Purpose Whispers Loudest When Obstacles Shout | Ep 391

Purpose Whispers Loudest When Obstacles Shout | Ep 391

What keeps you moving when everything says quit? We open up about the grind behind Voices for Voices: the tough stories, the lost studio, the doubts that show up at 2 a.m., and the stubborn belief that one listener’s breakthrough is worth every hurdle. This isn’t a victory lap; it’s a field report from a team that chose calling over comfort and service over metrics.

We talk candidly about stigma and the price of candor. When a platform gets pulled for addressing mental health head-on, you learn whether you’re here for applause or impact. We chose impact. That decision reshaped how we think about growth, reach, and success. Surpassing 390 episodes matters not because of vanity, but because consistency itself is care; people share when they trust you will be here tomorrow. Along the way, we unpack boundaries—why changing the channel is a mental health tool, and how to stop donating your attention to arguments that drain your purpose.

Faith shows up as quiet guidance rather than a prerequisite. Whether you pray or not, you know those nudges that say “stay.” We read small signs: doors that close, doors that open, and the unexpected resilience that shows up when you keep showing up. Guests remain the heartbeat—diverse voices that mirror listeners’ pain and progress—reminding us how one story can pull someone back from the edge. If the work helps one person find enough courage to try again, that’s the metric we care about.

If this resonates, subscribe, share with a friend who needs a lift, and leave a quick review to help more people find the show. Want to fuel the mission? Donations are 100% tax deductible at lovevoices.org. Either way, thanks for being here—and for being a voice for yourself and someone in need.

Chapter Markers

0:02 Welcome And Global Reach

1:53 Why Hard Stories Matter

4:18 Barriers, Doubt, And Stigma

7:20 Faith, Purpose, And Small Signs

11:20 Critics, Energy, And Choosing Not To Engage

15:25 Persistence After Losing The Studio

19:10 Surpassing 300 And Aiming Higher

22:20 Helping One Person Makes It Worth It

26:00 Free Will, Boundaries, And Respect

29:30 Calling Over Comfort

32:20 Gratitude And Ways To Support

41:40 Closing Message Of Hope

#PurposeDriven #OvercomingObstacles #MotivationMonday #FindYourWhy #ResilienceInLife #PersonalGrowthJourney #MindsetMatters #ChasingDreams #InnerStrength #LiveWithPurpose #SuccessMindset #EmbraceChallenges #InspirationDaily #TransformYourLife #BreakThroughBarriers #justiceforsurvivors #VoicesforVoices #VoicesforVoicesPodcast #JustinAlanHayes #JustinHayes #help3billion #TikTok #Instagram #truth #Jesusaire #VoiceForChange #HealingTogether #VoicesForVoices391

Chapters

• 0:02 Welcome And Global Reach
• 1:53 Why Hard Stories Matter
• 4:18 Barriers, Doubt, And Stigma
• 7:20 Faith, Purpose, And Small Signs
• 11:20 Critics, Energy, And Choosing Not To Engage
• 15:25 Persistence After Losing The Studio
• 19:10 Surpassing 300 And Aiming Higher
• 22:20 Helping One Person Makes It Worth It
• 26:00 Free Will, Boundaries, And Respect
• 29:30 Calling Over Comfort
• 32:20 Gratitude And Ways To Support
• 41:40 Closing Message Of Hope

Transcript

Justin Alan Hayes, Voices for Voices: 0:02

Hey everyone, it's Justin here, Voices for Voices. Thank you so much for joining us today on this episode of the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast. As always, we're grateful to have you with us wherever you are across the big expanse of this planet Earth. Right now, Lily again are grateful to be theming this show all across the world, over a hundred countries, a thousand cities, including Antarctica, Greenland, and all points in between. It's really a humbling feeling, and we don't um we don't take this for granted what we have here, and we're just honored to have you spend even a few seconds with us. We do have an expansive catalog of uh of guests and topics. We're over uh over 390 episodes, I believe, uh, in our catalog. We've been dropping, well, we had a couple days where we were just heavy, very intensive filming. Uh, and then we had that followed up by a couple days of intensive editing and uh getting the shows ready for you. Uh, and and so we uh try to manage our time as best as possible. We try to get the best guess that we can for you, for us as human beings, to be able to hear and listen and watch a story unfold. And it's uh it's really it's hard to put it into words, uh, because a lot of these stories that we're we're unearthing are are very tough to to hear. But I think there's the but uh but there really is no but they're just tough to hear. These are human beings that have gone through some of the hardest times any individual can imagine, and when we bring those guests to you, we do it for a couple of reasons. One is to allow those individuals to share their voice, right? Voices for voices, uh, whether it's their voice or somebody that that they know's voice. I got a little tickle on my nose here. So uh and then for the at least one individual who's watching and listening over the course of time, they may relate to what the what the guests are sharing and talking about and may help them change their perspective to think, okay, I can get through this. I can I can just keep trying. That's what we've done here at the show and the organization. We just keep trying. We have roadblocks, not roadblocks, we have we have all kinds of barriers. Seems like every every day there's a new barrier that comes up that tries to get in the middle of our show, helping people, and not gonna lie, it's hard. Very hard, it's hard to continue thinking we are making a difference when we are, but maybe you've felt uh a time or two or more where it seems no matter what you do, how you do it, how many times you do it, how many ways you do it, you check all the boxes, and it doesn't seem like it's enough. And so that happens to us, too. And so we want to share that you're not alone, you know. Stigma city is always gonna be there. We can try our best for ourselves and yourself and others, and we're still gonna try to smash that stigma of mental illness that's tied to mental health. That's not gonna isn't gonna stop us. So we're gonna continue on. We're gonna continue to go through whatever obstacles, whatever hurdles that we need to go through. We know not everybody is gonna be on board. I'm gonna say it's a waste of time. Why are you doing this? Find something better to do. And so we know we're gonna have that. We just it's just gonna be part of life. For whatever reason. Not even gonna get into hypotheticals of why we can only do the best that we can do. What we feel that we're called to do. Like, why are each one of us on earth right this moment? Why? For a lot of us, we're we're not gonna know exactly why. Because in our world with God and Jesus Christ, we're just not gonna know. So we have to pick up on clues. And that's what we've been doing. So as we whether you believe in God, whether you don't, whether you pray, whether you don't, it doesn't matter. We're all given clues of some sort. Some are easier to see and hear than others. Some of them are. And there's others that it's like, well, when am I gonna find this out? When I'm when am I gonna be told what I'm supposed to be doing, what I'm really supposed to be doing on earth. And that's where I keep coming back. I'm no savior. I'm not perfect. None of us are. And share those. And so that's what we do. And this is one of these episodes where it's just kind of just speaking from the heart. And there are so many days that are so hard. I mean so hard to question. Well, maybe I need to do a whole 180 and go in the opposite direction that I was going. But I can't let I can't let people down. Even if it's just one person that we've helped. I can't I can't just stop and turn away and and turn. So yeah, some people say, Oh, you love getting in front of the camera, and you love this aspect of it. But we have a lot of lot of individuals who listen. So they don't see me on camera. So what about those people? Oh that we're not talking about those, we're talking about you know, people to watch. Okay. I see we keep coming up with these excuses until we totally defeat a person. And the questioning again, like I mentioned, what am I doing? Is this what I'm meant to do? Is this not? Yeah, it's really incredible to hear and listen to humans. We're all different, all different walks of life, we're all unique. Some ways we're similar. It's amazing how many people will offer their two cents. And that's okay. We're allowed to do that. We don't discourage that when it keeps coming, it's like, well, ah, you know, maybe you should go and do this other thing because well where's the money? Where's this or that? I say, well, where's the passion? Passion's right here. And so we we can't we can't get in. You know, it's it's a little bit like I'm not one to preach. Kind of like, you know, the devil, the demonic trying to pull us away from this ministry that we have. And it's my family's priest who started calling voices for voices of ministry, and I hadn't even thought about it that way. We're ministering to people. So this is a way I can minister to you by sharing some things, some stuff. Friend Mark McAdams, Life Warrior United. We're all going through, we've all gone through stuff. And we gotta we gotta just keep coming through each minute, each hour. Each day. And so listening to opinions, okay. We do that. But I'm not gonna be here telling somebody else when they're in something for passion and something they fully believe in. Oh, you need to this just a hobby. You know, this thing right here, this is just a hobby. To come in and say or do that, to tell somebody, or to not let or not even listen to them, ask a question, and then get half a sentence in, and then say, I don't I don't I don't get it, I don't understand. It says what we're talking about. Well, you asked me a question, so I'm gonna answer it. If you don't want me to answer it, don't ask me the question. So I get it. I mean, I'm a human being. There's times where I get jealous and envious of people. I think we all do at different times. We try not to, we try not to judge, try not to say, oh, look at that person, look what they're doing, and let's go, let's go have these uh you know, gossip conversations or now gossip texts or gossip emails or messenger exchanges. I used to be one of those people. I used to be one of those people to judge my way or the highway. What's going on right now may seem like it's my way or the highway, but it it's in fact the very opposite. See, it's up to you whether you want to believe in God or your God higher power. That's your choice. But don't come and telling me when I'm being given signals that this is where I'm supposed to be. This is supposed to be where what I'm supposed to be doing. Don't come and tell me that you know best. Because I'm not going to come and tell you. You hear me talk on every show, and for a last big while, we talk about how we're praying for everybody, whether they are friends, followers, listeners, subscribers, donors, or whether they're enemies of ours. Because we're all human beings. And so I do every night. That's one of the prayers. Pray for myself and the whole world. Might sound simplistic, but I don't say I pray for me and only these other people. I don't do that. Pray for the whole world. That includes enemies. People don't like me, people don't like what we're doing, don't like stories we've done, don't like people shedding light where there's darkness. So I'll say it again. And this irks people, I don't know why. Number one, you can change a channel. You don't even have to listen to me. You don't you don't have to watch us. You don't. So if you're watching and listening, and this stuff does get under your skin for whatever reason, I don't know how it would or why. And you don't want to change a channel, you just want to listen and then nasty comments in, especially when we're doing a TikTok live. I'm not gonna sit around and watch or listen to somebody if I don't if I don't agree with it, I just turn it off. I change a channel, change a song, change a movie, whatever, whatever the thing is that I'm doing, if it bothers me that much, I just stop it. Because why would I waste my my precious energy? Just like why would you waste your precious energy in the short amount of time we have all have on earth doing something, listening to something that we don't agree with, or whatever the reason is. It's taken me a good long while to figure that out, but I've figured it out. You can turn the channel just like I can. You can just turn the off switch, you can just close down whatever app you're watching and listening to us on. So this is episode four all the people out in the world again. Whether you like us, love us, hate us, or our enemy. This is the message. It's you feel the calling, and you either pray or do your thing, how you come in tune with yourself. And if this is something that keeps coming back and keeps coming back. Like the studio and the program and those things. They continue to work. That's a small sign. So you get these little small signs. Some of you may or may not know. We're at the end of well, you may know where we're at in the calendar. So we're we're getting close to the end of calendar year 2025. We've gone through some real really hard things. I've gone through a lot of hard things in my life as well as I'm sure you've gone through a lot of a lot of hard things in your your life. I'm not here downplaying anybody saying that I'm the only person or our organization is the only organization. I'm not saying that. I'm just sharing examples. So this year we've had something that we had for over a year. Going on two years. The table, that's a shot from TV studio. And because we talk about real real issues, real real things. That that whole studio thing was just ripped away from us as an organization. Just yanked. That's okay. Continue going. Say that Miley Sarah song, We Can't Stop, We Won't Stop. I don't believe in every everything that she does, and I'm just giving a little bit of uh a visual symbolism. The voices for voices can't stop. And we won't stop. In fact, bull in the studio, among some other things. Some are public, some aren't. Doesn't really matter. But that's when you really find out is this what we're here for? Give you an example. We had a goal of hitting a total of 300 episodes total by the end of calendar year 2025. Well, as you're watching or listening to this show, this episode, and you look at that number, or you hear that number, or someone does sign language with that number, if they're signing the show, that number is way, way, way, way over the number 300. In fact, we're way, way, way, way, way, way closer to episode 400. So it might not seem like a big thing to you, and that's okay. But after some of the things, again, that I mentioned, one of the things is a studio just yanked, talking about too many, you know, hot topics, and you know, we shouldn't be doing that, and whatever other reasons. So that being one reason, and and the others that could have stopped us. That could have said, you know what, yep. Yep, we're done. We're gonna call it quits. That's the easy thing to do. That is the absolute easy thing to do. Is to follow the herd of sheep. Oh, this must just be the way things go. But not for me. Not for voices for voices. We do this for you. Because I could have I I could have stopped at show one and been like, alright, feel much, you know, I feel good. I feel I was able to get some things off my chest and uh share and I can help some people. But I I wouldn't be here and we wouldn't be here. Even fewer get to episode 200, even fewer get to episode 300, and you're damn right, even fewer get to episode 400. And guess what? This little itty bitty organization that nobody watches, nobody listens to is gonna hit and surpass episode 400. So we're gonna be at least a hundred episodes over top of what our goal was at the beginning of the year. We were only gonna hit, we were aiming for 300. And so I wouldn't be sitting here episode 300, 391, whichever episode. Because we we schedule things in a certain manner. We wouldn't do it. The easy thing was just like I said, would have been just a stop. Pack it in. Just a hobby. Doesn't matter. Everybody looks at the analytics and says, Oh, you're not reaching anybody, you're not okay. I'm gonna bring up this song one more time. I'm not endorsing the artists, I'm just merely using it for another symbolism example. So yeah, why does Voices for Voices continue? Why does the show continue? Why do we do TikTok lives? Why do we have books? Why are we continuing to have even more media options that are coming in 2026? Heard the song probably tens of times over my life. Eminem and Rihanna songs called Monsters. And again, I'm not endorsing either one of these artists or their behaviors or anything, purely talking about the words to the song, and only a certain subsection of words. And that is when Em says talks about if he can help his work, his work, his music, if they can be relatable to one out of 100 million kids. And over the course of your lifetime and beyond, and you know, you you have these huge lofty goals, and that but what I always do is bring it down to one that one person, that one individual, that one human being. It was able to step off of that ledge, that proverbial ledge. Picked up a basketball, picked up, you name it, and they're now just a teeny bit more confident in themselves, and so it's for that one person. Yes, we have big goals, and yes, we're gonna continue going after them. That's that's the truth. We're not gonna stop. We can't stop, we won't stop. We're gonna continue sharing, we're gonna continue bringing guests on. Some are gonna talk about controversial topics, some aren't. But for that one person, over 390 episodes. At least that one person that we were able to help, and not even just me. I'm talking about our guests. Because people relate usually to the guests more than the host, and that's fine. That's fine with me. I I don't care how they relate, I don't care how you relate. It's just I just care that you relate at some level. Not gonna relate on every single episode in our portfolio, and I get that. That's why we offer variety, and so for that one person that Eminem talks about if he can help one person over a hundred million kids, then that's it's worth it. That's one less person that has to go through as much suffering as they've had to go through. And even if it's only a little bit of less suffering, then that's a little bit more that that individual can use to do something that they want to do. Help give them the confidence, whatever that thing is. We all have things that we we like to do, and so that's why we're in the spot we're in. That's why the haters are there, they're always gonna be there, no matter what. Doesn't matter how popular somebody or their show or anything is, there's always gonna be somebody that doesn't like it. That's just the way life is. We're given the free will to like and not like, and we just like to say, if you don't agree, then just kindly turn to channel. If you if you don't agree with a guest or a topic we're talking about. And then the same on the other side. Every tool to be able to do so. And any and every platform that they're able to every year we're all presented with different challenges, different obstacles. You have to be the one to decide what what you'd like to do. You have to be that person. You can be given information, you can ask for feedback. At the end of the day, we either do something or we don't. And that ultimately comes down to us. Life would be so much easier if I just didn't do the show, didn't have the organization. It would just be so much easier because then that'd be I wouldn't have to do this. But that's not what I'm called to do right now. I don't always have the best words. Might sound like I'm mumbling or stuttering, and that's fine. That's just who I am. And for right now, this is what I'm what I'm meant to do. So we love again, we love every single one of you that's watching, listening, loves us, hates us, is our enemy, uh, is a subscriber, a follower, someone who gives us the big thumbs up and likes and shares and shares and shares and shares and shares. The voices for voices TV show and podcast. And does the same with the voices for voices, TikTok lives and IG lives and FB lives when we do when we decide to do those. If you're able to contribute, we do accept donations because we are a five oh one C3 501c3. Profit charity. So all donations 100% tax deductible. You can go to lovevoices.org. Lovevoices.org. That is lovevoices.org, which is spelled out L-O-V-E V-O-I-C-E-S.org. There's not an amount small or large that does not make a difference. And the same thing with the easy things, sharing and liking and subscribing. All those things are free, don't cost anything. And I would just take a gander to say you probably subscribe to one or many different shows. And so we just ask that if it moves you, if you can add voices for voices to your inner circle. Thank you very much. We have nothing but love for each and every one of you. We wish nothing but the best, the most prosperous life, whatever that means to you. And until next time, please be a voice for you or somebody in need. We'll see you next time, everybody.