In Episode 41 of Resilient Now, Liliana Brown sits down with author, journalist, mother, grandmother, and homeschooling pioneer Becky Cerling Powers for a conversation about faith, family, caregiving, and finding strength during overwhelming seasons of life.

What happens when life asks you to carry more than you ever expected?

Meet Becky Cerling Powers, and you’ll discover an amazing story of resilience on so many levels. Becky is a phenomenal example of what it looks like to take one resilient action after another—especially when life doesn’t go as planned.

Becky shares what happened after her family moved to the El Paso area in the 1980s and took a 40% cut in income. At the same time, she was homeschooling three children, helping care for her father-in-law as his Alzheimer’s disease progressed, supporting her mother-in-law—who, yes, lived to be 102 years old—and navigating stretches when her husband’s work took him away from home.

And then there was homeschooling.

Becky takes us inside the early days of homeschooling in Texas, when families like hers faced tremendous uncertainty and became part of a larger legal fight over the right to educate their children at home.

Years later, Becky can look back and see what came from those difficult seasons. Her children grew up, pursued higher education, and built careers of their own. Meanwhile, Becky’s experiences as a mother and homeschooler became part of her own work as a journalist and writer.

Becky also shares the remarkable story behind her book, A Forbidden Orphanage Outside the Forbidden City, and how researching the life of her relative Laura Richards—who cared for children in China through war, famine, and upheaval—deepened Becky’s own understanding of resilience.

Through it all, Becky returns to one simple and powerful idea:

“Resilience comes from reliance.”

For Becky, that reliance is rooted in her faith in God.

This is an episode about homeschooling, caregiving, family, faith, and what happens when life doesn’t go according to plan. Most of all, it’s a reminder that resilience doesn’t always mean carrying everything by yourself. Sometimes resilience means knowing what—and who—you can rely on.

Stay resilient now.