Being Okay With Who I Am: So Long, Doubt. Hello, Freedom.

I've come to a place in life where I'm okay with who I am. Not everyone can say this, I know. So I want to share a little bit about how I got here. 

For the majority of my life, I camouflaged myself to blend in.  I kept fairly quiet and smiled a lot, trying not to create a fuss.  Making myself as easy to get along with as possible, I never wanted to be anyone's enemy.  It was my self-protecting social tactic, which actually saved me a lot of drama throughout my school years. But it led to years of identity crisis.

My greatest motivator was to be liked.  I was (and still am, at times) a Grade A people pleaser.

All that I can point back to as a reason for this, is a combination of being a first-born child, as well as, growing up with divorced parents. I was happiest when others were happy with me- my teachers, my family, my friends. 

Unfortunately, the moods and opinions of others are hardly a reliable anchor for your self-esteem. It's probably safe to assume that everyone usually has their own best interest in mind, which can lead to those confusing thoughts that swirl around: Wait, why don't they agree with me?  Why haven't they called? Why do they talk to me that way? 

And then a crazy cycle ensues: I feel secure when others affirm me. When their presence or encouragement is absent, I feel insecure. I attempt to make things right or find another source of confidence, only to find my worth in the same unpredictable good graces of the people around me.

Then I am back to where I started:

Not knowing who I am, apart from what others think of me.  Always trying to prove to myself and to others that I was somebody.  But I was a mirage- a glimmer of who I wanted to be. Not solid, settled, or grounded.

Can anyone relate?

That all changed when, at a particularly low point a few years ago, a sweet woman I met in counseling asked me questions that stopped my unhealthy thought patterns:

Who ARE you?  Are you who THEY say you are?  Are you who you THINK you are? Or are you who GOD says you are?

It all comes down to what you believe.  And sometimes, you don't even realize the lies you've accepted as truth, until you're forced to take a really hard look at yourself. No matter how you FEEL, "the truth will set you free." 

The truth is that:

You are not alone.

You are loved and accepted.

You are valuable.

In the Bible, reminding yourself of what God promises, is what we call "renewing our minds." It doesn't get easy to re-train old habits, until you've practiced the good ones. Over and over, choose to believe that God has a plan and purpose for you- that no part of your personality or your story is useless. Don't waste precious time treading the waters of doubt.

We are living, growing people.  That means that we weren't meant to stay the same or burrow underground in fear.  We are always in a state of becoming.

Be okay with your areas of weakness, because it causes you to connect with friends who help you become stronger.  And your strengths (yes, you have them), can help someone else. All of these combined, make you more dependent on your Maker, which lets His glory and power shine through you. 

I once believed that I had nothing to offer. My constant need to be approved by others and the endless amount of comparing my abilities, brought me down to a place of hopeless anxiety.  I never, EVER want to go back there. 

Questioning myself and my worth is a dark and paralyzing place.

Knowing who I am and being at peace with who I am becoming, is light and freedom.

So when I hear a friend doubting herself, I have an immediate urge to grab the largest mirror and verbally re-create the image that she sees.  You ARE beautiful!  You are SO talented!  You are NOT crazy!  Believe me!  Believe God!

"For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago (Eph. 2:10)."

When you know who you truly are, it's like waking up from a bad dream. It's a sigh of relief. It's realizing, I'm okay.

A Working Faith

As I approached the new year, I started to become aware of a mistaken mindset that I've had for a long time.  I have been seeing a trend in how skewed beliefs affect my decision-making.  All this time I blindly functioned with the assumption that I was doing the best I could.  

But what I have realized is this:  there is a glitch in my faith.

When  faced with something that seemed hard, I immediately translated that to mean that I wouldn't do it.  It's not because I was intentionally being rebellious or lazy.  I just considered obstacles as closed doors.  The difficulties were obvious signs that it wasn't the right time to take that path.  If it was remotely complicated, I thought that it wasn't meant to be.

Oh, ye of little faith.

What I have missed with this way of thinking is that space between the here and the supernatural.  Somewhere, faith and hope and peace and joy are floating around us unseen.  All these spiritual gifts, are just waiting to be inhaled into our souls- where we can't touch belief, but we can feel it.  

We can sense God in that place, holding out to us tiny wrapped packages. But we wonder if they're for someone else.  Or if we take a gift, we say, "Thank you," admire the thought, then set it aside and never use it.

Something like faith, was never meant to sit on a shelf.  It may appear a small thing, but it is packed with potential.  Faith can spark big things.  It can produce miracles.  It can change everything.  

Faith can.

When that race looks impossibly long, and we don't think we can finish...Faith can.

When starting over seems like a joke, because we haven't succeeded before...Faith can.

When there's no proof and there's no chance, faith swoops in and messes up all of our logic.

Faith is the substance of things hoped for- the evidence of things unseen.

It's not easy to explain.  And yet there are all these stories of one prayer, one person, one life-changing decision that have been traced back to just a little bit of faith.  Someone just took God for his word, opened his gift, and gave faith a try.

Faith works. 

But faith without works is dead.  It's unusable.  It's a thing without batteries or an operator.  It just sits their lifeless.  Wasted.

So really, there wasn't a glitch in my faith over the years.  I had forgotten to take my gift out of the box and turn on the switch. I thought that "having faith" would be enough.  Possessing it. Calling it mine.

When Jesus healed the crippled, the diseased, the blind, He accredited their faith for making them well. They asked.  They moved in a direction.  They looked for Him and found Him. 

It was their last chance.  It was worth the trouble and travel and criticism. It was their opportunity, and they took it.

Their faith WALKED.  It HEALED.  It WORKED.  Jesus said so.

Our faith is a combination of believing, doing, and Jesus. It's the point right before giving up and right after acknowledging that it's a team effort.  

So what if it's hard?

It comes down to this: Do I believe God enough to obey what He is asking of me, even if it doesn't look like it will work?  I can admit that I am limited, but God isn't.  I can only do so much, but at least I'm not standing still.  Activating my faith just means that I start, and then He and I finish...together.

And practice makes perfect, right? 

 "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only..." -James 1:22