Hopeful Steps: Embracing Chaos, Imperfection, and Surrender

July 2, 2026

If you've found your way here, there's a good chance life hasn't unfolded the way you expected.

Mine certainly didn't.

Hopeful Steps is a place where hope and hurt sit at the same table. It's for those who are learning that joy and grief, peace and uncertainty, can somehow exist together.

If you're looking for polished answers or a perfectly curated life, this probably isn't your place.

But if you're longing for honest conversations, gentle encouragement, and a reminder that you don't have to have it all together, welcome. I'm so glad you're here.

I'm Lisa.

I'm a recovering perfectionist who loves a good checklist, believes books can solve almost anything, and has spent much of her life trying to control what couldn't be controlled.

Then cancer interrupted everything.

When I was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in June 2017, the life I'd carefully organized unraveled. I assumed that once treatment ended, I'd simply return to who I'd always been.

Instead, I discovered something unexpected.

Cancer didn't just change my body.

It exposed the places in me that had been striving all along.

The need to fix.

The need to perform.

The need to hold everything together.

For years, I've imagined myself holding one end of a rope, trying to pull Jesus closer to me, as if faith were a tug-of-war I needed to win.

Lately I've begun to picture something different.

Jesus isn't pulling against me.

He's simply standing there, calm and steady, inviting me to let go of the rope and walk toward Him.

To surrender.

I'm learning that surrender isn't a single decision.

It's a daily practice.

Sometimes an hourly one.

This blog is simply an invitation to walk that road with me.

We'll talk about faith, fear, healing, books, ordinary life, cancer, hope, and all the beautiful, messy places where God keeps showing up.

I don't know exactly what this space will become.

Maybe that's the point.

For once, I'm choosing not to have it all figured out before I begin.

Just one hopeful step at a time.

I'm grateful you're here.

One hopeful step at a time,

Lisa

If this encouraged you...