Hello, I’m Rachael
Welcome to the messiest, most honest corner of the internet—a place where ancient wisdom meets modern truth, and where your authentic self is not just welcomed, but celebrated.
I’m a child of the 1900s, and I’ve lived a thousand lives. Not because I’m extraordinary, but because I’ve never been able to sit still long enough to do just one thing. I’ve been held through all of it by the Real Jesus—not the one they tried to box and sell, but the one who shows up in the quiet moments and teaches us that our questions aren’t rebellion; they’re the language of seeking hearts.
My Story
I am what they call a jack of all trades, master of none—but better at many than most are at one.
I grew up on a horse farm in Georgia, learning to ride and train horses under a German trainer who also taught me to work with her Rottweilers. Before I could even drive, I had my first job at a grooming shop, learning everything from basic baths to breed-specific cuts. My family raised cows, chickens, and pigs alongside the horses, so I grew up with dirt under my nails and hay in my hair.
From there, I collected jobs like some people collect hobbies: hotel front desk work where I got certified in hospitality. Dog training that took me to families across the country through a Christian-based organization. Retail management and sales. Veterinary assistant work—probably my favorite job I’ve ever had, if I’m honest. I eventually landed as the kennel manager and chief operations officer of a 50-acre property, running everything from the 20-30 dogs on site to the owners’ cars, mail, and winter home.
Somewhere in there, at eighteen, I became a missionary. Bulgaria. Brazil. Jamaica. Countless states across the US. Each place carved something new into my soul—some left scars that became stories, others left wisdom that still surprises me when it surfaces.
I’ve also done the less glamorous work: industrial cleaning, commercial cleaning, whatever jobs got me through to the next chapter.
Today, I’m married, living far from that Georgia hometown, and I’ve built a life that looks nothing like what I expected—and everything like what I needed.
The Girl Who Stopped Writing
I used to document my adventures on “Rachael Around The World,” writing with the wide-eyed wonder of someone who believed the world was exactly as it appeared. That girl—brave, broken, beautiful—wrote with a heart full of questions she wasn’t allowed to ask and pain she wasn’t permitted to feel.
I stopped writing on June 29, 2014. Not because I ran out of words, but because I had run out of ways to make sense of a God I thought had abandoned me and a faith that felt more like prison than freedom.
Ten years of silence followed. Ten years of becoming. Ten years of learning that sometimes the most sacred thing you can do is walk away from what everyone else calls holy, so you can find what actually is.
I’ve found my way back to Jesus—the real one, who never asked me to shrink so others could feel comfortable.
What Steadfast Sanity Means
Steadfast because some truths are worth holding onto, even when everyone around you is letting go. Even when holding on feels like drowning. Even when the cost of truth is distance from everything familiar.
Sanity because in a world that calls your deepest wisdom crazy, that labels your healthiest boundaries selfish, that mistakes your real self for rebellion—sometimes the most radical thing you can do is trust your own mind. Your own heart. Your relationship with the Divine.
This isn’t a blog about having all the answers. It’s about having the courage to ask better questions.
What You’ll Find Here
I have a complicated relationship with writing. I love it. I hate it. I need it like oxygen and fear it like fire. But when I write, the masks fall away. What remains is raw truth wrapped in words that sometimes cut and sometimes heal—often both at once.
If you’ve ever received a physical letter from me… well, that probably wasn’t a good thing. Or maybe it was the best thing. Either way, it was deeply personal—the kind of personal I’m still learning to fully understand myself.
This space is an excavation site. You’ll find stories from my missionary days, raw diary entries from that eighteen-year-old girl who was drowning in questions, and reflections on what it means to live honestly in a world that often rewards pretense. I write about faith, marriage, boundaries, and the daily choice to show up as yourself when it would be easier not to.
Some stories take a decade to tell correctly. Some truths require the perspective that only comes from distance and healing.
Who This Is For
This space is for the square pegs. For the ones who’ve been told their questions are dangerous and their needs are too much. For anyone who’s ever felt like the problem in rooms full of people claiming to love like Jesus while acting nothing like Him.
You’ll find something here if you’re:
- Tired of performing faith instead of living it
- Learning to trust that still, small voice that sounds nothing like the crowd
- Figuring out that your complexity isn’t a flaw—it’s the point
My Promise to You
I write not as someone who has it all figured out, but as someone who has learned that becoming who you were made to be is its own kind of holy—especially when that person doesn’t fit anyone else’s definition.
This isn’t written in bitterness. It’s written in hope that someone else who feels like the odd one out might read this and understand: the problem might not be you.
You’re not broken. You’re not too much. You’re not the problem.
Welcome to Steadfast Sanity. Welcome home.
With love and hard-won wisdom,
Rachael
Steadfast Sanity 