Becoming the Oak: My Story

Hi, and welcome to Becoming the Oak Rooted in Christ. I’m your host, Kendra George, and I am so grateful you’re here.

For this very first episode, I want to begin with my story of how Becoming the Oak came to be, and the journey that shaped it.

To do that, I want to start with the Parable of the Sower.

In Matthew 13, Jesus teaches the Parable of the Sower. It appears in three of the four Gospels, which tells us how important it is. Even more significantly, Christ explains its meaning.

The parable describes a man who sowed seeds. Some fell by the wayside. Some fell on stony ground. Some fell among thorns and were choked. And others fell on good ground.

My story is about the seed that fell among the thorns.

When the seed fell among the thorns, it took root. It began to grow. But because of the cares of the world, the pleasures, deceitfulness, vanities, and distractions, it was choked.

That is where my story begins.

I have known my whole life that I am a child of God. I grew up singing it. I believed it.

But that root did not take hold the way I thought it had.

My story is a story of comparison.

Comparison is something so many women struggle with. For me, it wrapped around my identity so quietly and unconsciously that I didn’t even realize how deeply it had taken hold.

I remember being three years old and not feeling confident enough to color a picture.

My babysitter colored beautifully. She shaded dark around the edges and lighter inside. It looked perfect. When I tried, mine didn’t look like hers. So instead of experimenting, I copied the pictures on the front covers so I wouldn’t do it wrong.

Even at that young age, a story started forming:
“I’m not good enough.”

Fast forward through years of experiences, too many to unpack in one episode, and that story solidified into something deeper:

No matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried, I would not be successful.

I wanted to be liked. I wanted to be popular. I wanted to be the person everyone gravitated toward when I walked into a room.

That wasn’t my experience. And whether it was reality or just my perception, it reinforced the belief that I wasn’t enough.

As a teenager.
As a young married woman.
As a mother.

The thorns tightened.

My identity and self-worth were being choked by comparison.

Eventually, I stopped trying to change it. I felt like life was happening to me and I had no control.

Every time I tried to improve, I felt like it didn’t work.
I didn’t feel like my prayers were answered.
I didn’t feel direction.
I felt mediocre.
I felt like a failure.

I believed God answered prayers, just not mine.

I knew about the Atonement.
I knew I was a daughter of God.
But I didn’t feel important enough to receive help.

I thought maybe if I became more noticeable or more influential, everything would change.

It didn’t.

In 2008, after running a 10K, my back began to hurt.

That pain turned into eight years of chronic issues. There were days I army-crawled across the floor just to get up the stairs. I remember my sixth-grade daughter sitting on the stairs, asking how she could help me while tears rolled down my face.

I felt humiliated.
Weak.
Embarrassed.

Eventually, we discovered the issue, and I had spinal fusion surgery. Even after that, I continued to struggle with pain for years.

And every challenge reinforced the same belief:
“It doesn’t matter what I do. I will never be as good as everyone else.”

I was a mom of five.
Depressed.
Barely walking.
Spiritually going through the motions.

I was reading scriptures. I was going to church. I was praying.

But my prayers felt like they hit a brick wall.

During COVID, I began health coaching. I thought maybe if I could control my health, I could change something.

That program focused heavily on mindset, and that’s where things began to shift.

I realized something powerful:

I had a choice.

I didn’t have to stay in a victim mentality.

But I had to be willing to question the stories I was telling myself.
Were they actually true?

“Comparison is the thief of joy.”

Joy is something we generate. Joy is something we choose.

And I needed to find it.

A few years later, I pursued life coaching because I loved the mindset work.

Around that time, I remembered a quote from Joseph B. Wirthlin: that God has given us everything we need to become like Him.

Then I heard an analogy about an acorn.

An acorn already contains all the DNA it needs to become a mighty oak tree. Everything required for growth is already inside it.

When I placed myself in that metaphor, when I saw myself as the acorn, something shifted.

Maybe I didn’t need to reach for something.
Maybe I didn’t need to become someone else.
Maybe everything I needed was already within me.

That thought changed everything.

The first step I was given was simple:

Say, “I love and accept you.”

Every day I said:
“I love and accept you, Kendra.”

I visualized Jesus Christ saying it to me.
Then I visualized myself saying it.

At first, it felt awkward.
Then it felt uncomfortable.
Then it began to feel true.

Transformation didn’t happen overnight. It happened in small, repeated, daily actions.

While swimming laps, I would repeat:
“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
“My will is aligned with God’s will.”
“I am a light.”

There is a difference between knowing something intellectually and feeling it emotionally.

It has to connect to both to create real change.

Even after surgery, even while still experiencing pain, I had to ask:

If this is my life, how do I find joy?
What can I be grateful for?
What am I meant to learn?

I shifted from “Why me?” to “What is this teaching me?”

My head and my heart didn’t always match.
But repetition created belief.
Belief created peace.

Last summer, I was diagnosed with breast cancer.

When they first found the mass, I immediately rooted myself and said:
“Thy will be done.”

When I received the diagnosis, I chose to love and accept whatever would come.

Not because cancer is easy.
Not because it isn’t terrifying.
But because I believed something new:

God had already prepared me.

Because of the acorn analogy, I believed I already had what I needed inside me.

Instead of asking, “Why is this happening to me?”
I said, “You think I can handle this? Let’s do it together.”

And I felt peace.

The night before surgery, I prayed and told Heavenly Father that whatever the outcome — chemo, radiation, or neither — I would accept it. I trusted that either I needed the experience or someone in my family did.

I felt scared.
But I also felt joy.

Because I knew I wasn’t alone.

We do not grow without stretching.
We do not grow without pain.

The “becoming” happens when we root ourselves in Jesus Christ and allow His Atonement to strengthen us through the stretching.

During my back surgery years, I was going through the motions. I didn’t fully believe it would help me.

With cancer, I believed it.

That is the difference.

I don’t love cancer.
But I love that my Heavenly Father trusts me.
I love that He sees strength in me.
I love that through Christ, I can do hard things.

That is becoming the oak.

There are incredible women in this world who have walked through both big and small trials. Some rooted themselves in Christ during the trial. Some learned afterward.

But all of them grew.

My prayer is that this podcast will uplift, inspire, and encourage you to keep going.

You already have everything you need.
Heavenly Father loves you.
You are His daughter.
And He wants you to find joy in every circumstance.

Thank you for joining me on this journey.

Until next time:

Be still.
Believe.
Become.