressing myself. am a…

free thinker girl and I have all kinds of ideas and I remember coming home from school in like ninth grade from world history and expressing something that my teacher had told me that basically the way we treated Germany at the end of World War I was part of why we had Hitler. And I was gotten so much trouble. It’s like, why would you say that? We’re not, we didn’t cause Hitler. You know, so it’s like very American Southern ideas of the way things were done. But Andrea’s

Don’t think outside the box. But if you know anything about evangelical culture or anything, that’s just very much women don’t think. You don’t think outside the box. Everything is tied up in a neat little answer with a pretty little bow. And whatever we don’t understand, say, well, we don’t, God’s ways are higher than ours. And it’s much easier to do that. So I put myself in these spaces. I put myself in these boxes. And while I…

to break out every so often, it was made very clear to me by various sources that I needed to be back in the box. If it was in college or if it was, I don’t know, at church or especially when I married my husband and became a pastor’s wife. Talk about a box. ⁓ Talk about a box. yeah, so, but just realizing at 50.

Julie Hilsen (15:30)
Yeah. Yes!

Resilience and Personal Growth: Lessons from Life

Andrea Johnson (15:37)
After all of this, I mean, I tried to be like I was a family person. I was a Mary Kay lady. I tried to be an entrepreneur for a long time, but I realized that I didn’t, I can’t sell somebody else’s stuff. So anything you get from me, I’m going to attribute it to somebody like John Maxwell or it’s mine. I came up with it. But by the time I hit 50, my mother had struggled with breast cancer.

fought valiantly for a very long time. We lost her in 2017 and I had an eight-year-old adopted son. That was another journey of infertility and that kind of thing. But I realized at 50, I didn’t want my next 50 years to be like my last 50 years because I said, deserve to be me. you know, my mom, daughters and mothers always have interesting relationships and

Julie Hilsen (16:21)
Mm-hmm.

Andrea Johnson (16:30)
there are some of my deepest cuts came from my mother and some of my greatest comforts came from my mother. ⁓ you know, I don’t know if you have a daughter or not, I have a son, so I don’t have a daughter. don’t know how to be on the other side of that. But some of the things that I really worked hard to overcome were things that my mother said to me because we meant so much to each other. And…

Julie Hilsen (16:35)
No, no.

Andrea Johnson (16:53)
I think most women have that type of a story, you know, at some point. But before, she died well. Death is not pretty. I’m not one of those people that think death is a beautiful thing. just, it was really, really rough to watch. And I had spent 12 years in the cancer center at Johns Hopkins. I understood cancer. And so, but one of the things she did, she was very, very clear about making sure she said, have I told you everything? Is there anything you want to know? Have I apologized for everything?

And she kept saying to me, I know, right? And almost every time I tell this story, I cry. But she kept saying to me, fly be free. And I’m like, well, dog on it, I’m gonna fly and be free. And if that means that I have to leave behind all the stuff that I thought I believed or that I, the people that I trusted, because this was 2017. So this was also a very pivotal year in.

Julie Hilsen (17:23)
Yeah.

Andrea Johnson (17:42)
Charlottesville in the life of our country, in our politics, in the attitude that we had toward a lot of different things in this country. that was the beginning. I like, you know, I need to make sure that my son knows that I did everything I could to be everything I am, because if I believe that I was created imago dei in God’s image, and I believe that you were and my son was and everybody is,

then there is something about God that we are supposed to be displaying to other people. And I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with purity culture. And I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with making sure you do all the right things at the right time in the worship service, or I’m pretty sure it’s not those things, you know? so that’s when I kind of started down that path. And that was what, I had already started my business at the time, but that, so I’ve really been doing this longer than I say five years, because that’s when I quit my job, but. ⁓

Julie Hilsen (18:20)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Andrea Johnson (18:32)
I had already started and I knew that I had some things to say. And one of the things to overcome was not everybody wants to hear your opinion, Andrea. And, you know, I had, that was one of things I told her. You told me this and she said, I’m sorry, you know, and literally days before she kind of went, she was on hospice for a long time, but I would go over there each weekend. She got knee to knee with me and she said, I am so proud of you. You can do this.

and I want you to fly and be free. so kind of that was the real impetus that gave me the courage to say, no mass, I’m done. And that started my big journey. So that’s a backstory, but that started my biggest journey.

Julie Hilsen (19:16)
Wow. So, I mean, coming out of the expectations and, you know, having this charmed childhood for consecutive years, it sounds like you were in Korea for three, four years? No.

Andrea Johnson (19:30)
No, I was

okay. So we went there in 1974 and I graduated from high school in 1984 and then my parents didn’t leave until 1986. So most of my childhood was shaped. We did come home to the States for like furloughs, like, you know, six months here and a year there. But other than that, we were in Korea. so, you know, just, that’s, my family has always measured

Julie Hilsen (19:34)
Okay.

⁓ so you came.

Andrea Johnson (19:59)
whatever we talk about in the before Korea and the after Korea. yeah, because it was that impactful on us, impactful with the people, impactful with the work, impactful with the friends, impactful in the way we saw community, because it’s very different, ⁓ the missionary community, the expatriate community, the military community, and then there’s the Korean. So yeah, we were, I was there at least 10 years.

Julie Hilsen (20:03)
Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

That’s normal.

So that, I mean, to have, it probably was a huge culture shock. And then you realize that your past wasn’t valid in Houston, basically. So you just sort of started over and it’s a testament to your resiliency, really. You probably sort of just split. You’re like, okay, I’m gonna put this in the box. And then like you said, post Korea. And wow, so now you lived your life and you’re,

Andrea Johnson (20:35)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Julie Hilsen (20:52)
you’re coming up on your mother, another transition and your mom gives you permission to let all of that go. that it was, wow. mean, I’m amazed at her perspective and her ability to offer that because that took a lot of insight for her. And then you stayed with your husband. A lot of times when you have these epiphanies, the men are like, who are you? What’s going on?

Andrea Johnson (21:06)
Right.

No, he

is. So I want to talk about my husband, but I want to go back really quickly to the resilience comment. This is one of the things that I believe very strongly in is, I almost, almost every time I say it or it’s in my bio, I think that I say resilience must be earned. Julie, we don’t come by resilience just because just out of chance. We come by resilience because we have fallen down enough times and gotten back up just as many, if not more.

Navigating Relationships and Personal Identity

And we have learned from all of those things. And so I’m not one of those people that thinks I had a hard life or a hard, you can use the word charmed. There are plenty of things that I have had to come to understand as trauma in my life. But when I can look at all of that and say, I yet, yet I got up, you know, it’s like, here we go one more time. We’re gonna, my sister even told me, stop ramming your head against the wall. And I’m like, nope, the wall is gonna come down.

But I think that if there’s one thing I want people to take from that, it’s that resilience really can be earned and it does have to be earned. And when we start viewing the past hurts and hardships through the eye of resilience that gives us the opportunity to celebrate ourselves and to pick ourselves up and say, you did it before, girl, you can do it again. And boy, is that a testament to those watching. You know, it’s…

It’s a testament to people like you with me. It’s a testament to my sister. It’s a testament to my son. It’s a testament to my niece. So I just wanted to make sure that we grabbed that comment because resilience is extremely important. I think we’re gonna need a lot of it coming up in the next 10 years or so. ⁓ But my husband has always been, when I met him, I was in a biblical backgrounds class and I sat on, I have to sit up at the front because I’m nosy.

Julie Hilsen (22:48)
Yep.

Andrea Johnson (22:58)
And so if I sit in the back of the class, I’m paying attention to everybody else. So I do this at church too. sit on the front. It’s just like otherwise, I’m paying attention to what I’m not supposed to be paying attention to. So yeah. Well, we’re curious, right? It’s a good thing. Yes, I have terminal curiosity and that’s a good thing. And it’s okay if I die from curiosity. It’s not a problem. So I was sitting up second row all the way to the left side and every day for class,

Julie Hilsen (23:07)
I can relate. I call myself curious though. I’m like, I’m just curious.

Andrea Johnson (23:27)
the bell would ring and as the bell would ring, the door would open and this is in seminary, right? He would come in with a cup of coffee with a big smile on his face, like I made it and sit down. And we met about a week later at a extracurricular kind of function. And I thought I was gonna go to seminary and date a bunch of guys. It’s like, I haven’t dated enough people to date you. I know, I think you could wait a little.

Julie Hilsen (23:51)
You’re like, I wasn’t supposed to meet you yet.

Andrea Johnson (23:56)
But the other thing was, had, like I was sharing, I had put myself in this box and I had put myself in what I, the term that we use in evangelical culture, and you may or may not have heard it, is called complementarian theology as far as women and men are concerned and how we relate, as opposed to egalitarian. Egalitarian is when everybody’s equal and it’s, you know, it’s, there’s no hierarchy, but complementarian says it’s a little bit like animal farm.

Julie Hilsen (23:56)
That’s cute.

Andrea Johnson (24:23)
Can you tell I don’t like it? It’s a little bit like everybody’s equal, but some are more equal than others. And it’s the concept of women submit to men, especially in the marriage, the woman submits to the husband. it’s like, you know, so I was very bought into that. And he came from a different background. He was not Southern Baptist growing up and he came from more of a mainline Protestant. And I sat him down one day and said, if you want to date me, you’re going to have to like take charge, you know, because that’s what you’re supposed to do.

I was positive he was going to like, because this was my opportunity to date other people, right? He just walked in a minute and he got real quiet and he goes, okay. And I’m like, darn, that backfired, you know. But that has been his MO for 32 years. He is thoughtful. And I also have the story of gastric bypass because I weighed 300, I’m five foot one and a half and I weighed 310 pounds and I couldn’t get it off.

And I’ve struggled with bleeding depression and all kinds of stuff. so when I said, I really, really, really want to do this, when my mother was diagnosed with cancer, I said, I want to do this. So March 31st, it was 20 years ago. And so I’m kind of the poster child for getting it done and keeping it off. But when I said, I want to do that, he said, how can I support you? I said, well, we won’t do sugar anymore. We won’t do sodas anymore. And he’s like, OK. He just said, I’ll change whatever I have to eat, how you need to eat.

And so that’s been, yeah, so this is the man I’m married to, right? So, which is just a really good example. And when I started struggling, I didn’t know what to call it at first. And I didn’t tell him at first. I mean, he knew that I struggled as a pastor’s wife. We have been through some hard things in the church. I have more trauma from my experiences as a pastor’s wife than I do anywhere else in my life. And it’s just a hard, hard life.

and there if anybody is listening who is either experienced it or is interested in it there is a book brand new book out by Beth Allison Barr called Becoming the Pastor’s Wife and it kind of walks you through the historical framework for how women moved from being ministers to being an unpaid ministry position and it it is all based on Southern Baptist Archives and she’s a history professor at Baylor and it’s

phenomenal book, but I literally like cracked me open again when I read it. But, ⁓ yeah, yeah, you think you’re done. And it’s like, no, you deconstruct that piece. You got to deconstruct this one and that one and that one and that one. But no, when I finally told him, because part of what I went through is I had to get to a place where I was like, OK, I don’t have any idea what I’m doing here, God. But if I need to walk away from everything that I’ve, if I get to the end of this,

Julie Hilsen (26:40)
Hmm. You thought you had dealt with it and you’re like, oh, here’s there’s some more in there.

Andrea Johnson (27:02)
edge of the earth and it literally is a drop off. I’m willing to do it. And I had a friend who said, you know, because whether or not, you know, when you’re listening, if you believe in Jesus or not, she said, Andrea, Jesus can hold on to you better than you can hold on to him. And because I have always thought I don’t need to defend Jesus. don’t, you know, he’s got this. If he’s who he says he is, I don’t need to defend him. I don’t need to do apologetics. I don’t need to do any of that stuff.

Exploring Feminist Theology and Spiritual Freedom

And so that’s kind of what I said. I just was like, I’m willing to go to the end. So I looked into and read a lot of feminist theology and sacred feminism and learned like different, I’m like, oh, that’s what the snake means or that’s what the turtle means or that’s what, you know, it’s like, oh, I had no idea. And I learned so much about who we are as women historically. I’m not done. but what it did was it,

gave me the opportunity to walk out to that edge and say, I’m willing to jump off the edge here and walk away from everything. Cause I have friends who’ve done it. I grew up with a missionary kid who went to seminary and came out an atheist. And, you know, of course on our side, we look at that and we go, Oh my gosh. You know, my tribe goes, that’s terrible. And I’m like, he must feel so free. That was my perspective. I was jealous, you know.

Julie Hilsen (28:16)
Yeah

Navigating Personal Faith Journeys

Andrea Johnson (28:23)
And because I was feeling that I had all these things that just were incongruent for me. ⁓ Some of them are Baptist polity, you know, the way we do things. Some of them are the Protestant theology or the way things have developed. And I just I still had to do it. And so I finally told my husband, I don’t know, last year I said, that’s where I was. He had a blanched a little bit like he’s like, wow, I had no idea.

Julie Hilsen (28:28)
Mm-hmm.

He

didn’t know.

Andrea Johnson (28:50)
but he has gone through and is going through his own. We joke in our little family of three that I’m usually the first to go and then my husband and then my son. And my son is the most cautious. But I notice things first and I move faster. I told him from the time we met that I have the gift of discernment. And I don’t know if you’re familiar with the working genius assessment, but it’s a really cool assessment that tells you kind of how you work in teams.

My top two are wonder and discernment. And I’m like, see, I just keep getting these things that tell me I figure things out faster. And so even in this arena, he’s like, yeah, you figure this stuff out faster than me. so he’s been extremely supportive and we’re working through it and we’re moving forward. And he’s been 31 years in the pastorate. So we’ll see how much longer he has there. It’s a hard life.

Julie Hilsen (29:21)
your things out.

I adore how you shared so openly about this because it seems like there’s some, it’s in some people to be, to die on the Hill of religion. Like they feel it so strongly. And then, and other people don’t have that at all. For example, like I was raised Catholic. My mother’s a communion distributor. Like, I mean, we had priests in my family, nuns, like,

Andrea Johnson (29:52)
Mm. Yeah.

Mmm.

Julie Hilsen (30:07)
My

Andrea Johnson (30:07)
Yeah.

Julie Hilsen (30:08)
uncle would have a private Christmas Eve mass at our house.

Andrea Johnson (30:12)
Wow.

Wow.

Julie Hilsen (30:14)
But I struggled. I struggled. walk into church and my stomach would hurt and I’d throw up on occasion and just different things with the nuns. I didn’t understand and I felt this pain. I’m very empathetic. And there’s no labels for it. Just Julie sensitive. Julie has a sensitive stomach. There’s no exploring it. You just, you know.

Andrea Johnson (30:26)
Yeah. Yes.

No, right.

Julie Hilsen (30:37)
you wipe it up and move on, right?

I would go and spend like half the time in the bathroom with the green furniture. It was so funny.

Andrea Johnson (30:44)
⁓ bless your heart.

And I’ll bet interesting smells too, because they probably had some kind of weird air freshener in there.

Julie Hilsen (30:48)
Yeah, and so then when I was like,

I’m gonna be a mom and this is interesting because your son, your son drove you because you’re like, what can I teach him? What do I want to leave the legacy? And I was thinking about, you know, my husband and I wanted to start a family and I’m like, oh my gosh, if I raise my kids Catholic and I have a daughter, she can’t feel as significant as a man.

Andrea Johnson (31:12)
Yeah, that’s where we are in Southern Baptist Hall. Yeah.

Julie Hilsen (31:12)
And that was my deal breaker. That was my line in the sand. Like, I’m

gonna think about my daughter. By the way, I never had a daughter. I have two boys.

Andrea Johnson (31:19)
Mm-hmm.

Okay, you know what though? I think that’s just as you know, I say I work most I work with women and I started off saying well, I don’t necessarily want to shake my fist at the patriarchy now. I’m like hell did you know I might get the patriarchy. But I’ve come to understand that it hurts all of us, you know. Yes, and to tell the men and the boys that they are a certain type, you know, I mean my husband and I, I’m

Julie Hilsen (31:32)
Yes!

It hurts all of us when we can’t be true to ourselves and we can’t be anything.

The Impact of Gender Roles in Religion

Andrea Johnson (31:49)
My disc type is the leader and my husband and I’m an enneagram, six-winged five and he’s a nine. So he’s like very kind of, you know, whatever. And to think that he actually married me, I joked with him this morning. I’m like, I’m so glad you stuck it out. But to look at that and, my dad was like, well, who, we had church literally ask us who wears the pants in the family.

And we went there anyway, Julie. I think we deserved what we got. However, while at that church, we adopted my son. While at that church, my mother got special breast cancer treatments. You know, I mean, it’s just, there’s, I look, that’s where this resilience piece comes in, right? That’s where you can look back and say, all those hard things, the things that I went through, built up the strength and the resilience that I needed to help my mother when she had breast cancer, to help, to be there when it was time to adopt my son.

Julie Hilsen (32:18)
Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Andrea Johnson (32:37)
And so, yeah, being able to look at those things and say, I don’t need this anymore. I don’t need to believe that anymore. I mean, my very first foray into anything was a Jen Hatmaker podcast for the love. And I was still working at University of Virginia and I had a really old Nissan, so I didn’t even have like a, I couldn’t.

plug my phone in so I had one of those cassette tape things that I’d plug in and it would Bluetooth it to my phone. yeah, so I tell you about it was old. I drove it for a long time, but I know how to drive a stick shift and not many people do. So I plugged it in and rolled my windows up. And as I drove out of the driveway, I literally looked around to see if anybody was going to notice I was listening to this hair tape gen hat maker. And you know,

Julie Hilsen (33:14)
Yes.

Andrea Johnson (33:28)
One of my dreams is to be on her show and to tell her that story.

Julie Hilsen (33:33)
Well, hair take

is someone who thinks outside the box. Yeah.

Andrea Johnson (33:36)
but yeah, but you know,

depending on the community you’re in, heretic can mean something very different. And she had just recently come out to say that she supported the LGBTQ community. And you know, I was like seeing all these people talking about her, but I was like, what does that mean? What is she doing? What is going on? And so she was one of the people, and of course now she’s, her business is flourished, but she’s been through a lot personally, and boy does she have resilient stories. And being able to say,

Julie Hilsen (33:41)
Right.

Andrea Johnson (34:03)
And she was also Southern Baptist, like raised a Southern Baptist pastor’s kid and pastor’s wife. so being able to say, I watched where it started for me and it started very, very small and it has bloomed and blossomed. And now it’s something I talk about very openly. I don’t really talk about it to my dad. don’t think he’s not ready for it, but he’s also not listening to these podcasts.

Julie Hilsen (34:27)
Right, right.

Andrea Johnson (34:28)
He’s

82, you know, and so, yeah, and I share because I hope that it will give someone else courage. They may not have a mom like mine who said fly be free, you know, and so I want to make sure that they have that and that my son, who idolized my mother, knows what she said and knows that every woman has a voice and every woman has the ability to do everything that she was created to do and that doesn’t diminish him in any way.

that he can support all of us. so I think it’s very important with our sons to do that.

Julie Hilsen (34:57)
Bye.

I do too. And it’s beautiful. I love how you’ve taken this and you’re helping women entrepreneurs discover how to lead. And we’re running out of time, but it comes from this ability to know yourself and what’s driving you. it’s…

Andrea Johnson (35:15)
you

Empowering Women Through Leadership

Julie Hilsen (35:20)
It’s changing the world. So I’m just celebrating your work. And please, if you’re interested in coaching or finding out about being a more effective leader, Andrea has a podcast, Stand Tall and Own It, Purpose Driven Impact. And yeah, so I’ll put a link in the show notes with your, I believe you have a website too, right? Yeah.

Andrea Johnson (35:34)
Mm-hmm.

Thank you. I do, it’s the

intentional optimist. That was what I started with. And that was part of the reflection on my mother’s death. I went in that crucible that we do when we grieve and came out with six tenants of intentional optimism, which I call my life principles. And so that’s my business name. You can find me on all the platforms. But one of the things I do is I want women to understand that it is not what you do that makes you impactful, that makes you valuable, that makes you

Worthy it is who you are and you were created to do all the good things You were created to to be the specific light in your little universe You were created to be the specific wonderful holiday dish at your table and if you don’t show up with all the goodness that you were created to do then we’re all missing out and we don’t want to miss out and So that’s why I do the work I do and that starts with core values. So I’m I would love to

chat with anybody about it.

Julie Hilsen (36:37)
Yeah, those core, it’s interesting how our society, you don’t really talk about values, you talk about vacations, you talk about where you grew up, where you’re from, you know, but the core values, you know, it’s, it’s not a class in school. ⁓ You have to seek it out. But it’s so worth it. And I’m telling you, one thing I’ve been doing lately is working on these dream videos. And I’ve done a couple for myself. And I’m

Andrea Johnson (36:51)
now.

Core Values and Authenticity

Julie Hilsen (37:01)
I think I’m going to open it up to other people because I think it’s so we talked about having a vision board. But to me, if you can take your core values, the things you cherish, the things you can do that other people can’t seem to do as easily as you do and, create this vision of, you know, your core structure and you have you have your true north, it gives you more of a voice and it keeps your presence centered on those things versus

Andrea Johnson (37:07)
Mm-hmm.

Yes.

Julie Hilsen (37:29)
all the distractions, all the competition, the fear, the myth of separation, all these things that are introduced to control and manipulate us to keep us predictable, then in the box, break free.

Andrea Johnson (37:34)
Mm-hmm.

And in the box. Well, it gives you clarity and it’s

when you understand these are your non-negotiables. These are the things that just either light you up or light your fire. you know, and we all have them and they’re all valid. There’s no bad core values. It’s how we’re going to honor those core values and we can honor them anywhere. And we’re the ones that usually dishonor them. My top core values, critical thinking is like freedom of thought and talk about

putting myself in a box for years, that was completely incongruous. That’s why I had bulimia and depression. mean, it just, so, you know, all those things are valid. And when we lead from those places, then we have clarity and we have authenticity and all the things that we want. And we have confidence, you know? I mean, it’s, when you know who you are, that’s why I named it Stand Tall and Own It, the podcast. When you know who you are, you can stand, even if you’re only five foot one and a half, you can stand tall and you can…

Take up all the space that you need to take up because you don’t have to apologize. Your boundaries are really clear. Your message is really clear. And people, I think, respect you more for knowing who you are. We’ve all got friends like that that already do that.

Julie Hilsen (38:44)
Definitely. And like you said

on your bio, it gives other people freedom to be themselves too.

Andrea Johnson (38:50)
Absolutely.

Yeah, because that’s ultimately what we all really want. We just want to be loved and accepted and we want to be heard and seen and when we can be ourselves, we can do that. so that’s that’s at the heart of like everything that I do.

Julie Hilsen (39:04)
So wait a minute, you lost the 300 pounds after you decided to get out of the box or before? Two. Okay.

Andrea Johnson (39:10)
No, I weighed 310 pounds. I didn’t lose 300. I

lost, I’m at like 140. So, you know, I did lose a whole human being. I’ve been a little bit lower than that. working, I went back up a little bit, but it’s been stressful. But no, I did that when I, that was 20 years ago and I hadn’t quite decided to get out of the box, you know, cause Julie, we work on the things outside of ourselves a lot more often than we work on the things inside of ourselves.

Julie Hilsen (39:16)
Still, you lost a whole human being.

Okay.

Yeah, that’s I was just wondering the timing of it. Like, so I’m glad you clarified. And it’s okay to start with your body at the outside first because you got to start somewhere.

Andrea Johnson (39:40)
They’re easy to see. Yeah. It’s easy to see. Yeah, it’s easy to see. ⁓ sure.

And it gives us habits that we understand. Like when we start on our behaviors, then it helps us see how we’re acting out the things. And then once we understand what our behaviors are, then we’re like, where did that come from? You know, it’s like, then we get curious again and we say, where did that come from? And we can say, well, why do I have those behaviors? Or what is it that…

What is it that’s pushing on that that bothers me? so there’s nothing wrong with starting outside. Kids start that way when they learn. They learn very concrete things and then they move to abstract things. We do that when we’re adults too. Adult learning is no different. We start with very concrete things and move to abstract. And abstract feels weird. When I do workshops for core values, I say, why haven’t we done this work? And invariably, I always get somebody say, because I’m afraid. What’s in there?

Julie Hilsen (40:33)
Mm-hmm.

Andrea Johnson (40:35)
And so, you know, it’s like just understanding that there are no core values that are bad. They are all good. And, you know, of course you got somebody in the room that says, what if I have a core value of narcissism? And I’m like, well, then I’d say that that’s not a core value, but we need to help you get over that. You know, I mean, it’s like, it’s that’s not a core value. You know, it’s so when we think about our non-negotiables and who we are, then we can actually say that’s

That’s actually a really good thing. And it is my superpower. I help other people think critically because I’m willing to do it myself. Now, does it mean I question some things that a lot of people don’t want me to question? Yep. That’s just who I am. But my other top core values are belonging. So I try to create very welcoming spaces because core values are reciprocal. If I want it for me, I want it for you, right?

Julie Hilsen (41:14)
you

See ya.

Mm-hmm.

Right, right.

Andrea Johnson (41:26)
Like

if respect is my core value, I want you to be respected too. And it’s probably gonna make me really angry when somebody disrespects you. But because of that, I create welcoming spaces. back when it was not real popular to say I’m a safe space, I’m like, I’m a safe space? And I tell people too, it’s like, I want my arms to be wide open. It’s a non-defensive position, right? You’re not protecting anything, you’re leaving all your vital organs.

Julie Hilsen (41:32)
Mm-hmm.

you

Andrea Johnson (41:50)
exposed and you know, it’s just like, but I want to be a haven for people to come and explore and to come and figure out who they really are. doing that with women who have decided to go out into business and created big teams and created their own companies, so founders and CEOs that are very driven, because I feel that as well, ⁓ those are the women who come to me and they’re just like shocked at how they’ve dishonored their own core values.

Julie Hilsen (41:50)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Generational Change and Community Support

Andrea Johnson (42:17)
but I followed all the rules. I’m like, the rules, forget the rules. And the rules might get you where you are, but they’re not gonna get you where you wanna be. becoming you gets you where you wanna be.

Julie Hilsen (42:21)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

I love that. And you touched on so many of my core values, the divinity and honor and respect. And it’s just it’s a beautiful place to be. And thank you for holding space for this. you know, the divine feminine and I feel Mary Magdalene, she’s part of this. And I just I honor I honor all the women that came before us that we we need to remember.

Andrea Johnson (42:34)
Yeah.

Yes!

Yeah. Yeah.

Julie Hilsen (42:53)
and they’re part of this with us. And so we can call

on them. We can say, hey, know, what can I see here? Give me clarity, give me wisdom. And sometimes you can really feel that presence. And so it’s there if you ask. our sisters are there waiting and your mom is there. So it’s so beautiful.

Andrea Johnson (43:07)
Yeah

Well, and if you’re

in like the evangelical space I was in, there’s a scripture in Hebrews that says, run the race well because there’s a great crowd of witnesses watching you. And what I learned to do was say, my mom is leaning over the railing, cheering me on. And if we think about that, like just this last Sunday, we talked a lot about Mary Magdalene, because she’s the one who was at the tomb and Jesus spoke to her first.

Julie Hilsen (43:29)
Hahaha

Andrea Johnson (43:40)
And she was the first evangelist, the first preacher. And that’s just not taught to us in evangelical spaces. Women are not supposed to do that stuff. And so that’s been a very freeing line of inquiry for me.

Julie Hilsen (43:51)
Right, even at

the Egyptian holy sites, they won’t let women meditate and pray. They move, I just heard my friend was talking about her trip and she said, yeah, I was moved along, I wasn’t allowed. And if you weren’t praying or being quiet, they let you spend as much time as you want. But it’s women, they won’t. So there’s so much work to do and.

Andrea Johnson (43:56)
Yeah. Yeah.

Interesting. We have so much work to do. And I

love the analogy of, did your kids have those little barrels of monkeys that had the one fist up like this? And so that’s what I say. This is what we need to do as women, always reaching up to somebody to pull us and always reaching down to pull the next one along. I’m very dedicated and committed to generational leadership and generational change.

Julie Hilsen (44:19)
yeah, they, yeah.

Andrea Johnson (44:35)
so that we have the ability to make the difference that matters. Because here in the United States, generationally things are coming to a halt and they’re shifting and things are to be very different in the next 10 to 15 years. But we still have the ability to make changes in our own circles and make those generational impacts as we go.

Julie Hilsen (44:54)
If you don’t say something, if you don’t speak your truth, then that’s chance that you missed. And no shame, if it’s not that, you don’t, you have to be a, that’s what I want to say is you have to be a vigilante about this. It’s a loving presence and acceptance and a vulnerability to say, this is how this hits. And it might not be heard as funny as we were talking about.

Andrea Johnson (44:56)
Right.

Yes.

No. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Julie Hilsen (45:17)
My husband mentioned ley lines last night, we talking to my son on the phone, I was like, did you just say ley lines? And he’s like, yeah, I said you have been listening to me because I think he rolls his eyes and he goes one ear at the other. And he’s like, yeah, I’m listening.

Andrea Johnson (45:30)
I

love it.

That’s great. Yeah.

Julie Hilsen (45:33)
Well, I can’t wait

to share this. This is going to come out probably in about three weeks. so we’re, you know, it’s timely. It’s going to be the beginning of summer and.

Andrea Johnson (45:43)
Well, my hope is that it will offer a different perspective to people, you know, because a lot of women who are, even if they’re in the Southern culture and not wholly in the evangelical church, the Southern culture is very wrapped up in that. You you’re in Atlanta, right? You get it. Some of the biggest Southern Baptist churches are right there, right? So it’s permeated our culture and it’s coming back stronger. And we need to be…

Julie Hilsen (45:57)
Mm-hmm. yeah, where’s your church home?

Andrea Johnson (46:07)
joyfully defiant and I just, can’t let it rob me. I can’t let anything rob me of what it means to be, the beauty of what it means to be a woman in this day and age, even when it’s hard. And I want to, so sometimes I have to listen to people who are willing to scream and rant and rave in order to help me get that out. But my goal is to do, as you say, I want to be that presence that is a welcoming space.

for anybody who hasn’t actually thought about it yet or is finally hitting this point where they’re like, wait a minute, why am I here? What am I doing here? And why do I believe this? And to know that there’s no wrong answer. And I think that’s really, really important for women.

Julie Hilsen (46:47)
Well, thank you dear sister and I can’t wait to share this this has been a real pleasure

Andrea Johnson (46:53)
Thank you, my pleasure too.