Introducing Sara Urquhart and the Altitude Summit

Part 1 of 2 · Ep. 682

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It is December 9, 2016. We're here in Salt Lake City. Very excited to be here. And we are here to interview someone who I think is really fascinating. And this is going to be a really important interview. Her name is Sarah Urquhart. Sarah Stanley Urquhart.

Sara Urquhart [00:00:21] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:00:22] We interviewed her husband Steve yesterday just to talk a little bit about that. Steve worked in the Utah state legislature for 16 years, eight years in the House, eight years in the Senate. And Steve talked a lot in his episode about what it's like to work in the Utah legislature. He talked about the different causes that he worked to advance. And then perhaps most interestingly, Steve talked about the LDS Church's influence in Utah politics and in the legislative process. So it was super fascinating, really enjoyed it. And Steve talked a little bit about sort of his faith transition out of the LDS Church. Now, having said that, I got to know Sarah talking to Steve and found out that Sarah in her own right is fascinating.

John Dehlin [00:01:17] So Sarah is the founder of something called the Altitude Summit or Alts Summit, and that is Sarah, why don't you tell us just a bit about what that is?

Sara Urquhart [00:01:27] Sure. AltSummit is the premier conference for social media influencers in the design space. So people who we could see about 10 years ago that people were, they were kind of, they were bloggers at the time and they were starting to work with sponsors. It was starting to become less a hobby and more a job. And so we opened a conference that brought all of those people from across the country and even around the world together to meet about, to talk about what was working, what wasn't, what's coming up, what's new in the space. And it's been a fun ride.

John Dehlin [00:02:04] And some of the big name bloggers that have participated just kind of rattle them off.

Sara Urquhart [00:02:10] We've had a number. Anybody big in the space has come to ALD had Deuce, who's local. We've had apartment therapy design sponge Susan Peterson, who's also local. She's kind of shot up. The Martha Stewart is not a blogger per se, but she's been a part of ALT for a number of events. And yeah, just anybody in the space that's big and awesome. They've been a part of Alt and we've loved it.

John Dehlin [00:02:45] And you have a few sisters who blog as well, right? What are those blogs?

Sara Urquhart [00:02:49] I have three sisters. Jordan Fernie runs oh Happy Day. It's a party blog and I say it, it's awesome. And so, you know, don't dismiss it because I call it a party blog. It's awesome then. And she's doing great things. Oh, say yes. Is a sister in law. She's married to my brother. And that's Liz Stanley. Liz Rick Stanley and Gabrielle Blair is design mom. And they're all doing great things.

John Dehlin [00:03:28] And so that in and of itself, sort of the blogging world and what that is and what it means to people all over the world, I think that's an interesting topic. But in addition, I think it's fascinating that Sarah started this company when Steve went to work for the Utah State Legislature as a mother of four. And so that in and of itself is also fascinating. How do you start sort of a premier company as a stay at home mom with four children?

John Dehlin [00:04:01] And that's particularly relevant, I think, to our Mormon transitions audience because there's so many people who go through a Mormon transition and I would say, especially women, that when they get through it, they're like, man, I would have made a lot of different decisions. Do I want to work? Do I want to develop myself? How would I do that? And they have children and so they're a mom. And so I think that's a really important topic to cover. And then finally, you know, Steve and Sarah's faith transition happened, you know, within the LG Church throughout all this as well. So I think that's also just a fascinating layer to talk about.

Growing Up in the Church and Family Background

John Dehlin [00:04:34] So without any further ado, Sarah, why don't you just tell us a little bit about your upbringing in the church and we'll go from there.

Sara Urquhart [00:04:40] Great. I grew up in St. George, Utah. I was the third of eight children. My father was a convert to the church. He joined the church in college and he ended up at byu. My mother comes from pioneer stock and she also ended up at byu. And of course that's where they met and had this big family. My father was a schoolteacher with these eight kids. And so we didn't have a lot of money growing up in St. George, but we, you know, and we did the Mormon program. We Tuesday night was young women's and nothing could conflict with that, of course. Church every single Sunday, no exceptions, Family home evening once a week, Monday nights, family prayer every day, morning and night, Scripture study every morning. I mean, we did it all.

John Dehlin [00:05:43] Ann, talk a bit about, you know, did your mother work in addition to your dad and did that have an influence on you as a kid growing up?

Sara Urquhart [00:05:50] Sure. My mom did work a little. I think that started out, it had more to do with the fact that they had eight kids and a teacher's salary. But she worked at a local restaurant for some friends, and while she did that, she got a master's degree and ended up being an adjunct faculty member at Dixie College for a number of years. Started the adjunct program there.

John Dehlin [00:06:17] Excellent. And do you remember sort of that being interesting, hard, valuable? Was it even an issue? Was it just what you. What you experienced as a kid?

Sara Urquhart [00:06:26] So, yeah, it was just. It was just what it was. It was just normal, wasn't it?

John Dehlin [00:06:32] Benson making a bunch of noise about women not working outside the home.

Sara Urquhart [00:06:34] Yeah, I think it was hard. I think it was hard for my mom to be outside of the home. And it was hard for me, and not terribly hard. It was an inconvenience for a teenager because I was then responsible. I. I was one of the older kids, so I was responsible for dinner or cleaning up or getting kids to bed when she was gone. So I didn't like that infringing on my time.

John Dehlin [00:07:02] But

Sara Urquhart [00:07:05] I think I never saw it so much as horribly difficult. And it might have been for my mom. I actually have never asked her that. I don't know that. But I will also say my father was one to never. I mean, he had four girls and four boys, and there was never a lot of sexism from his part. He, you know, if I was the best one, if I was strong and capable, and he would grab me just as quickly as he'd grab one of my brothers. And, you know, there was never a because you're a girl kind of statement. He just. He expected us all to do good, smart, capable things.

John Dehlin [00:07:49] Got it.

Sara Urquhart [00:07:49] So that was good.

Meeting Steve, BYU, and Early Married Life

John Dehlin [00:07:50] Okay, so you went to byu. You met Steve. What happened from there?

Sara Urquhart [00:07:54] Yeah, after high school, I headed to byu. I had four years there. I was a political science major, graduated.

John Dehlin [00:08:00] What was your intent when you got that major?

Sara Urquhart [00:08:02] Well, I remember hearing, if you want to do grad school, political sciences, they is the. Is a good major to get because it was, you know, a lot of kids went on to law school. I thought I might do that, but I actually loved political science and I just knew it was a good step for me and thought something will come of it. I didn't immediately go to grad school. That came later in my later years. But, yeah, I love my political science degree in those years. I married Steve actually, at the end of my sophomore year. So I was young when I did that.

John Dehlin [00:08:45] Steve was in law school, right?

Sara Urquhart [00:08:46] He was in law school. He had.

John Dehlin [00:08:48] Yeah, he's a Cradle robber.

Sara Urquhart [00:08:50] He was, he was, but because we have a five year difference. But you know, that mattered then. But he. So we got married, we had the. And we both graduated at the same time. He from law school, me with my undergrad degree and we had some years in California and Seattle and then when we were ready to start our family, we moved back to Utah and we've actually been in St. George for 20 some odd years since our move back.

John Dehlin [00:09:22] Okay, so I get the sense that Steve worked as a lawyer in St. George for several years until he decided to join the Utah State legislature.

Sara Urquhart [00:09:34] Well, let me clarify. Sorry. He still, still was a lawyer but he had a lot less time to do law work. So he still had a few clients and he did, he brought in some money. But we took a financial hit as a family when he started the legislature.

John Dehlin [00:09:51] So let's start with that discussion. So how exactly does that work where he basically says, I think he said he made $2,000 each year in the state legislature.

Sara Urquhart [00:10:03] No, no, closer to 10, 10,000 something even.

John Dehlin [00:10:06] So yeah, you know, he goes from, he goes from a lawyer salary to making kind of $10,000 a year. He said it's almost a full time job. He comes to you and says I want to do this, my income is going to drop significantly. Like how does that work?

Sara Urquhart [00:10:20] Well, he didn't say those things. I don't think we knew that was going to happen. And there are a lot of legislators who, and remember these are local, these are your local Utah legislators. So they're not the ones that are going to D.C. they're the ones that are staying here at the Utah State Capitol. And then for anyone outside of Utah, your, your, your local state capitals, he, it was, it's supposed to be a part time gig. You're supposed to be able to have a job outside of it.

Sara Urquhart [00:10:48] I see plenty of people that do that. They limit their hours in the legislature and what they can give or they come, you know, it's the end of their career. So they have incomes, they have businesses that continue to pay them.

Sara Urquhart [00:11:01] So I see a lot of people who do it that way. I didn't know how it was going to work for us. So we knew it might do something and we started and he tried to balance it all and that got harder and harder because he really, to do the job really well and to make the meaningful changes he wanted to make, he had to put more time into it. He had to spend, you know, 40 plus hours a week doing legislative work and you don't get paid for those hours. And so, you know, that was just going to come out of our time. So he was trying to do work at night and other things at the same time.

Sara Urquhart [00:11:44] We were having conversations that wasn't working and we talked about him getting out of the politics and I started a business. And after a couple of years, I started out summit.

John Dehlin [00:11:55] Okay, wait, wait just one second. So is it like we're running out of money? Is it like, oh my gosh, you're too busy. This is crazy. Is it like we're not feeding the kids? What's that conversation like of like I'm doing this?

Sara Urquhart [00:12:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:10] What did led up to it?

Sara Urquhart [00:12:11] No, it's. Steve has always been super supportive. I mean, I've always needed to do big things and my version of big things. And so when I could see there was a possibility here and I wanted to try it for a year. So I remember we had to commit to the venue that we would be responsible for the venue and it was going to bankrupt our family if this didn't work. And I remember sitting across the table from him saying, I think it's going to work. We really need to try this. And he, you know, he was. He always knows I'm gonna do good things. So he, you know, we were back and forth and he wasn't against it. I'm trying to say he wasn't doing that. But we were both so nervous and we signed the papers together. We made that commitment and we had to make it work.

How the Blogging Conference Idea Was Born

John Dehlin [00:13:08] So backing up a bit. How did you get into this space? Like, what made you interested in the space at all? How did that occur to you as the business you might start?

Sara Urquhart [00:13:19] Yeah, I'm not. I did not come up with it completely at all. I was, as I mentioned, I had three sisters who were bloggers. And at the time, everyone was a hobby blogger.

John Dehlin [00:13:31] What year? About

Sara Urquhart [00:13:34] 2000, 2010? Nope, even before that. I bet it was 2008. Sorry, I don't have all the numbers in place. And we. I actually went. So I had three sisters who were getting into blogging and they were starting to be approached by companies. So anybody who was in the blogger space, I kind of call them pioneer bloggers. Anybody who was in there at the time, they were starting to get approached by companies. They were having some success. They companies wanted to buy their influence and get a presence on their blogs. And we were at actually a family function. So all the siblings and all the spouses were on a trip together.

Sara Urquhart [00:14:25] Only time we've ever done this. And everybody is super entrepreneurial. In the family. And 100 ideas were shouted out during the week long trip. And as we were headed home, I asked my brother, what do you think is the best idea that you've heard? And he said, this blogging conference sounds like the best to me. And my sisters are the ones. The ones who were in the space said, we need a conference. And I remember at the time thinking, well, I'm never gonna blog. That's just not my personality. I knew I wouldn't be good at it. But I can throw an event. I'm an event planner.

Sara Urquhart [00:14:59] I always have been from high school on. I just. Any kind of event, I'm your gal. So I took it on and I talked with the sisters and figured out what they would need, what they would want. And one of the sisters became a sponsor of the event with her company. And so she played a role from the get go.

Sara Urquhart [00:15:25] And we launched and we had success year one, and that turned into more success year two. And by year three, it was. I was getting an income.

John Dehlin [00:15:36] Now, real quick, were there other blogging events going on that gave you the idea of doing one specifically for design blogs?

Sara Urquhart [00:15:45] Yes, yes, absolutely. Blogher, I think, was the very first one. And that.

John Dehlin [00:15:51] That's just for women bloggers.

Sara Urquhart [00:15:53] It's for women bloggers. And. And it's really not even for people who are necessarily making money in the space and they're focused more on the written word, you know, how to be a better writer.

John Dehlin [00:16:03] And your sisters had attended that.

Sara Urquhart [00:16:04] Yeah. And said, there's no space for us here. This is not our place. We need some accounts. And that's when I said, well, I can help with that.

John Dehlin [00:16:13] Okay. Okay. So I'm imagining you sitting there thinking, okay, I'm going to organize this conference. I got to find a venue. You said, what venue did you choose?

Sara Urquhart [00:16:22] We ended up at the Grand America. We looked in San Francisco, we looked in New York. But this ended up being so easy. And I knew it was. So we were thinking about, can we allure anybody to Salt Lake? Because, you know, we just wanted to bring them here. And somebody came up with the idea to bring them here during Sundance. That Utah's the sexiest place on earth one week out of the year. And we took advantage of that. We did. You know, we drew them here. We even got some tickets to help people if people wanted to get up to Sundance. Not. Not very many did, but they liked the idea that they could be here when Sundance was happening.

John Dehlin [00:17:07] Right. So. So you scheduled during Sundance. And I'm just trying to Picture you, you've got four children, your husband's working crazy hours trying to hold down two jobs, and you decide you're going to start this conference and you decide Utah. And then you got to throw down a deposit at the Grand American. Right, Right. And I'm imagining that was several thousands of dollars.

Sara Urquhart [00:17:30] Yeah, it was a lot. And it was. And so Steve and I had to have a very long conversation about how we were going to do this and could we make this commitment. And. And we decided to take the risk. We've both been risk takers, so that didn't completely surprise me. But if this was not successful, it was going to ruin our family. We'd carry it for years.

John Dehlin [00:17:53] The financial burden, because you had to make that initial outlay.

Sara Urquhart [00:17:57] Not just that, but we knew the big expenses were gonna be a part of this conference. And so we had to, you know, we had to make a decision. Were we in this together?

John Dehlin [00:18:07] So just tell us, this is just interesting to me. Tell us some of the high level big expenses of a conference that require that sort of investment.

Sara Urquhart [00:18:17] It's really the food, catering, solely food. It's, you know, you're gonna spend $50 on a lunch, you know, more than that on a dinner per person. So, you know, you have. And if you're offering that to people as part of their ticket, you have to cover those expenses. And then, of course, any kind of decor, any kind of, you know, we threw a big party one of the. Or both. Both nights. And so, yeah, expenses were rolled into that. And at the time it was brand new, so we really didn't have big sponsors that came later.

John Dehlin [00:18:56] Okay, so.

Sara Urquhart [00:18:58] So

John Dehlin [00:19:00] you make that big initial investment. It's scary. You're worried that you're going to bankrupt the company. And you've got four kids.

Sara Urquhart [00:19:05] Bankrupt the home.

John Dehlin [00:19:07] Right. Bankrupt the home. You've got four kids at home. And how many people ended up coming to that first event?

Sara Urquhart [00:19:14] We had 150 people come to that first event, but 30 days out. So we held it in end of January, end of December, I was up making some final decisions here in Salt Lake. And I had 30 people signed up for the event. And we needed more than 30. It was 30 who scared us all. But I sat. In fact, one of the people who was helping, he said, we gotta cancel. And I said, we can't cancel. We have made this investment. We have to do it. And so we did. We rallied in those 30 days. We, we did some awesome things to get those 150 people to attend some of that My sister did.

Sara Urquhart [00:19:58] She was a sponsor of the event and she got some of the big names to come out and keynote. But I could still see there was going to be a shortfall. So what Steve and I came up with, this was kind of fun because we're both problem solvers and this was a big problem. We knew we needed more money and to help. Help just cover the expenses. And so we ended up. We knew what we had. We had some of the best and brightest people in the social media space coming to Utah. They were on the front edge and we knew we had a venue.

Sara Urquhart [00:20:34] We knew we had. And then we knew we had some good political connections. We knew we had legislators who wanted to learn about this and other places, other elected officials, mayors. And when you're in the social media space, as an elected official, you might want to temper things, I say that with our new president elect, but most elected officials want to temper their participation on social media and they were scared to step into it. So we ended up throwing together within those 30 days a quick conference where I had these best and brightest from around the world coming and talking to elected officials, and we made it free for them to come.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:21] And we were able to get some sponsors to sponsor that political event. And those costs helped offset the costs of the other event because it was a shared venue, shared speakers, all of those things. So it ended up being a pretty neutral year financially. I think we had a little bit in the bank at the end of it all.

John Dehlin [00:21:43] So at the end of that big conference, you barely broke even.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:47] And usually with conferences, you lose money. You lose money big. First year, second year, you end up paying off year one, and then by the third year, you're making money. So we were on that path, except we were a little bit ahead because we at least were even.

John Dehlin [00:22:02] And so was this generally an annual conference just one time a year.

Sara Urquhart [00:22:07] We've had it one time a year. So it's about to be the eighth or, sorry, the ninth year in 2017. But no, we've had a handful of events in the summer in San Francisco. We ended up doing a couple in New York. Those were done. Those. We were invited to use the Martha Stewart headquarters for those events. So that was fun. We were right in her space and she came to speak at those. And we did some summer events at the Grand America. So we, you know, continued to bring people to Utah again. Martha came to one of those and keynoted. So we've had. We did that a number of years.

Sara Urquhart [00:22:50] It's backed to once a year and It's. And actually, we haven't said this yet, but I sold my company. I sold my company to a sister who became a partner, and she's running it now. So the next event is in January 2017, and I'm gonna be in Amsterdam.

John Dehlin [00:23:15] So jumping back, that's the end of the story.

Sara Urquhart [00:23:19] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:23:21] So when you're. So had you ever run an event before? And how did you learn how to run events? That seems intimidating if you had never run an event business before.

Sara Urquhart [00:23:33] You're right. And I probably should have been intimidated, but I wasn't. I have always been the one to run things. Like I mentioned earlier in high school, when, you know, our. We did these annual plays and I was never the elected person, but I was always a major part of that team.

Sara Urquhart [00:23:55] And I just. I always. If there was a dance to be put on, I did the logistics. My mind just always works that way. For years, I ran nonprofit organizations. When you go to St. George, you see all the statues downtown. That was my project.

Sara Urquhart [00:24:17] I co founded that with LD and True Blood. And it's a continued project that's been going on probably 10 years after I left the nonprofit, but it's a project I started, so I've always done that. At the same time I was starting Alts Summit, I actually was hired by Senator Bennett.

Sara Urquhart [00:24:37] Bob Bennett was running for re election, and I did all the events for. For his campaign. So it's not. Yeah, I never had my own company, but I always did events. And for sure, I went every event in church, every event activities committee to get back to that, I was always running those.

Launching the Business as a Stay-at-Home Mom

John Dehlin [00:24:55] Okay, so a couple things, like, number one, I can imagine a lot of people or, you know, women or mothers who are like, oh, my gosh, this is so overwhelming. How could I start a company? How could I jump into this business that I know nothing about? It sounds like what you're saying is that was just your personality. And so maybe you don't have anything to offer someone who might be sitting in their chair terrified about starting their own company.

Sara Urquhart [00:25:23] No, it's so I can hear the things that are common for other people if they want. I did something I was always good at, something that was just familiar to me. I did something I knew I was an expert at.

John Dehlin [00:25:40] You weren't an expert.

Sara Urquhart [00:25:42] Well, I was never paid for my work, but it didn't mean I wasn't an expert. I knew and I knew I could see I was better at this than most people.

John Dehlin [00:25:58] But you had never run a big conference before?

Sara Urquhart [00:26:00] No. You're Right. But I'd run big events.

John Dehlin [00:26:02] Okay, okay.

Sara Urquhart [00:26:04] You know, I did it volunteering because it's no different whether you're doing the word Christmas party, the PTA carnival, the Senator Bennett's, you know, fundraiser, or my conference, the logistics, you're going to ask the same kind of questions. The answers are different, but you're going to ask the same kind of questions. I'm good at that. I do that naturally, that part. So everybody does something really well. So are you doing it for free? Can you get paid for it?

Sara Urquhart [00:26:47] That's what I was asking. And the answer was I didn't know when I started if I could get paid for it. And remember, it wasn't until year three that I really started to get an income from this company I'd started. And it went from being part time to very full time by about year three.

Sara Urquhart [00:27:05] But I could risk it. Steve and I were willing to do that. We were willing to try to do it for a couple of years to see if we couldn't make a go of it, and we were successful.

John Dehlin [00:27:17] Okay, so do something you love. It helps to have a partner who's in it with you and willing to take a risk to kind of make it work.

Sara Urquhart [00:27:26] And the last thing is you have to work harder than you've ever worked. I mean, when I'm a volunteer, I always like that because I could leave if my kids needed me if something happened. But when you're being paid, I was working more hours than I've ever worked in my life. Now I'm a hard worker. I work hard, I work efficiently, I work. But I still worked harder in those years that I owned this company.

John Dehlin [00:27:49] Okay, so now let's switch to the, to the motherhood side. You not only are trying to keep a marriage healthy and alive, take care of yourself and your own personal well being, raise four little children, serve in all your callings in the church, but you're also running a company. Like, how do you, how do you juggle taking care of yourself, your spouse and your children with running a company?

Sara Urquhart [00:28:20] Okay. So I will say, because since it's more of my stories, the transition out of the church was happening in these same years. I think if I. And as I was starting out part time, I still did have the calling. So I think my last calling was primary president. And so it's not like I was doing little things. I was doing some significant things. But when I transitioned out and my transition was pretty fast.

John Dehlin [00:28:46] Oh, let's not go there yet.

Sara Urquhart [00:28:47] We won't go there yet. But I will say it gave me lots of time.

John Dehlin [00:28:52] Okay.

Sara Urquhart [00:28:53] So I had time to give to myself and to my family that in the past I was giving to them.

John Dehlin [00:28:59] Do you remember what your transition was about?

Sara Urquhart [00:29:03] I think, think it's been about. Yeah, I think it's been five, five to six years. So.

John Dehlin [00:29:09] Okay, but. So you did a good four years.

Sara Urquhart [00:29:11] I did a. Yeah, I did a few years, but that's what I'm saying, right. As that transition of, of all becoming full time, I was transitioning out and I finally had some full time to give it.

John Dehlin [00:29:24] Okay, but, but, but even so, those

Sara Urquhart [00:29:26] first three or four years, I was balancing. Yes.

John Dehlin [00:29:29] How do you do that?

Sara Urquhart [00:29:30] Okay, so this is my do not neglect your kids work life balance. People say this is real and this is how I have done it, how I've chosen to do it. Other people find other ways. My feeling is you can be good at everything, but not on the same day and not at exactly the same time.

Sara Urquhart [00:29:53] My husband goes to visit his mother, Texas, about three or four times a year. And that week he is the perfect son. He's not a very good father because he's not at home. He's not a very good husband because he's not home. But during that week, he is a perfect son. As long as he can do that enough that he feels good about being a son. Check that one off. Same with parenting. You don't have to be a perfect parent every single day and give your kids, I mean, depending on their ages, but your teenager, all the love they need every single day. That's smothering or what you think they need because they.

Sara Urquhart [00:30:31] That's smothering. But if you can give them, if you can give, if you're a good parent, they know they can come to you when they need you and you know, you expect things of them, then you're a good parent. Same with the job. You have to, you know, the week I do Alt Summit and actually the weeks leading up to it, I hardly cook a meal. I certainly don't clean the house. But do I think I'm a good housekeeper? Do I think, you know, do I maintain a good house? Do I, am I a good cook? Yes. Those things don't go away just because I'm choosing to do Alt summit, I'm choosing to do something else.

Sara Urquhart [00:31:09] And that fills my time. And so my kids know that time right before the event, the time right after, I'm intense doing the event. Other than that, I can keep it within hours. You know, all of that works out and I've been able to keep a very healthy balance in my head, which is what allows me to keep a healthy balance in my life.

John Dehlin [00:31:27] And I'm just imagining kind of a hyper conscious mom that feels like she has to be there for her kids every hour of the day, all day long, every day of the week. I'm guessing that there might be benefits to maybe being that type of mom or parent at some point, but then also not being there for your kids. What. How might that be beneficial to your kids to have you? Sort of sometimes early on, but sometimes not. Maybe that's an obvious question.

Sara Urquhart [00:31:54] Well, yeah. And first of all, I was lucky because I was. I own my own business, I was working from home. So it really was there in the transition times when they'd come home from school, I was there when, you know, when they were at school. But we got to a point where I really was working. I had business calls, I had things that I was doing. So if they left something at home, I couldn't. We had to set a limit. I will bring you five things throughout the year. Otherwise you have to remember I can't come every day and bring you a lunch. You know, we had to come up with some things and most of the.

Sara Urquhart [00:32:31] My kids were very. I raised them to be very independent. Even when I was the at home mom. That was one of my. I felt like my job was to teach them to live without me. That's what a good mother does.

John Dehlin [00:32:46] Do you have any examples of that?

Sara Urquhart [00:32:49] Yeah, people pointed this out to me. I didn't even realize I was doing this. When my kids were very young, very young. And I'm an at home moment, I had things. Low cereal crackers, things that they could access because I wanted them to be able to access it.

John Dehlin [00:33:09] Make your own food, make their own breakfast.

Sara Urquhart [00:33:10] Yeah, yeah. There were things that they were responsible for doing. I don't think, I mean, I don't think I ever made a lunch for my kids ever. If they're five, they can make a sandwich and put in an apple. And it was my job to have the supplies and it was my job to teach them, but it wasn't my job to do what they could do. And so that was the kind of thing. Here's another thing. My sister in law laughs at me. I wouldn't go to parks that had swings because my kids just wanted me to swing them the whole time. But I was at the park so they could run around and get tired. So I know all the parks in town that didn't have Swings, that's where we'd. So that they could be their own, they could entertain themselves and it wasn't my job.

John Dehlin [00:33:57] So what if somebody's saying that's just being a neglectful mom. I can imagine you like with your cell phone texting people calling people and your kids are running around. Some would say that's just a non attached neglectful mom.

Sara Urquhart [00:34:08] Well you look at my kids, my kids are awesome. They are, they are awesome. You can challenge every parent takes their kids off. No, I'm right though. You can challenge me on anything you want. I'm a good mom. And you know what? I'm a good mom because it's not about me. It is completely about my kids. It always has been. Here's another example. When they were, I never picked a kid's. When they would come home in fifth grade, they were moving to sixth grade, they had to pick one class, orchestra, band or music like choir. And you know, I know many parents that would circle it, sign it.

Sara Urquhart [00:34:50] I wasn't going to do that. I signed it, handed it back to my kid and said what are you going to, what are you going to sign up for? And I never picked a class, I never filled out a registration, I never. They knew if they needed a signature on something they had to bring me the paper with a pen. And I'd say do you know what's on this paper? They'd tell me, yes, okay, then I'm done. And it wasn't. Grades were always theirs, you know, and that was as long as I could judge by other things. Were their friends good? Were their grades good?

Sara Urquhart [00:35:23] Were they doing accomplished things? As long as they were making good decisions, I didn't have to over parent. And they're happy, they're healthy, they continue into adulthood making great decisions and over and over they make decisions I would not make for them. I would make different decisions for them. They're always right, they're always, they always make better decisions than I would make for them.

John Dehlin [00:35:50] So let them make their own decisions.

Sara Urquhart [00:35:52] Always, always.

John Dehlin [00:35:54] And I'll just speak for you, I know that your oldest daughter got a Monson scholarship to byu. I don't know that she went, but she was offered that. And you have a son at mit, so I mean not to point out prestige but from my talks with Steve that's some pretty significant accomplishment I think by any parents standards.

Sara Urquhart [00:36:10] Yeah, and more than that they are kind, they are good, they want to go out into the world and do great things and serve and I just, you can't, you know, you can't question. I can't question those things because I just think, oh. And it's because, one, we stayed out of their way, and two, we just shored up around them what they wanted to accomplish. We got in. So the opposite of a helicopter parent opposite, 100% opposite.

John Dehlin [00:36:42] What did you do about computer time, TV time, screen time, mobile device time? Did you have controls and limits there? How did you keep them from becoming addicted to video games? Watching TV too much, texting all the time?

Sara Urquhart [00:36:58] So great questions. We did not. So my rule was always as long as one, I completely trust you. If you do anything to break that trust, then we have to change the rules. But as long as you continue to do good things, then I trust you. And that was with everything. I trust you on your phone. I trust that you can control your computer time. I trust that you know how long video game, you know how long you should be playing. Because. And my going back to. Were the grades good?

Sara Urquhart [00:37:35] And I will also say we have. My kids are different. They're going to have different accomplishments. So they didn't all have to have 4.0 grade, you know, 4.0 grade average. They had to be doing what I knew that kid could accomplish.

Sara Urquhart [00:37:54] You know, were they doing extracurriculars and was that filling their time? Their friends were. That was a big barometer for me. You know, if their friends were great, it's hard to ask for anything else. And so. And they very rarely would challenge those things because the other thing I did when they were very young is I never gave an idle threat. I don't think one time in my life did I have to go back on a threat, meaning if they did something wrong, I told them what the punishment would be, and I followed through on that. I never didn't do that. I know that's double negative, but I never didn't do that.

Sara Urquhart [00:38:37] I always did it. And so as they got older, they knew if I said, you will lose all the. You will lose the privileges. They knew the risk they were taking. And I think they very rarely took the risk because they knew the rules. And I will say this, that was something I did opposite of my parents. And in my house, the rules were always changing. And that was hard for me. And so what I gave my kids was what I was hoping was complete stability so that they could then make good decisions for themselves.

John Dehlin [00:39:13] And yet there are kids who get addicted to video games, addicted to porn. There are kids who blow off school and get in with the wrong crowd. Do you think that was luck? Do you think there was something you did to prevent that?

Sara Urquhart [00:39:27] I'm not. That's a loaded question. Because then it makes every parent who's dealing with those sad things, it makes me sound like I'm judging them and I'm not. All I can speak to are my kids. And you know, when they would, when they would cross a line, I just, for sure there was always love, always love that, you know, and we tried to make that clear, that if they made a choice that they knew we wouldn't like, they still, we wanted them to come to us, that we were the place that they were going to land and then we'd navigate the consequences and we'd help them with that because I wanted them.

Sara Urquhart [00:40:14] And we never had curfews in our house. We didn't have anything like that because they, as long as they told me where they were going, as long as they and I had a sense of where they were and that they were safe. And that became easier when they had cell phones because remember my kids were transitioning as the cell phones became popular for little kids.

Sara Urquhart [00:40:35] Now everybody has them. I know, but at the time that kind of was new. And so we, you know, as long as I kind of knew where they were and they were checking in with me, I felt safe and as long as they continued to hit those high points. So for other families who aren't dealing with that, I don't know, is that something? I will say this also. Can I tell another little story when this is a big one for me and Steve and our parenting. When our son was young, two or three, we were doing everything wrong. We were doing the, you know, we really wanted to teach him the right things and we were being hyper aggressive with him and too much so.

Sara Urquhart [00:41:19] And he was getting to the point where he says when he'd throw a fit, especially between his dad and himself, he'd just destroy the room and then we'd come down hard on him. It was not a good cycle. And with the help of Steve's mother, my mother in law, who was never one to really buddy and I just loved her for that. She gave some advice and said, Ike just wants me to, to know you love him.

Sara Urquhart [00:41:49] And Steve came home and we talked about that and we changed the way we treated Ike and we stopped the hyper anything and we just loved him and hugged him and realized even as a two or three year old he could make good decisions. And we were being challenged by a three year old. So we stood and we just got out of his way. And that's the kid at mit. I think we were on track to break him. We were on a track to ruin him. And we just completely backed off, changed our parenting. And he can make better decisions for himself than we can make for him. Even as a child, did your kids

John Dehlin [00:42:36] ever get resentful that you were working? All the time, like, mommy, mommy, get off the computer, mommy, get off the phone. You know we need you. Why are you always talking to other people?

Sara Urquhart [00:42:47] Yeah, no, I didn't have much of that. First of all, my kids were getting older as this was happening, so as teenagers, they wanted a little less of me. And I really tried to keep those. Since I was the boss, I would try and keep those hours. You know, when they were at school, I would rarely, I would very rarely book too much work.

Sara Urquhart [00:43:12] I would keep the work flexible at the end of the day so that as they came home, if they needed me, that we could do that. And they got old enough, they could understand the trade off because it was a lucrative job.

Sara Urquhart [00:43:26] You know, we traveled more. They knew that's why it was happening. Because I was working as teenagers, they got some privileges and they were so. No, they were very good about it, but I talked to them about it. It was always a back and forth and so they understood there were choices and there were consequences. Some of them are good and some of them are bad. I always talked it through so they would understand. I even asked them, would you prefer this, that I do it this way or that I do it that way because it's going to impact you. And they could tell me and then they had part of the control.

John Dehlin [00:44:07] All right, well, that's. I'm just, my mind's blown. You know, my mom stayed home with us. Margi has stayed home full time. I wonder how you would have felt if Steve had just been a lucrative lawyer and you never had to go. Would you have enjoyed motherhood?

Sara Urquhart [00:44:26] No. Yes. Yes. No. I thought you were gonna ask something else. Would I have joined motherhood? I enjoy motherhood, but. Well, I did that for a lot of years. I think my oldest. Well, my oldest was eight years ago. That's. I'm not good at math, you know, she would have been a teenager, so 12, 13, when. So for those first 13 years, I was almost exclusively a full time mom. But that's when I did all my non profit work because I get a ton done in a day so I could balance a lot of things. So I ended up not just on multiple boards, but I ended up sharing those boards.

Sara Urquhart [00:45:07] I ended up starting Projects I ended up. So what surprised me is that I wasn't. I wish I had given myself maybe to do a little work, to do some, you know, I was giving all this work outside of the home, whether it was to the church or to these nonprofits or these. Which I loved. But I wasn't being paid for it. And you know, that's my one question is maybe I should have been. So I counted myself a full time mom and maybe other people wouldn't because I was out. But my kids didn't know I was outside of the home. I was. When they were home, I was home.

Sara Urquhart [00:45:49] They didn't know I was really doing these non profits other than they'd show up to an event I'd put on and they knew I had something to do with it. So no, I loved the balance. I loved what I gave it and I think I gave it what I could.

John Dehlin [00:46:05] What about self care? Like exercising, eating right, getting up, sleep, just taking care of yourself.

Sara Urquhart [00:46:13] I've always been good about eight hours of sleep. I just have to do that. So that was my hardest thing about having little babies is not getting that eight hours. So I'm pretty structured. So I'd go to bed at a certain time, wake up at a certain time. I didn't have to really watch my eating or exercise until I got a little older. But I was always very. I've said this before, I'm very, very active and, and so that was just a part of who I was. I didn't have to build those things in. And to be honest, unlike some people, I don't get any kind of high or any kind of endorphins from exercise. I actually resent it the whole time. I hate still now hate it. But I have to do it now.

Alt Summit's Growth, Revenue, and the Blogging Industry

John Dehlin [00:46:57] So talk about and maybe Altsummit is at its peak right now, but at its peak. What can you tell us about number of attendees? I don't know if revenue was public. Talk about it. At its height of success,

Sara Urquhart [00:47:16] The largest event we had was 800 people. I'm thinking 750, but I think it was closer to 800 people. But that's a year we did two and we had 800 in the winter and then in the summer event we probably had 500. So you know that many for the annual and

John Dehlin [00:47:40] people pay what, 300?

Sara Urquhart [00:47:42] About $700. $700? Well between five and seven depending on.

John Dehlin [00:47:46] So that's a, that's more than a half a million dollars of revenue a year.

Sara Urquhart [00:47:50] Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were, we were, we were Grossing over a million dollars. Wow.

John Dehlin [00:47:58] That's pretty amazing. To go from barely breaking even, you know, a couple conferences to pay for it. Fast forward eight or nine years.

Sara Urquhart [00:48:08] Yeah. And I will say again, a lot of that, remember, is overhead. These are expensive events, so. But it was the. I remember I was in the car. Cause again, I'm not. I don't think of myself as a mogul. I think of myself as an events person. I remember I was calculating. Oh, okay. This is what. I was adding it up. The very first time we, you know, and we hit a million dollars. And I didn't, I. It kind of turned my stomach. It scared me. I had to put down the paper and talk about something else because Steve was excited. He wanted to talk about. I'm like, nope, talk about something else. That, that was. It took me a couple of days to wrap my head around. Oh, that's, that's what we're doing is, is I'm, I'm a serious business person.

John Dehlin [00:48:55] Yeah.

Sara Urquhart [00:48:56] Now for many businesses that's not a ton, but for that, for me, that was a lot.

John Dehlin [00:49:01] Yeah. Yeah.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:02] And for many it is a lot. And you know, it is. And again, we didn't bring that home. I have to clarify, that was, you know, not everybody understands it.

John Dehlin [00:49:12] No. But I mean, to go from like the idea, four kids at home to a business that's grossing over a million dollars a year, that's a significant accomplishment.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:22] I was very proud of myself.

John Dehlin [00:49:25] Alright, so let's talk a little bit about the blogging industry. My wife Margi follows a lot of the blogs and just a few of the design blogs, but other sort of blogs as well. And she had some really interesting sort of questions about just the blogging and the industry itself.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:46] I'm gonna jump in.

John Dehlin [00:49:47] Yeah.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:48] I'm not a blogger.

John Dehlin [00:49:50] I know.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:50] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:49:51] But you can speak to the industry, right?

Sara Urquhart [00:49:52] I can speak to the industry as an outsider close to the industry. That makes sense.

John Dehlin [00:49:58] Yeah. Yeah.

Sara Urquhart [00:49:59] Okay, so I can speak to that. But if it's a question I can't answer, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna make it up.

John Dehlin [00:50:05] No, that's fine. Okay, so I'm reading some of these questions here. This is the one that. This is a long question. I'm famous for long questions, but this is a really long one. There's a common dynamic where a woman sits down to read a blog that shows an impeccably styled life. Many successful LDS blogs are so good at conveying this. The home is beautiful, the family looks so happy, and all are Incredibly well dressed. Part of the blog is to name stories where they buy furniture or clothes, as the aesthetic is part of the point, as is the sharing of ideas. The moments captured on that blog are slivers of a Norman Rockwell book, so ideal it is addictive in a way.

John Dehlin [00:50:52] I think I've called it mommy blogging porn or something like that. You know, she says, like the best candy ever. And where that blog is in so many ways good for the woman writing it, we're assuming she's assuming. And even for many women who have the means and the creativity to be empowered into creating a similarly styled life, the woman reading it can feel a discrepancy between the life she is looking at and what life actually looks like. For most people, it leaves a cat chasm. In reality, the blog can perpetuate an unhealthy ideal or expectation. It can leave a woman feeling inadequate and deprived.

John Dehlin [00:51:34] Can you talk about that at all? What comes to mind when I read that to you from Margi? Is there a sense of responsibility at all in the way that bloggers show and speak about their lives? That's an intense question. What do you got?

Sara Urquhart [00:51:49] So that's intense. Interesting. And because remember my. I'm a consumer of blogs like anybody else who's. Because I've never written a blog, I'm only a consumer of it. But from my perspective, where I know a number of bloggers well, I'm related to a number of them.

Sara Urquhart [00:52:09] I think most understand that dilemma and speak to it in their blogs. You know, they're, they'll, they'll acknowledge that yes, to do it right. I am going to remove the socks that were on the floor from this shot. You know, I don't. The socks are on the floor, but I'm not. That's not what sponsors pay for. It's not what my readers want.

Sara Urquhart [00:52:33] So I'm going to remove them. It's, it's. But I think they acknowledge that they know that and that that's part of, of it. If a reader doesn't understand that, I think that would surprise me. I think most readers do understand and acknowledge that. You know, if you're reading the blogs that show a lot of diy, you know, a lot of good steps in place, and part of it is knowing yourself when you're reading it.

Sara Urquhart [00:53:06] Are you taking, are you acknowledging the things that you're good at or are you comparing. You hear this a lot. Are you comparing your worst to somebody else's best? That's going to be on you, the reader, rather than on the blogger, Are we mad at Martha Stewart when she does her beautiful magazine layouts?

Sara Urquhart [00:53:33] If you are, then you probably shouldn't read Martha Stewart. If you're not, and there's enough there to be inspired by, then I say go for it, you know, but no, I think I will say this too, remember, because I see the backstory for some of these bloggers. I know what they're acknowledging and what they're giving to the world and what they're keeping private. That, you know, it's not all fairy tales.

Sara Urquhart [00:54:01] But I don't think anybody says, my life is perfect. Most of them acknowledge it somewhere in their blog. So I, you know, I think it's a statement. I understand Marty's statement. I don't know that it's. And maybe I'm not answering, you know, but from what I'm understanding you saying, I think that's. It exists, but it's not. No one's claiming perfection.

John Dehlin [00:54:27] What about this idea of just privilege that a lot of these people just happen to have a lot of money and they're. And I don't know if that's true, but, you know, there's a bunch of people without as much money, and it's sort of just a way to kind of live vicariously through someone else's life. People who have a lot of privilege, when in reality, a lot of the audience would never be able to have the beautiful home or the education or the travel or even the camera to make the shots.

Sara Urquhart [00:54:54] Right.

John Dehlin [00:54:55] Is there an element of privilege in who's able to be the blogger?

Sara Urquhart [00:54:59] No, no, no. And I say that 100% the only privilege, the only thing that is, are you born with a good eye or have you been educated enough and have you learned that? But those things can be learned by anybody. If you have a small smartphone, many people, that is their Instagram phone, many people. And the nice thing about blogging is it has such a low barrier of entry if it is something. And not just blogging. When we say blogging, we actually mean all social media platforms.

Sara Urquhart [00:55:40] My conference started out with just bloggers. By year two or three, there was Twitter, Pinterest. I didn't tell you this. Pinterest. Pinterest. Actually, the very first year, the founder of Pinterest came to Alt, and his beta users came from Alt attendees. And he gives us credit for helping with some of his success, which I think is very sweet. But all of those platforms you can have access to, you don't need the best cameras, you don't need the best homes.

Sara Urquhart [00:56:15] One of you know, I know people who have one wall and that's where they do all of their shots. They have one wall in their tiny little college apartment. But from there it grows. So, no, I wouldn't say it's privileged all.

Sara Urquhart [00:56:32] Are some bloggers privileged? Yes. But I look at my three sisters, they came from. Well, two of them came from the background I came from because remember, one's a sister in law. They came from eight kids, poor, you know, and they.

Sara Urquhart [00:56:49] We all went to college, though. We did get that. But you know, it's. Blogging is not for privileged. Not just for privileged people. That's what I love about it.

John Dehlin [00:57:00] Right. For some people who want to start a blog or a podcast or whatever, what are the main tips over the years to sort of differentiating yourself and having a successful book?

Sara Urquhart [00:57:13] Okay, this is, and this is the hard part for people. You have to start. You're gonna start. Let me ask you this. Your first podcasts, when you go back and listen to them, are you just so proud of them or are you like, oh, no, no, of course not.

John Dehlin [00:57:33] Totally embarrassing. It's horrible.

Sara Urquhart [00:57:34] And. But you do it. And the only way you could learn how to do it better was you just had to do it. And you had to do it, as messy as it was. You had to do it, have some success and go, oh, this worked, let's do more of this. This didn't work. Let's stop doing that. Or this didn't work, let's change how we do it. You have to just start.

Sara Urquhart [00:57:54] People want their first blog post or their first Instagram to be their very best. And that's just not the way it's going to be. It's going to be probably your very worst, but you don't know it's your worst. It's the best you can do. So do it. And that's what it is. But you have to start. You have to start and then you have to see what brings you success, part of what will deter. You want to have kind of a goal, but it's a soft goal of who you know. Probably why you started the podcast in 05 is a different.

Sara Urquhart [00:58:29] Is different than why you keep doing it now. Yeah, because you've changed. You've adapted over time, what your readers, what your listeners want to hear. So you've adapted with them. They've told you where to go and you've accommodated. And in some things you're like, nope, this is who I am. So we're gonna stay here. You come to me. But in Other things, yeah, we can go there. That's true for anybody in this space. So you have to just start. It's going to feel messy. You're not going to love it. But. And the other thing is, do it for three months, do it for six months.

Sara Urquhart [00:59:01] Don't even pretend to start thinking about sponsors or anybody like that until you have been doing it for a year or two. And you know, if you skyrocket, then you can start thinking about it and find somebody who will talk to you about it. A lot of people in this space are generous and will talk you through it, especially if you're having immediate success. But most people, it takes some time to build. So get to that point and then you'll know when it's time to start bringing in sponsors and other things.

Finding Sponsors, Successful Blogs, and Lessons Learned

John Dehlin [00:59:32] How do you find sponsors?

Sara Urquhart [00:59:33] Mostly they find you, really, when you have a following. I'll tell you this little interesting story. I remember hearing about a woman who, she did a blog for Indian weddings. Like People from India. She had this tiny little readership, but she was good at it. It was beautiful. And she was selling sponsorships for far more than anybody else who was running a blog her size because there were so many sponsors who wanted to talk to Indian brides so she could command more from those sponsors because she, because she had this very loyal following. And, and the brides were ready to spend money. And so these, these sponsors wanted to get in front of those brides and they were willing to pay the money.

Sara Urquhart [01:00:32] You know, in other cases, you have to be very big. And, but if you, if you can, if you're small, but have a very loyal following, you might be able to charge more than someone who has a huge amount of followers. But, you know, you can't prove that they, when you say go buy this thing, that they actually go do it.

John Dehlin [01:00:51] How do you set a price point with the sponsor? How do you, how do you know, how do you know what price to set?

Sara Urquhart [01:00:57] Well, first of all, you go to Alt and you find out, because we talk about those things, what are people.

John Dehlin [01:01:03] So go to professional, go to a professional conference.

Sara Urquhart [01:01:05] And not all conferences are generous with that information. So you have to find the right one. The other thing is find a network of people in your space that maybe have a private group, you have four or five where you really can be open about that. I've been approached by this, this much money, but I had somebody say once, and I loved this. I lived by this when I talked to sponsors because I didn't have other conferences that I could really talk to. I had to set my own price points, but set up the ask for the amount that turns your stomach.

John Dehlin [01:01:40] So be aggressive.

Sara Urquhart [01:01:42] Just a little bit.

John Dehlin [01:01:42] Be aggressive.

Sara Urquhart [01:01:43] Because all they can say is, we can't pay that. Here's our budget. Or, you know, and if they're on and they want to work with you, they're gonna say, you know, they're gonna let you know if you're, if you're up in the night and you do too many of those and, you know, they'll let you know. But no, I was amazed how, how many times I could get people to a point where I was just shocked and they'd write out the check.

John Dehlin [01:02:11] And you had to get sponsors for your event.

Sara Urquhart [01:02:13] Yeah, I was good at that.

John Dehlin [01:02:14] What do you mean?

Sara Urquhart [01:02:16] I was good at that. I could. When they would, many of them would come to me, but I'm a good negotiator. I'd walk through. So part of, and this is why I'm good at events. Part of what I would say in the very first meeting is why do you want to come to Alt? What is it you're looking for? Do you want to just get name recognition? Do you want to meet one on one with people? Do you want to walk away with a certain amount of bloggers for a campaign? I mean, I really wanted to know why they were investing in my conference. And once I knew that I would find an organic way to give them that experience.

Sara Urquhart [01:02:52] So. So we didn't just do a big expo where sponsors could set up and nobody wanted to go through it. We found ways to really bring the sponsor into the event and to make it natural for people. And because I was so good at vetting, I would tell attendees, these sponsors want to talk to you, they want to meet up with you. These are the, and I put it in the booklet, why the sponsors were coming, the kind of blogger they wanted to meet up with. So it became a real exchange that, you know, attendees knew that they could. These sponsors wanted to talk to them and it was to help build a mutual relationship.

Sara Urquhart [01:03:32] And I was very good at promoting that or doing it and then promoting it, letting people know that's why we were running this event.

John Dehlin [01:03:43] Fascinating. I am so inspired just running a non profit myself. There's so much to think about and so much to do. This sounds like it's really your gift. It's kind of running things.

Sara Urquhart [01:03:56] Yeah, it is.

John Dehlin [01:03:57] Is that true?

Sara Urquhart [01:03:57] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:03:58] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So Margi writes regarding the role of advertising in blogs. She gets that women need to make Money for their art, for their crafts. But she says she wants. Sometimes as a reader, the experience of connecting to the person on a blog can be adversely affected as we are bombarded by more and more stimuli with regard to consumerism, it is tricky. So can you speak to sort of how sponsorships can sometimes ruin a blog?

Sara Urquhart [01:04:33] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:04:34] Or sour the experience.

Sara Urquhart [01:04:35] Yeah, and that absolutely happens. Remember, most of these bloggers are. It's not like they went to blogging or went to college to major in blogging. So it's. They're experimenting too. They're trying, you know, is this sponsor a good fit for me? And over time and again, they've had to invent how to integrate sponsors in. It's not like there's a book you can read and it tells you exactly what been done over the last few decades, because it hasn't been. These are people inventing jobs.

Sara Urquhart [01:05:08] So there's a lot of trying and a lot of experimentation and being good. If you're good at that, you can be good in the space. If you get too much into ruts, again, you probably won't be good in the space because you really do need to continue to adapt and change over time. So does that happen with Ruth readers? Absolutely. And are bloggers aware of it? A hundred percent. And when it's a bad exchange, it makes them sick. They don't, because they know they're losing some readers because of this one blog post. So they try to really think about that. They really do try to be, you know, the good ones, the ones who have staying power, really try to be thoughtful about a reader's experience and try to give them what you know.

Sara Urquhart [01:05:58] Why does a reader come to my blog? I'm going to try and give them that. Even if I'm integrating a sponsor, can I continue to give them that good experience and make it a organic, natural fit? Sometimes it's not.

Sara Urquhart [01:06:11] And people are going to have different levels of how much they're okay with that. So just kind of, if 90% of the readers are okay with the way this sponsor works into this blog post, and 10% aren't those 10%, it might offend them enough that they're gone. You know, they just have a thinner skin. There's something they don't like about it, something that's offensive. But if 90% are okay with it, you bet that blogger's going to continue to do it.

John Dehlin [01:06:41] Maybe you've answered this already, but Margi asked what you think the major tenants are of a successful blog. You talked about how to become successful. But what about, you know, the characteristics of a successful blog?

Sara Urquhart [01:06:55] That's going to be different for every person. So I'll say a few general things. One, steadiness. If you say you're going to participate, if you say you're going to do a daily post, you better do a daily post. If you think you can only get to it twice a week. Make sure you say that and then. And be as, you know, steady as you can on what you say you're going to do. And then be watching that respond to. Do people want more? Do they want less? And are they willing to, you know, I had some people early on who thought, oh, little is good, so more is better.

Sara Urquhart [01:07:29] They were trying to do five or even seven posts a day. That was way more than anybody, any reader wanted. So many came down, you know, considerably. But be adaptable. We've talked about that. You know, be willing to learn, be willing to change. Be super, super open to new kinds of platforms, new kinds of participation. And as much as anything, what you're doing is creating a community.

Sara Urquhart [01:07:59] So are you good at that? I mean, that's the other thing. Are you good at that? Have you been good at that over your life? You're probably going to be good at that online. I look at my husband, who he has fun on social media, but he always is.

Sara Urquhart [01:08:16] He's the one going back to church. He's the one who gets there early and is shaking everybody's hand and not. That was long before he was a politician. He loved it. He loves the community, he loves the people.

Sara Urquhart [01:08:29] I'm not that person. Never, never have been. I knew I wouldn't be good at accommodating a community. You know, I got better at it with my conference. I created a bit of a community there, but I would have to hire people to help because I'm a little prickly. And sometimes that would come out on social media as I was a little too prickly and, you know, I had to acknowledge that and, you know, see, give what I could. And so, yeah, for anybody else, you know, there's some general things, but if you're good at that, for sure, think about it, there's room, there's space.

John Dehlin [01:09:10] Margi asks, what are some of the favorite parts about what you do or what you did? What were your favorite parts about it?

Sara Urquhart [01:09:17] For me, I love the organization of things. I love the problem solving. I loved having success. You know that. Oh, those first few calls with sponsors and emails with sponsors, they just. Because that was new for me. And you Know, talking about money, that was new.

Sara Urquhart [01:09:41] But I did it, and I found out I was kind of good at it. And then I really loved it. And so, you know, I loved. Because my. If I ran it well, most of my work was done before I even got to the event. In fact, one event, we were about a month away, and my husband got a chance to go to Thailand over the days of my conference, and I went with him. I missed my conference because all my work was set up, everything was done. I delegated to the right people. I had teams in place, and they were able to run it beautifully without a hitch.

Sara Urquhart [01:10:19] I love all of that. I love thinking, you know, that I've done all the organization well enough that I'm not even needed at the event. I love that. But I do that. When I was the. When I was the party.

John Dehlin [01:10:40] What?

Sara Urquhart [01:10:40] I can't remember what it's called. Yeah, activities leader. Same thing. That has been my policy for long.

John Dehlin [01:10:47] Organization's your thing, right?

Sara Urquhart [01:10:48] Always. Always.

John Dehlin [01:10:52] So it almost sounds like what we're hearing is kind of a charmed life. Like, perfect marriage, kids are at mit, or perfect successful business. There's got be to. To be times where you dropped the ball or made mistakes or hard things have happened. But. Okay, talk about that.

Sara Urquhart [01:11:12] Okay. I've never said perfect anything.

John Dehlin [01:11:15] No, no, no. But I mean, I'm just saying, this is all roses. You're like.

Sara Urquhart [01:11:19] You're asking me. Awesome, awesome. You're asking me about the awesome things. So, no, my marriage is not perfect. We like each other, we really enjoy each other, but not perfect. My kids, that's early teenagers I had. But I am going to say with the kid thing, I did that right. I started early, made some mistakes, did it right. Now, my oldest, she laughs at me. She says it's out of kindness, but I got some things wrong with her. As my first. She was absolutely the guinea pig. So, you know, you could have a whole hour with her and she could tell you all the things I did wrong because she.

Sara Urquhart [01:11:54] That's the other thing. Steal mine like a steel trap so she can remember every. Everything I did wrong so we could go there. So, no, that wasn't good. We had a lot of conflict with. When I didn't know if we could get the bills paid, you know, when we were.

Sara Urquhart [01:12:14] Because that's the other thing. My husband again, even before politics, through politics, he loves everybody. He did so much law work for free. And that just about killed me when it was time to pay bills, because I paid the bills, you know, And I Ran that part of it. But if he didn't send out his billings to have him pay or if he did all this work for free, you know, that was rough for us.

Sara Urquhart [01:12:42] And then of course, in our home, we've had, as most homes have, we've had some hard mental health issues where, you know, we've had sad, difficult times. And. But that, you know, that. That's. And actually part of that maybe we will get to. Because I had some rough years in my transition out of the church. So. No, we've had, we've had very sad things. And I will say we've had, you know, death in my extent extended family. My father died young. We've, you know, we've. It's. It's not, I'm telling you, the good stuff.

John Dehlin [01:13:22] Of course. Of course. Were there ever like a couple moments where you wanted to quit or something really bad happened or big mistakes happened and you just, I mean, you've told us that you've sold the business now, but maybe name a. Maybe name a time or two where you were just so discouraged and wanted to quit. You know, what was that like? Or were there any. Or was it all just kind of downhill?

Sara Urquhart [01:13:46] There were for sure some hard things about alt. Many of them I love. No, all of them I love. But I, because this was new to me. I was not great with partners. I'd give away too much of my business and then I'd have to come back behind and clean. Clean that up or I'd, you know, I'd have people that were demanding more. So I'd have to take. All of that was messy. I was never good at it. Now that I, you know, I would have done it all differently. And there were times absolutely that it got to a point where I had to decide, you know, do I try and keep this relationship at some point in some way in my life or do I cut this person loose or do I cut myself loose?

Sara Urquhart [01:14:39] I mean, it was there and some messy, messy things there. And I, you know, I. So, yeah, some things that were very hard and things that were heartbreaking.

John Dehlin [01:14:54] But you kept going.

Sara Urquhart [01:14:55] Yeah, I kept going and it kept going until. Yeah, until it was time. Time to sell and make that transition. But honestly, that was one of the transitions I had to decide, is this working for me? Because there was one partnership that was just getting too hard to manage.

John Dehlin [01:15:17] One more question. Margi had. Oh, do you have any favorite blogs about. And what do you love about them? You don't have to have any.

Sara Urquhart [01:15:32] No. Then let's. I don't want to answer that.

John Dehlin [01:15:34] Oh. Cause that's too. Because you're a constituency.

Sara Urquhart [01:15:37] But then I'm starting to pick and choose, and that.

John Dehlin [01:15:40] That's fine. Okay. So you don't want to. I don't want to ask. Okay. Okay.

Sara Urquhart [01:15:43] All right. I like lots of blunks. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:15:45] Okay. You're a politician a little bit. Yourself? A little.

Sara Urquhart [01:15:50] I've learned a few things from my husband.

Sara's Faith Transition Begins

Part 2 of 2 · Ep. 683

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Okay, so let's switch over to the faith transition. Talk about when that started and how it happened.

Sara Urquhart [00:00:07] Okay. So I started out going well, so I'm backing up even further. I was the one that was all in. I did all the presidencies again, because that's what I'm good at, right? And so, you know, my very favorite calling was actually stake primary president. And I'd had one when I was the stake primary president. I had had one calling in primary when I was in high school, right after I graduated high school, before college, I was in the nursery. That was the only time I was in primary. And now I'm the stake primary president. It was crazy, but I loved it because it's, it's reading handbooks and understanding and getting to know the wards, and I loved it.

Sara Urquhart [00:00:54] So I did all of that. I did relief study president, young women's president, super orthodox president, super, super orthodox. And with my own kids, family prayer every day, you know, prayers every meal, scripture study every day. I would even.

Sara Urquhart [00:01:10] I tried to do temple attendance every week. And I would keep a skirt and a pair of shoes in my car in case my errands happened and got done faster than I wanted. I could throw my skirt on, do the surfer change in the parking lot and go to the temple again, you know, because the kids weren't out of school for a while. So that was because I, I just do it, do it, do it. If you give me the list, I'm going to go down the list and I'm going to. This is the way we're all going to get back to heaven. And that's what I did.

Sara Urquhart [00:01:40] I believed it all. I did it all. And I am going to go back to. We didn't talk about this in my younger years, but I remember a very painful young woman's lesson for me was my sweet teacher. I remember her name. I remember the classroom we were in, talking to us. I was Laurel and talking to us about staying at home, being an at home mom. And I remember saying. And I was using my mother as example, but my mom could be the CEO. My mom could be in charge. My mom. And you're saying she can't go to work.

Sara Urquhart [00:02:15] And my sweet teacher just stayed the course and told us that I'm sobbing. That was so hard for me. And when we got home, my sister who was in the class told my mom what had happened. And my mom just laughed and said, well, she wasn't talking about me, she was talking about herself. And I didn't even know that I was, too, but my mom could see I was driven and wanted.

John Dehlin [00:02:37] You were a feminist? Kind of.

Sara Urquhart [00:02:39] Well, except, yes. Without identifying, without knowing, without knowing what that even was or what that meant. I just. I knew I wanted something, but. Because that was the lesson, I knew I was going to get my degree because we heard that from the pulpit, but then I absolutely was going to be at home, and that's what I did, and that's the choice I made. So I was at home and was a great mom, as we've talked about. And I did volunteer work outside of the home, did a lot of church callings. And then, okay, so then the transition. So I was struggling. I kept having things.

Sara Urquhart [00:03:22] Anytime a big question would come up. I'm very good at compartmentalizing, and I put it aside until I have time to analyze it or look through it. So. So a lot of questions kept getting pushed to the side. The way my daughters were being treated in young women's versus my son's experience in young men's, that was my own experience growing up. But I was hoping it would be better by the time my kids got older, and it wasn't, and I would be in these ward councils. And this sounds so arrogant, but I remember looking around the room one time thinking, oh, I'm the smartest person in this room.

Sara Urquhart [00:03:58] And. But then being ushered out, because now the men were going to make some decisions without the women present. And I'm like, oh, no, you want me here? I'm going to help you get to the decision, you know, the right decisions. And it was not arrogance on my part. It was all for the Lord, all for the good of the ward, all for, you know, if God made me smart, it's to help build up the kingdom.

Sara Urquhart [00:04:26] So I really didn't. And it took me a while to figure out I was smart because I wasn't raised to think that way. You know, I didn't know that. And anyway, so some things like that happened that bothered me. I had many bishops who. Not just bishops, but men who were challenged by me. And that was. I never liked that.

Sara Urquhart [00:04:55] And so that. That wasn't fun to go through those experiences, you know, that would make me sad. But then we got to a point where I had. So I had a couple things happen. I had. I was. I moved into a new ward.

Sara Urquhart [00:05:13] I was made the young women's president, and I was just a few months into it. And so one bishop made me the youngest president just as he was leaving. He knew it was almost his, so he wanted to have Things ready for the new bishop. So he put me in and I had somebody, a mother of a daughter, start complaining about me. And the bishop told me, he said, I'm having these things. And we talked it through. I said, what can I do better? What should I do?

Sara Urquhart [00:05:42] And then when the transition happens, I'm saying transition, but when the new bishop was put in, he was young and a dear friend. Love him, still do. But he got the same complaint and panicked and released me. So I'd only been in a few months. That was super humiliating to me. And I didn't have anything else to, you know, my reputation in the ward felt like that's all I had. And so that was a real blow to me now in his.

Sara Urquhart [00:06:18] He then tried to and did over the next number of years. He used me in many ways. He kept changing my calling to. He moved me into places to kind of whip a different organization into shape. And he used me. He had me speaking a lot. You know, he loved me and I really did love him.

Sara Urquhart [00:06:38] I say, did. We're still good friends. But he. So. But that was still. That blow felt very hard. And part of what felt hard about it was I put up with. I felt like a lot of leaders that were doing their best, but they weren't great. But you put up with them because you support them. You raise your hand and support them until it's not their turn anymore. And I felt like this was my turn to do young women's. And this person was not supporting me and was able to maneuver me out, which that would never occur to me to do.

Sara Urquhart [00:07:16] And it broke my heart. So we, in fact, 10 years later, I'm still mad at that person. So we. So that happened. And so this bishop kept using me, and then he ended up getting arrested and sent to prison.

Sara Urquhart [00:07:37] And the bishop, the bishop, and he knows I'm telling this story, so it's okay if that makes anyone nervous. But he. And, but still, I'm still trying to stay in. I'm still trying to hold on. And the ward had. I mean, we had a number of sacrament meetings where the stake presidency would come because this was, this was crazy, right? To have a bishop arrested and have something go down. It was a white collar crime.

Sara Urquhart [00:08:12] But these sacrament meetings were full of, you know, people would be selected to speak and they'd all get up and talk about forgiveness and how we just love each other and we're all going to rally around. And I was like, okay, this is. I've had all the lessons. This is what it's about. And, I mean, it was odd to me that we were talking about forgiveness, because I'm like, is it my job to forgive him? He didn't do anything to me.

Sara Urquhart [00:08:40] So I never. That was. That always bugged me that everyone thought they had to forgive him because I'm like, yeah, he's. We weren't the ones that were offended by his crime. So that felt a little weird. And I guess I was able to stretch and say, well, because he was the bishop and he had our confidence and, you know, he broke that. That may be okay. But then what happened is he went. He was gone for two years, and in that time, they lost their house. This is a mother. Her oldest son was my son's best friend a couple houses away.

Sara Urquhart [00:09:16] Their youngest, I think, was one at the time. I mean, just this baby. So five kids and the new bishop in the year he was gone, while their house was being repossessed, went to visit them one time, and it was to kind of keep this fight going in the ward. It was this weird visit. So here she is, essentially a single mother. Her husband's in prison, and people just dried up. Nobody was knocking on the door to see how she was doing. Nobody other than me. And I. My business was. It was in those years where my business was taking time, but I didn't have money yet, so I.

Sara Urquhart [00:10:06] It was taking time that I didn't have because I was not only visiting her and being a support to her, which I was glad to do, but it was hard to be the only one and then. Or what felt like the only one, because I'm sure there. But when she and I talked, there didn't seem to be many. And then she was trying to get down to see him. He was in California, 14 hours away. I was driving her quite a bit. Her mother drove her some, you know, wanted to.

Sara Urquhart [00:10:38] No, there weren't being supported at all. There wasn't. It wasn't that I wasn't feeling it and people weren't. I mean, I was looking around going, where are all these people to rally? Where is. This is our social contract? This is. You know, my feeling is I give and give and give, and when I'm low, I expect people to rally for me. And here, this family just gave everything. Now, he did make some mistakes, but nobody rallied for him. And for me, I.

Sara Urquhart [00:11:09] It was kind of the last straw. I had tried to ignore things and. But this scared me. It scared me because I thought, oh, we're alone. I can't count on people. I can't this is. We're alone. And it made me very sad because this is a neighborhood of people that I wanted to love, I wanted to respect. And I found them to be gossipy. I found them to be. And if they weren't gossipy, they, they were just living their own lives completely. And I just expected people to do a little, if everybody did a little.

John Dehlin [00:11:53] So some would argue if the church was true, none of that matters. So what did you do with the fact that the church, you believed the church was true and the doctrine was true and the scriptures were true, but

Sara Urquhart [00:12:05] if it's true, then why aren't we. Isn't the first and great commandment to love one another? I mean, for me, it only is true with action. So. And I will say it was my feeling has always been the whole concept of. And I remember this from the pulpit, all of it's true or none of it's true. All of it's true or none of it's true. You can't pick Joseph Smith, but not the Book of Mormon or vice versa. You can't, you know, it's all true. None of it's true. That was in my brain. So when I started to see some cracks, when I started to go, I don't know if you called me a feminist and that.

Sara Urquhart [00:12:47] There's some. I feel prickly about that. I know a lot of people don't, but I do. I. But I don't like the way women are treated. So in some ways I know I am a feminist. In other ways, I don't claim it, but the.

Sara Urquhart [00:13:02] That bothered me. And you know, the way, if people aren't going to rally for each other, here we are singing about, you know, those in prison, and he's literally in prison. And I thought, oh, well, these pieces aren't true. These pieces.

Sara Urquhart [00:13:22] And so if these aren't true, then none of it's true. And for 40 years of my life, it had all been true. And I was willing to take the junk with the good because all of it's true. But when I could self identify, oh, these things are not true, then I was able to go, oh, then none of it is. And that was my thing. That's the way I got there.

Navigating Family, Doubt, and Leaving the Church

John Dehlin [00:13:49] But I imagine you're thinking your husband's a believer. You're thinking, all your family are believed. Yeah, isn't that terrifying?

Sara Urquhart [00:13:57] He's so terrifying. Now, Steve and I, I mean, we've had a very good marriage. So I went to him very early and could say, I'm scared, I'm you know, really feeling this. And what did he say when you

John Dehlin [00:14:11] said, you don't think it's true?

Sara Urquhart [00:14:13] Oh, he's so funny. He smiled and said, oh, I haven't believed for years.

John Dehlin [00:14:17] Oh, my gosh.

Sara Urquhart [00:14:19] What?

John Dehlin [00:14:19] They're both not believing for years?

Sara Urquhart [00:14:21] No, I had. He's been not believing for years and just not telling me. And I said, why? I challenged him, why wouldn't you tell me? He said, I didn't want to hurt your faith. I wanted you to have it, and I didn't want to take that away from you.

John Dehlin [00:14:36] How'd that make you feel that he couldn't tell?

Sara Urquhart [00:14:38] You know what? He did it out of kindness and his intentions were good. And it made me sad for him that he didn't feel like he could tell me. But he.

John Dehlin [00:14:50] What does that say about a situation where this thing is supposed to be the most important thing in the lives of all the family members, and yet a spouse can't tell the other spouse the truth? What does that say?

Sara Urquhart [00:15:06] Well, I think it has something to do with the marriage, I think. And I think we have a great marriage. But he was giving me space to come to those conclusions on my own. And not that I was for sure gonna do it, but I think he could see me struggling and he just. He didn't need it to be fast. I'm not like that. I need things to be fast. I need things to be efficient. But he could give me. I. You know, I think there are some people who would challenge that. And in some ways, I guess they do.

Sara Urquhart [00:15:40] The way I challenge it is I never loved all those Sunday meetings. Not just the three hour block, but then you'd have firesides and word councils and other Sunday meetings where I'm thinking, aren't I supposed to be at home with my family? Or these men, Aren't they. This is their weekend. They should be home.

Sara Urquhart [00:15:57] But the church just continues to. Now there's a stake meeting, now there's a steak fireside. I never love those, you know, so I know what you're saying, but I think I was okay with the marriage part. That's where I found that challenging is, yeah, if we're supposed to be a church about families, how about we let people go home to their families?

John Dehlin [00:16:18] So he told you he hadn't been believing for years?

Sara Urquhart [00:16:22] Yes, and he gave me, you know, so we talked about it and tried to figure out how to navigate through that. And he had been going to church with me and the kids, and he just into callings. That's just the way he was going to do it. He loves the social, always has. But for me, I wasn't there for the social reasons. If it was true, I was going to do it all. If it's not true, I am not wasting one minute. And so when I came to these conclusions, I was done. I was out and I was done. He kept going to church because we had kids going to church, and he wanted to go sit with them on Sunday.

Sara Urquhart [00:17:01] And so he continued to go, and I. I continued to be at home. And, you know, we had a couple of years of that, and we navigated through those. The other funny thing is, as this was happening, I probably hadn't been to church in nine months, and I hadn't told any of my siblings who were. I felt, you know, it's that many. You're close to some and not to others, and that changes over time. But the ones I was particularly close to, I was not telling. And I remember coming out to a sister and my older sister, and I said, I don't think I've been to church in nine months.

Sara Urquhart [00:17:37] And that was a big statement for me to make. And she said, me, too. And she. She was going through a transition. And I was like, why? That blew my mind. Because she was, I think at the time, I think her husband was the branch president. I mean, she was this. Was this big and on a mission or getting ready for mission. I mean, it was a big deal. So I, you know, so that was shocking to me. And as I started to talk to siblings, many of us were transitioning. It was a. It was. That was kind of nuts to me because we're all different ages.

Sara Urquhart [00:18:13] We were in different parts of the country, even different parts of the world, but we were all kind of in different stages of it.

John Dehlin [00:18:19] Is that kind of validating to have other siblings kind of in the same spot?

Sara Urquhart [00:18:23] Yes, it was for me. And as I think about it, you know, I don't know how it lines up with my dad's age when he was leaving, but I think the fact that my dad did it probably made it a little easier for us. And the other thing I'll acknowledge is I don't have the burden that I see some of my friends have whose families are still stalwarts, and they have a much heavier burden as they transition because the impact it makes on the family. I will also say my mother is fully in, and it's been a heartbreak for her to lose all of these kids out of the church, but it's because all most of the siblings have done it. It's. Yeah, we can. And we're all. For completely different reasons. Different. You know, our stories are all different. But, yeah, it's. It's. It for sure is validated.

John Dehlin [00:19:18] So what were the hardest parts about the transition for you? Has it been awful? Has it been wonderful? The mix? Are you glad? Are you sad?

Sara Urquhart [00:19:26] Well, I'm glad now, but I for sure had some sad, sad years. In fact, I had a counselor once tell me, you mourn to the level of your investment. So if you have a deep investment in a child, in a parent in your mourning is gonna be far greater than the parakeet. You know, some people invest in their parakeet, so. But for most people, and for me, I. Oh, I mourned this. This was a huge part of my identity.

Sara Urquhart [00:20:02] It helped me make all my decisions in life. I didn't know. I was scared. I didn't know what it looked like on the other side. I. Here, I was so confident in my children and being a mother, and I didn't know how that was going to change. I didn't know how it would impact my marriage.

Sara Urquhart [00:20:22] These things. That church had helped drive me to a certain place. I didn't have enough confidence in myself to know how much of it was me and how much of it was the church. And that really, really scared me. So there was a lot of fear, a lot of sadness, a lot of tears. And I do things privately, so I didn't.

Sara Urquhart [00:20:48] Now, that's not. If someone reaches out to me, I'll, you know, be a part of. I'll bring them in and have them be a part of my conversations. But I didn't seek people out. And I was completely amazed. Other than one, maybe one and a half people, nobody came knocking on our door to say, where are you? Where are the Urquhart? We miss you.

John Dehlin [00:21:12] So you were right. You are alone.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:14] Like.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:15] That lesson you learned about your former bishop and his family who were just deserted sometimes it could be a community that's only an inch thick.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:26] Not always, but.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:27] And I will say about that family, they're still in. They figured out a different path, and it works for them. And I do becomes a ghost town, doesn't it? But for me, I was shocked because, again, I heard all those lessons. And when it was my turn to go and seek out the lost sheep, I did it. I went and knocked on doors. And we miss you. We love you. Come be a part of our group.

Sara Urquhart [00:21:51] And what can we give? What do you need? And to have none of that was shocking to me. And I thought I started going, oh, I was either the only one listening to those lessons or everybody else knew it was a lie. I mean, some. I felt, again, I felt kind of ripped off. I felt kind of betrayed. That was. That was heartbreaking. So I had some years of that. Now, same time, I'm having this success with my business, so I can compartmentalize and have my sad moments. But then I turn around and I have some very happy successes. And, you know, and I continue to challenge things. I wondered if my money would decrease because I stopped paying tithing and it increased so much. I wondered if.

John Dehlin [00:22:43] Were you worried about losing business, that a lot of these bloggers or people you interacted with were Mormon and maybe. Or was your business secular enough?

Sara Urquhart [00:22:51] Secular enough. It wasn't. That was never an issue. And nobody knew where. They didn't know I was the young woman's president when I was, and they didn't know I wasn't when I wasn't.

John Dehlin [00:23:02] You were worried that some of the bloggers would pull out or stop supporting you?

Sara Urquhart [00:23:05] Not all. Not all. That was because not many of them. I mean, we have a small percentage that are local, maybe 10%, but. And I have to assume most of those were Mormon, but not all were. And, you know, I found many of them going through transitions as well. So it just. That wasn't. No, that was never an issue. So that didn't challenge me.

Sara Urquhart [00:23:26] But, you know, there were. There were things. So I carried a lot of anger, and I didn't know how to reconcile it. That was. Again, I felt betrayed. I felt like I would have made other decisions. I would have been a different kind of young mother, maybe working.

Sara Urquhart [00:23:44] I would have, you know, been a different kind of wife. I kept trying to submit to my husband, and I'm not a big submitter. That was hard for me and hard for him. But, you know, when we both really wanted an equal dynamic and we weren't allowed to seek that, it felt like. So that was. That was hard. And. But this is. I think you might get a kick out of this. I carried anger until I saw Tyler Glenn's trash video.

John Dehlin [00:24:16] Wow. Really?

Sara Urquhart [00:24:17] Yeah. And I. And I told this to Tyler, which I was really fangirl. It was really awkward for both of us because I'm too old to be fangirl, but I. It. There was so much anger in it that it was like, oh, I don't have to carry this anymore. Like. Like, somebody else can carry it somebody else. Now, it's been documented. It's been. So it exists. I don't have to hold it onto it anymore. And I. It has been. It has been. That video is very therapeutic for me. And so thank you, Tyler. And I.

John Dehlin [00:24:55] Just because you. You felt so bad about all the anger you were holding on to helped you feel validated.

Sara Urquhart [00:25:01] Well, for sure, it gave you permission, but it's the kind of thing. I had an experience where one of my children, my fourth daughter, came very early, and I held on to those experiences. Life flighted. She's having. She almost dies. And all these experiences for about a year, six months, I couldn't let go of those until I documented them. We put them in on paper. Once I did that, I could let it go. And I think this video, I didn't know how to do that with this anger I was feeling. So when I saw it in an artistic form, I mean, it sounds. But when I saw it, I thought, okay, I can let that go, because I know somebody has documented it for me. And that's what it did for me. It's the same. It was awesome.

John Dehlin [00:25:52] Wow.

Sara Urquhart [00:25:53] Yeah.

Healing, Rebuilding, and Core Values After Transition

John Dehlin [00:25:54] So what have been the important parts of your rebuilding after the anger and after all the pain and difficulty?

Sara Urquhart [00:26:02] So it.

John Dehlin [00:26:03] You say you're glad now.

Sara Urquhart [00:26:04] Oh, so happy.

John Dehlin [00:26:05] How can you be happy when you've lost all that stuff? Your identity, you know, your identity, your sense of purpose, your sense of meaning, your community, Almost all the rules, all the morals that you had been given, a sense of spirituality, You've lost all that.

Sara Urquhart [00:26:23] Yes, well, I thought I did. So what I had to do was figure out which belonged to the church and which belonged to me. And that was hard and it took some time. But in parenting, what am I going to hold on to? What brings me success? What brings my kids success? Success. Those things are mine. And part of it was I wanted to give the church all the credit for every success I had, that everything belonged to them. But now that I'm out of it, and now that I'm. I have some distance, I'm like, oh, I would have been a good mother as a Catholic mother, as an atheist mother, because I'd good at that.

Sara Urquhart [00:27:08] I would have been. I would have found what worked if I, you know, I would have. Some of those things were just me, organization, I wanted to say. And I remember saying, when I heard there was, you know, the gifts, the spiritual gifts. That one is the spiritual gift of organization. I said, I have that.

Sara Urquhart [00:27:27] I am an organizer. Well, I'm going to be an organizer whether I'm in the church or not. In the church, that's just who I am. And I don't. In the past, I would have counted it as a spiritual gift, but because that's not where my thinking is anymore. I think that's just how my brain was wired when I was born. My dad was a good organizer, so maybe I got it from him, you know, So I. So it took some time to build up a reputation and to find an identity in something other than the church. And. But I did it, and I'm grateful I did it because I think I have a clearer picture of the world and where I fit in the world.

Sara Urquhart [00:28:14] And, you know, yeah, I'm so much happier now. My marriage is better. It's much stronger. My relationship with my kids, and that's the other thing. My kids have all been able to choose. I haven't pushed them. I've really tried to give them that same space that I've always given them. I really thought my son might go on a mission, and he chose not to. I was going to pay for it. I would have supported you, sent the letters, done all the things.

Sara Urquhart [00:28:44] He chose not to. But I'm afraid if I'd been in the church, there would. The sweet, open relationship I have with all my kids would not be the same. There would be too much disconnect. Now, again, maybe I'm giving the church too much credit. Maybe I would still be Sarah and figure out a way to have support and love with my kids, even though I'm in the church and they're not. If that had been the case. But I'm kind of glad we're all on the same page, that we're all out and. And can be supportive of each other in that way.

John Dehlin [00:29:22] Wow. So you made it through and you're happy. What about people who are just like, if my kids, if I don't hand them a religion, they won't have a sense of morality, they won't have a sense of identity, they won't have a community. And they're so terrified about how their kids are going to turn out.

Sara Urquhart [00:29:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:29:42] Sounds like you raising them to be so independent maybe is going to kick in there.

Sara Urquhart [00:29:46] For sure. For sure there. And I asked them those questions. I asked them, where are you with religion? What do you believe? How, you know, do you want to have those conversations? And my kids, we're all over the map. We're. We're in different places. Some of us are atheists, some of us are agnostics. Some of us are, you know, believe in.

Sara Urquhart [00:30:07] Believe strongly in God. And you know, and some of us have different definitions now. There's only six of us, so we're really all over the map. But we can have those conversations. And I appreciate, you know, that our relationship is open enough that we can do that, because more than anything else, I want to have a strong family. And, you know, that doesn't mean they're at my house every week. In fact, we live in different states. But they're, you know, I want them in my life, and I'm glad I get to be in theirs.

John Dehlin [00:30:41] And you're. And you feel like leaving the church is going to do what to your family overall? Strengthen? Weaken.

Sara Urquhart [00:30:49] Well, I think it's. I think we're a strong family. I think we are. You know, since we're all there, I think we're stronger. But, no, I'm not even gonna say it's because we're all there. I think we could be anywhere. But because I don't have. I can help make it stronger because I don't have somebody else telling me the parameters of what. I'm not using anybody else's definition of what a strong family is. I'm not using anybody's definition on how to get that strong family. I'm going to use my brain, my very smart, capable brain, and I'm going to figure out what my family needs to be strong, and I'm going to give them that. And I don't have any guilt. I don't have any shame. I don't have anybody else over my shoulder telling me I'm doing it wrong.

John Dehlin [00:31:40] Something I've noticed about you is that you. You feel comfortable complimenting yourself, saying you're a good parent, saying that you're smart.

Sara Urquhart [00:31:48] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:31:49] And that's so foreign to me in many ways. Is that something that has just always been true for you or something you've developed?

Sara Urquhart [00:31:58] No. Yes and yes and no. I remember saying things really early, trying to accept compliments from people when they would give them to me. But I'm part of understanding who I am. I think much of this has come as I've left the church and I've created my own identity separate from the church. And I. I own who I am. Because I'm saying I'm smart. I'm saying I'm capable. But I'll tell you my mistakes, too. I'll tell you the things I do wrong, because there. That list is big, too. But there are some things I do well. And whether, you know, whoever you give credit to, they. They are true. And I used to try and be Self deprecating and humble about that, you know, but that's not what this conversation is. Who am I? And that's who I am. And I'm, I'm grateful for it.

John Dehlin [00:32:54] So as we kind of wrap up, I think this has been a fascinating conversation. I just want to thank you for it. To hear about your upbringing, to hear about how you started your business, how you made it successful, to hear about how you dealt with challenges, to hear about how you dealt with the faith crisis. It's all super valuable. I think a lot of people are going to deliver a lot of value. So thank you. The way that we ended with Steve was to just have him share sort of his testimony now, but not necessarily a Mormon testimony, religious testimony, just sort of a summary of kind of what he stands for now, what he believes now.

John Dehlin [00:33:34] And I'd ask you to do the same thing. What are the values that you stand for now? If you had to pass on a message to your grandkids or to a random listener listening, what are the things you believe in now?

John Dehlin [00:33:46] You know, do you still believe in God? Do you still believe in, you know, church religion? Or is it just more of secular values? What, what is your testimony today?

Sara Urquhart [00:33:56] I am grateful for the abilities that I have. I'm great. I'm grateful. And I think the world would be a better place if we could, without shame, identify our abilities and then serve people with those abilities. And that is what I have done and that is what I continue to do. I am hyper honest. I want to be so good to people and I want to be very fair.

Sara Urquhart [00:34:33] Those are things that are very important to me. I want to be kind. That one is actually hard for me. I'm not as kind as I should be. And you know, and that breaks my heart when I have an exchange that's bad. But I'm, you know, if I could be better if I'm hard working and I think of same thing, if we could all be out there to serve and work hard. We didn't talk about this at all, but there's a sense of service in the church. But that's part of what I came away saying is there's a lot of fake service in the church and if we would take that time that we were giving to the church for fake service and give real service.

Sara Urquhart [00:35:16] And that is what I've tried to do. I've tried to fill my life not only with this new job that I, that I built in this career, but with real service. I just think there's so much good I can do in this world, and that is what I'm trying to do.

Sara Urquhart [00:35:32] You know, it's part of my testimony. I always thank you. I love my family, and I'm so grateful for my family. They've brought me great joy. My marriage has, you know, has been probably the happiest thing of my life. It's not perfect, but it's. It is for sure the happiest. And, you know, for all of those things, I'm very grateful. I have moved away from needing religion, from believing in God. That could change again.

Sara Urquhart [00:36:01] I was surprised. It was fluid, and it is, but I haven't needed that. I've found solace in some independence, and so I'm grateful for that. And so I have tried to fill my life with those things. And you are needed, whatever your talents. There are so many people that need you right now. And so to speak to the people, to either my grandchildren or a listener, find where you're needed because somebody is aching for you and they need you right now. And give that time and give of yourself, and our world will be better.

John Dehlin [00:36:41] All right, so, Sarah, Stanley Urquhart, thank you so much for joining us on Mormon Stories. It's been a real pleasure. You're inspiring to me, and if you're inspiring me, I'm sure you're inspiring our audience.

Sara Urquhart [00:36:55] I hope so.

John Dehlin [00:36:56] Thank you so much. Thank you, listeners. Thank you so much for tuning in today and always those of you who support us financially, you make this possible. Your donations are tax deductible, and they go to making this podcast possible.

John Dehlin [00:37:13] Sometimes these donations sort of trickle down over time as people sort of move on and lose interest in Mormonism. So if you've been listening, if you've been appreciating Mormon Stories, but you don't contribute, I would just ask you to please consider contributing, because at some point, if those continue to trickle, then we have stops. So please go up to MormonStories.org or any of the Open Stories foundation podcasts and click the donate button and become a monthly subscriber if you can. And that's what makes all this possible, because we don't have subscribers or we don't have sponsors. Yeah, maybe we should, but it's a bit of a niche.

John Dehlin [00:37:50] It's a bit of a niche, but maybe. Maybe we should. Anyway, thanks to everyone who listens. Go to the blog MormonStories.org, make comments there. Hopefully Sarah can check those out and make comments as well. But thanks again for all your support and enjoy your next several weeks and months. Or years, whatever is coming up for you. And again, please join us again soon on Mormon Stories podcast. Sarah, thanks again.

Sara Urquhart [00:38:16] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:38:17] Take care.

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