What is a man? I could talk about this topic all week because it's near and dear to my heart. A man in his truest form is one of the most powerful and beautiful creatures God ever created, and those lumpy things you get all over your bodies make smart girls stupid! Men are our gladiators, our protectors, the voice that cuts through the emotional noise, our swords when the wolves come prowling at the gates. You are the foundation of our society. We need you whole and healthy more than ever. Don't give up on us! You're in pain, and I see it. How do you navigate a society that wants you silent and impotent? Well, @GatesGarciaFL is one of the best men I know, and he has some thoughts on that, so give this a listen!

𝐅𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐕𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 𝐓𝐨 𝐕𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐞 I'm about to shock you... I've come to terms with the fact that I will never be a monster account or massively popular. I don't think it's fun to mock people or hurt them, and I "talk about Jesus too much". I wasn't always this way... I will never stop talking about what God has done for me and the transformation He made. I used to be an absolute vampire. I've always been conventionally pretty, barring the couple of years I shot up to 300lb wildebeest status. Fueled by childhood abuse and adult trauma, I could wreck and seduce a man from across a football field. I grew up surrounded by boys and five younger brothers. I understand men better than most women ever will. I know what they hunger for. I know what to do. I know what to say to climb inside their defenses and take up residence. I did it all. I loved it all. After an assault as an adult, I started seeing a trauma therapist who saw right through me. I'm female, but kinda not. I have a lot of traditionally masculine traits: aggression, dominance, even some psychopathic tendencies, though I'm not actually a psychopath. I see you better than you know yourself. Your motivations. Your strengths. More importantly, your weaknesses. If I know how to twist the knife (metaphorically) I can stop you before you ever hurt me. Working with Ed, he named what I was. For a woman, I am a wolf. Men will be drawn to me like gravity. Women will bristle and recoil because something in them recognizes an innate predatory nature. I trigger the oldest parts of the mammalian brain. That truth has carved deep loneliness and isolation into my life. Saying I am not like other women is not a cute line. It is a fact written in blood and carved in my bones. You would be shocked by everything I survived as a kid and still kept my sanity. My childhood didn't break me. It turned me lethal. Into a weapon. Then a series of events happened. I won't bore you with the grisly details. They brought me to my knees. I quite literally had nowhere left to turn except God. I was torn asunder and shattered. Karma, I suppose. I started Bible in a Year with Father Mike, and it was the first time I fully began tackling what I had always seen as a monumental task: simply reading it. Rapidly I saw that the whole book is about broken people redeemed by His grace. For the first time I didn't feel beyond saving. I didn't feel like I needed to tear other people apart to feel better. It never actually did, but a wounded animal bites. Bit by bit. Step by step. I began to transform into someone who likes to help other people, write about beautiful things, and heal. I made a personal covenant with God to start my day with the Word in some fashion: a sermon, a devotion, or simply learning new ways to understand Him. That has made all the difference. I still have to fight the compulsions instilled in me over a lifetime of survival. But now I have hope. Now I do far more good in the world than bad, and every day I am a tiny bit better than the day before. Last night I climbed into my fiancé's lap and kissed his neck. He said, "Even sick you're a dangerous woman." I smiled and said, "Only for you, baby." And I meant it.

The Epoch Times just dropped the first trailer for the documentary I narrated, so please check it out. The topic is frightening, but this is information we all need to know!