Pamela D. Smith is an amazing spiritually gifted International speaker, author, and founder of RP Smith Publishing & Go(o)d Girl Life Enrichment Ministry. Motivated by God and his promises, her movement is Success & Spirituality, Proverbs 16:3. Pamela encourages, equips, and empowers others to align their success goals with their spirituality in order to live a life of peace, purpose, and productivity. She does this through evangelizing, speaking, personal development and business coaching to authors and consulting self-publishers. | Midori Star Media Group
Back as long as I can remember, I always kept a journal. I’ve always loved to write. When I would go back and read things that I’d written without giving it any thought, it just flowed so well. I started using some of my old writings, like the ones when I was going through hard times in life – I would just go back and look at a notebook from like three years ago and it would just encourage me. When I realized that God was calling me and leading me into ministry, I decided that I would use my writing as my ministry.
What’s interesting about Pamela is that although she’s an international speaker, she really does not like speaking in from of people. Her writing is where she felt the most comfortable, but she’ll tell you that God told her, “no, you’re going to do both. Get up and let your voice be heard.”
Saying yes to my calling and using my writing, something that I’ve done since I was a little girl, as part of a tool to reach people.
Writing is truly Pamela’s passion. So much so that she founded RP Smith Publishing as a consulting service to assist people with their self-publishing. Recently Pamela came to the decision to limit her consulting due to it starting to overshadow her ministry and keep her out of focus on the main objective which aligns with her movement, Success & Spirituality.
I just started it. It’s more about helping women align their success goals with their spirituality. How it came about is – I pretty much shied away from my definition of success is and highlighting my accomplishments, because growing up in a small town – you could spot the successful women. They wore the high heels, the nice dresses, lipstick and handbags. The elders would labels those women as ‘cocky’ and ‘arrogant.’ So I kind of shied away from being like those women without really knowing that it’s okay to be successful and spiritual. It doesn’t take away from your spirituality being successful. Those women were labeled ‘greedy’ or ‘money hungry’ because she was a working woman. You know back then, women weren’t really pursuing entrepreneurship like we are today.
I want women to understand that whatever her definition of success is, it needs to be individualized and personalized, and not the universal definition. Once she has defined that for herself, it’s okay for her to walk in that. It doesn’t mean you’re greedy because you have to charge for your service. It doesn’t mean you’re not spiritual because you’re balancing entrepreneurship or work with church life. Those older cities that I grew up in, they made church be your life. Once you grew up, you’re thinking that going to church is what it’s about – you then realize it’s about relationship and you begin to pull away from the church.
So I think there have just been a lot of women who grew up in those settings who just shied away from successful and not being afraid to walk in it. It’s about aligning the two together and realizing that it’s okay to want to be successful and it doesn’t take away from the spirituality as long as your know how to balance it.
I agree! My parents are both from small towns in Northeast Mississippi area. When I was younger, church was LIFE! Sunday morning was church. Sunday evening was church. You literally had enough time in between the two services to eat Sunday dinner (late afternoon lunch), wash dishes, and gossip for about 5 minutes. Everybody in the house was going to church. Period. If you weren’t in church male or female, you were basically considered a heathen. LOL! It didn’t matter if you worked all week long or if you pulled an all-night-er.
I believe more so that it’s a generational gap issue, because more young women are getting degrees more so than they are getting married, having babies, and taking care of the home. Women are making their own marks in corporate America, and blasting through glass ceilings. I believe while the vision to be greater and utilize gifts have magnified, I do not believe women who work are less spiritual.
That worked in their time because they didn’t have all of these responsibilities. I do think that sometime we put more on ourselves than we should, but we’re working outside the home and have a lot more responsibilities. Just because she can only come to work on Sunday, doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a relationship with God. The relationship is not really inside the church. That’s just a building where you go to recharge and refuel. I’m all for going to church as much as you can, but I don’t like when people who don’t go are made to feel like they don’t love God, they don’t love God, they don’t want anything to do with God because they aren’t there every time the doors are open.
If I’m tired and burnt out and serving with the wrong motive, God isn’t honored in that way. So I might as well be honest and serve one ministry and not do four or five.
Pamela’s Success & Spirituality movement is streamlined through speaking engagements and social media. She’s even decided to present her movement through a women’s workshop in 2020. It made me think… success and spirituality… why don’t we pray over our businesses?
Ministry is not narrowed down to the pulpit. Some people have ministries that may never get called to the microphone or behind a podium. It’s more of a lifestyle – what you put into the atmosphere, your presence, your actions…
It’s not about getting up and preaching and reading scriptures. Are you being drone into what people are doing when they’re gossiping or being negative or are your changing the discussion into something positive and graceful.
Y’all know I’ve always felt like my work is my ministry. Your passion is your ministry. You ideas do not just appear out of air. God plants seeds and it’s up to us to water and nurture it.
I really need to put in the work to become more visible here [Dallas, TX]. I’m waiting to expand and I’m working a strategy – more ministry work in the community. Things that does not require me to go and preach, but I go and do ministry in love. That’s one way I want to be more visible.
Remember she loves to write, so she actually puts herself on a writing schedule and sticks to it. In March 2019, Pamela released her 7th book, “The Doors of the Church Are Open: Staying Committed to Christ Even When The Church Fails You,” a Christian fiction empowerment book highlighting the decline of church attendance. Her latest book, “She Wont’ Fail: 12 Steps to Aligning Success Goals with Spirituality In Order to Prosper” was release in June 2019.
This book is talking about being a woman of grace, planning, integrity, and being humble. My advice to young writers, is to seek God, be bold and courageous enough to walk in it.
Giving her all to God and allowing him to work through her as she fulfills her purpose, Pamela is available for speaking engagements at conferences, workshops, seminars, church services, corporate events, and to host a book signing. | Midori Star Media Group