God never wants us to be someone we’re not- He created us as we are for a reason, even if we sometimes feel like a complete and total mess or mistake. We never need to pretend to be someone else.
Easier said than done.
When I look around, I get so caught up in everyone else. I get caught up in the lives of the people around me- what she is doing and where he is going and how successful she is. I become so absorbed in their lives that I forget how to be my own person (Hint: this is called codependency, and it’s a beast.) How everyone else seems to be living their lives to the full while I am over here standing still and paralyzed- feeling lost, confused, and left behind.
Now, I know this isn’t true and we are all on our own journey. There’s no use in looking around and feeling like a failure because guess what: most everyone else is doing the same thing. We all see from our tinted lenses; mine just happens to be the lens of perfection.
If she is good at this, I must be better or else I am worthless.
If he doesn’t like me, there must be something wrong with me.
Why do I keep chasing this unattainable goal, try to be this person that I never can be?
God’s grace is enough.
While I still don’t understand exactly what God is doing or the path I am supposed to be on, I know that He is a loving Father and He does not punish us: He confronts us with the things that need to be confronted, and then He heals us. He wants us to get well, to become more whole, to become more like Him.
The more we become like Him, the more we become fully ourselves.
I don’t want to be who others think I should be, or even necessarily who I think I should be. I want to be who God says I am, and live fully into that. I still need to figure out what that means, but I know that I am a work in progress and looking outside of Him for answers isn’t going to get me anywhere.
A great blogger I discovered wrote these words:
Your calling is meant for you, not everyone else. Everybody may not get it, and that’s okay. It’s not for them. They weren’t designed for this. You were. God didn’t place it in their heart. He placed it in yours. If we left the purposes and plans of our life in the hands of people, our entire life would be conformed to what people want to see instead of who God made us to be, and that’s just no way to live. ~Brittney Moses (http://brittneyamoses.com)
As I pray for clarity and discernment, the Lord will sustain me and show me where to go next as He reveals more and more of His plans for me, which are so enwrapped and intertwined with my identity and personality. Through trial and error, challenges and failures, I become closer and closer to Him, and therefore closer and closer to myself.
I go forward in courage, empowered by His grace and love for me.
rhythms of grace 