Not Who Am I, But Where's My Place In This World?

When someone's struggling to figure out "who they are" - it isn't that they don't know themselves, but their purpose has become a question rather than a known answer.

A midlife crisis is one of those seasons, as is an empty nest, an involuntary career change, a chronic illness, a divorce, widowhood. When my girls left home, I filled my time with hobbies - not because that was my purpose, but it distracted me from the unfocused and uncomfortable feeling of being lost, a little boat cut loose from its anchor. 

Who am I?  Not exactly, more accurately - What's my purpose now?  What's my direction?  I spent many years focused on those people who now feel like bugs under a microscope, so I have to take responsibility for redirecting myself.

A season of discovery.  A short season of naval gazing, perhaps, to figure out what I had to offer and making a decision of where and how to make the offer. My most developed skill set revolved around motherhood and family. But beneath that skill set is the desire that influenced me to be the mother I am/was.

That desire needed to be discovered and understood.  It was the natural expression of what became important to me as I navigated my own life.

Are you in a season of wondering "Is this all there is?"  If so, I can tell you - the answer is no.  I don't need to know where you are, to know that if you feel that way - there is more for you.  Have hope and keep reaching out.

The Voices In My Head and YOURS!

Friday morning, I was up at 5:30! I haven't even seen 5:30 in years and years - except when I had the flu and was recovering from surgery.

By 6:15 I'd had breakfast, packed my car, filled my coffee cup - making 5:30 almost civilized – and was heading for Nashville.

Over the weekend, I was 'discovered' and will be singing duets with country stars by next week. HA! No, I was heading to Jon Acuff's Quitter conference. Jon writes the blog StuffChristiansLike.net. He's written a book of the same title as well as one titled “Quitter.”

The overall message of the conference, as I experienced it, was don't be ashamed of the dreams you hold that bring you joy. Pursue them, develop them, and understand that your dreams aren't only for you. You are the caretaker of your dreams. (By dreams, I don't mean when you're a ninja conquering the bad guys at the court house in your sleep. At least, for most of us that isn't what I mean – who am I to judge your dream?)

All that was wonderful. I took notes, networked and bought a poster. I go to every conference with a prayer for God to reveal His plan for my next step. Most times it's a glaring spotlight impossible to miss.

This conference had some solid information and direction for me. And then there was the “reveal”. It wasn't shiny and bright, but more a warm glow of companionship in those places of our hearts that we don't talk about. The party we throw then fear that no one will show up and they don't, or the voices we hear in our heads that remind us of who we “really” are. (This would be the kind that no medication c an help.)

Each of us have this cruel inner voice intent on speaking a message of doubts, accusations and hurtful memories until we sit down and shut up. Until we quit. Each of us. All of us. When we do, the voice becomes softer – just a whisper that keeps us in our seat. This weekend, we shared the message of our voice in public. Around the room of about 400 people, voices raised and we heard...

       “That's selfish!”

       “You aren’t smart enough.”

       “It didn't work last time.”

       “You're too old.”

       “You're too young.”

 laughter - we began to see the reliability of this "voice"

       “Who are you to think you have something to offer?”

       “That's already been done.”

       “Something that obvious doesn't need to be shared.”

If more people listened to that voice and responded by sitting down and shutting up – we wouldn't even be getting water at the well in the yard, reading by candlelight or riding to town in a horse drawn cart. All the dreams that brought us indoor plumbing, lighting and motorized transportation were fulfilled by people willing to be caretakers of their dreams. Willing to share their dreams with the world. They refused to be neutralized by that voice. Because of that, we're aware of need and injustice in our world and able to help people half a world away.

I believe we serve an outward enemy when we allow ourselves to entertain that inner voice. An enemy who wants our feet trapped and slowed by deep mud, hands tied behind our back, mouths covered with sticky duct tape. He promises us no rewards except the drudgery of nothing unexpected, no adventure, no risk, no faith and yet with that horrible voice speaking to us we sign on as accomplices.

I believe it's the opposition of the One wanting you to step onto a path he lights as you go. He has gifts for you and you must hold out your hands to receive them. He's placed a song in your heart and expects you to not only sing it, but live it.

My voice tells me, “You should've started 20 years ago. You'll never get past the learning stage. No one will take you seriously. Just look for ways to enjoy your life.”

So, what is the voice saying that threatens to make you sit down and shut up? 

Are We Trying to Communicate? Or Audition for a Reality Show?

Nothing can hinder change of heart more than being personally attacked. When our thoughts are attacked and our character slandered, everything our attacker says is suspect. If they are so wrong about who I am, they don't have much credibility. After all, I'm not an expert on much, but I've lived with me longer than anyone else has. 

When we're attacked and misunderstood, we dig in our heels, get our hackles up, stick to our guns, our story, our plan. We grow our backbone, stiffen our resolve, close our minds, put up walls and a million other clichés to say we protect our beliefs in a determined and stubborn way.

It isn't always because we hate to be wrong. Sometimes it's very exciting to discover I've been wrong. It means I've learned something and grown. I have a hard time admitting I've been wrong when I feel someone is out to destroy me, though. As though they don't really have an interest in sharing information, but solely in proving they are right and I'm not, making sure I cannot leave the conversation with any sense of dignity. They want me to know I've been pwned lost.

It would be easy to say those people are just jerks. And sometimes I've said just that. Sometimes I've used stronger language, rolled my eyes and wholly helped them to continue and actually expand on this obnoxious behavior by pushing back – hard! But this lack of civility is childish and immature.

Instead of valuing the possibility of sharing insight and knowledge, our culture values the opportunity to humiliate other people in order to puff ourselves up. Look at reality television and you'll see our culture actually considers this horrible trait entertaining!

It's been very difficult to find people to learn from. I'm on this journey to understand and get a personal grasp on what's important to people ideologically different from myself. It takes plenty of humility (yeah, this is a place where I'm growing – and I started as a tiny mustard seed, so I may be only the size of an acorn about now). I remind myself I want to get past the frustration, anger and hard protective shells to the REAL man or woman. 

Unless we're going to become a country of sequestered cliques, only talking to the people deemed worthy to be in our circle, thinking exactly like we think, stroking our egos with their agreement and never putting ourselves in the other girl's shoes... we have to grow up. We have to get in there and open ourselves up to the criticism and show a different way of communicating... by practicing the “listening” part – not just to twist a sound bite, but to grasp a deeper understanding.

Racism is born and raised in ignorance. One would hope we've learned this, but our continued attachment to believing people are just subsets of groups, instead of individuals, reveals we've just shifted our target to a different group. We insult, humiliate, and slander one another. We stereotype and blame entire groups of people for the actions of one or just a few. We're too lazy to get to know people, instead assigning a label and saving ourselves the time and effort of making our own decisions.

“Those who will not reason, are bigots, those who cannot, are fools, and those who dare not, are slaves.” - Lord Byron

Nothing proves this point more than when someone comes face to face with someone who defies all their prejudices... one of two things happens. They either ridiculously try to reveal that this is all a ploy and deep down they really do fit the stereotype though there is no evidence of it, or they stand slack jawed and silent... because they never really considered this to be a possibility.

Last minute addition to this post - I'm not alone... look what I found Bullies, Politicians, Me. Same same?

Hands Off! That's Someone Else's Guy!

If you look across the table at Olive Garden and you're annoyed by all the things that guy is... you may be on someone else's dream date. But it isn't yours. Now, you can complain, nag, and try to mold him into someone else – all the while hating that he doesn't love you “for yourself.” - or you can wake up and realize... You're dating someone else's guy. Your guy is out there looking for you, and you're wasting time with Becky's guy, and wasting Becky's guy's time. 

A man isn't something you construct like Build-A-Bear or Mr. Potato Head. Just as you have been encouraged to “be yourself,” by people you love – his people told him the same thing. He won't turn into an animal lover just because you drag home 4 cats and 2 dogs – so if that's a deal breaker for you, be a big girl and break the deal.

Some of us have married someone else's guy. Years of feeling unaccepted and unaccepting, unloved and unloving inside a marriage isn't worth the time you saved by not waiting for YOUR guy and running down the aisle with someone else's guy. I wonder if we think he'll fit better when we break him in... like cute shoes that are made for someone else's feet. 

Many marriages are unhappy because the wrong two people are in them, not because there's something wrong with one spouse or the other. 

So, how do you not marry someone else's guy? 

Don't date him once you realize that at least one of you doesn't really like the other. Sometimes dating feels like a stock market investment. You hate to call it a loss and pull out for fear that the next day incredible riches, or in this case a complete personality change, would fall your way. People don't change into other people. They may learn something, improve some bad habits.. but someone's identity isn't a bad habit. 

If you are already whining (even if only in your head) that he is selfish and won't do what you like to do... perhaps he doesn't like doing what you like to do. Sometimes women can be happy as long “as we're together.” I've learned many many MANY men do NOT share that quality. It isn't that you aren't irresistible enough and you aren't going to win this one in time. You will never have more power in being irresistible than while you're dating. In 5 years he will do LESS of what he doesn't want to do, not more.

If you feel as though you're suffocating or more lonely than when you're single – examine your needs for intimacy. If you have commitment issues – see a therapist. If commitment isn't an issue for you – get out. People with vastly different needs for emotional intimacy should not marry one another. The tendency will be for one will feel suffocated and the other intense loneliness.

If you're a Christian and he's an atheist, agnostic or follows another religion, you date at your own peril. Intimate relationships impact the people in them. Winning a man and losing your faith is foolish. It isn't something to play around with. If you think you've been brokenhearted over a man, it's nothing when compared to being brokenhearted over losing who God is to you. I've been there and you truly need to trust me on this.

He stands you up, you stand him up, you text him so often he has to take his phone with him to pee, he gets a little crazy because you didn't take his call and you happened to be “in the stirrups.” Move along. Nothing good is happening here. 

So, what if you're already married to someone else's guy. Well, it isn't going to be a Cinderella story, but that doesn't mean you have to abandon your commitment. You will need to grow up and rise to the occasion if you don't want a life of constant bickering and disrespect – unless you'd rather sulk and feel sorry for yourself.

• If you need help coming to terms with this, see a therapist. If you're emotionally unfulfilled, dig deeper into your relationship with God. I mean REALLY deep. 
• Develop close relationships with other women. Don't play the martyr and waste away – do the things you like to do and allow him the freedom to do the same with friends of the same sex. Don't play around with platonic relationships with the opposite sex. For your situation, it's unwise. 
• Put some effort into finding common interests rather than sulk that he hates the ballet, hates NCIS, and hates folk music. 
• Accept him for who he is. Be kind. Be honest about seeking to find common ground and ways for you to find contentment as a couple. I have news for you – he isn't as oblivious as you think. Chances are pretty good you've been blaming him for “being himself” for quite awhile and this new approach could be a breath of fresh air.

If you have words of wisdom – or a funny story about dating someone else's guy - to add to this topic, please share them in the comments.

Since You Aren't Doing Anything Important...

“Since you're home all day, could you...?” “You don't have kids holding you back, so you can do whatever you want, can you....?” “Well, I knew you'd be off today so, can you...?” “They always say busy people get things done, so I thought I'd call you – you're one of the busiest people I know...”

I started a computer services business in 1993, working from home. I had unrealistic expectations of what working from home entails.

Fantasy #1. Wake up, have a relaxing coffee, make breakfast. Get my work done. Go to the bank and deposit the amount of money that covers 150% of my household needs and wants. Have lunch with a friend or my mother. Buy some office supplies. Straighten up the already tidy house. (Pffft!!!) Cook a nice dinner and relax for the evening.

Fantasy #2. The entire family works together on keeping the house up. My work day is 8-4 with regularly scheduled breaks where I would smile at my family members who are all doing their own thing quietly in some other area of the house during my work hours.

The Work At Home Reality – You want to work from home for the freedom it will give you! Your children, regardless of age, are unable to quietly do anything – pour a bowl of cereal, find their socks, dress themselves, pick up the remote control, locate the milk. The amount of errands that need done has multiplied, since you're home. A friend calls you at 10:30 in the midst of a bawling meltdown because she's maybe getting a divorce and everyone else is “at work”.. and she knew you'd be home. A relative and another friend also call daily during your work hours and just have to tell you "one thing" before they'll let you hang up... one very long, emotionally exhausting thing. Your mother wants to go to lunch once a week, because you need a break honey! You spend Tuesday morning at the pediatrician with a child exhibiting signs of strep throat, then pick up the prescription and special foods and spend the rest of the day running to their assistance because apparently the strep has disabled their legs and they can't reach the remote control, a glass of juice, a blanket, a pillow, their stuffed animal or a new roll of toilet paper. At 3 o'clock you vow to at least return phone calls from your business voice mail. At 3:30 the rest of the crew gets home and bursts into your office. You hold the phone to your left ear and wave frantically with your right hand to shush them. They ignore you and continue yelling their news to you through the closet door where you finally retreat – plugging one ear with a finger and getting into the corner farthest from the door. Your potential customer thinks you're an amateur. A lonely client keeps you on the phone for almost an hour while your family eats dinner without you.  You want to go back to work to escape.  Everyone thinks you are "living the dream!"

People didn't respect my boundaries, because I had none. I felt compelled to juggle it all. After all, I wanted to work for myself so I could be there for the important things. I just had no idea there would be so many!

After a day in my “reality”, I wasn't creative enough or energetic enough to market, run and grow my business. I worked into the evenings, but it wasn't my best work. I was angry, frustrated, exhausted. I wanted to “get it done” with the least amount of personal investment necessary because I was tapped out. I no longer had the ability to say no without a reason, or justification that would be “acceptable.” I felt that way for years after the business closed. It had a numbing effect. I expected myself to do MORE with less... always. 

If you won't prioritize and control how you spent my time, others will. You'll feel powerless and resentful. I wasn't my own boss... I had 4-8 bosses spending my time and energy between them. 

Years passed and this Superwoman role became a part of my identity. So had the stress of feeling out of control and on call for emergencies both real and imagined. Some days it became an effort to breathe.

After a panic attack that felt more like a heart attack, I promised my husband things would change. For a time, I avoided people since I didn't know how to say no. I'd led everyone to believe I'd always “be there” for them. I started to say no to everything, but I felt I needed an excuse to say no. 

I knew I had to find the power to make my own decisions. I stepped out of the hub of this wheel and tried to connect all those people to one another – encouraging them to lean on each other for a little while.

Eventually most people forgave me for this, but some have had hurt feelings. They've felt abandoned and unloved. They felt “pushed off” on other people. I said no to almost everything – going from one extreme to another as they saw it. 

It took several years before I could say yes or no honestly. Changing direction was hard, but it was way past time for me to grow up and act like an adult in my own life. Not carrying the weight of the world has reminded me that only God can be God in the lives of others. When people are not able to comfort us, God comforts us best and helps us to change.

How can you know who you are if your entire life is lived at the will of the people around you? If you've not made the decisions for the direction your life would take? If you deny the things that would be “best” in order to serve the things that are only “good?” If you've never taken the time to identify them for yourself? 

For one week - take 15 minutes each day to sit quietly with pen and paper. Ask yourself and God – Am I saying “yes” when I should say “no”? If I said “no” to those things... what things would I be free to say “yes” to? Come back and share your “best” list with us!

I Don't Live in a Billboard Picture of a Beach Vacation

I read a story this morning, in a magazine called The Sun. It was about a young woman just before and years after her older sister disappeared at the age of 16. The sister was found, years later, murdered. 

The author expressed the emptiness, regret, horror, fear, suspicion, danger, loss, fragility of relationships – so perfectly to my own imagination it made me cry. This had been my greatest fear. I didn't want to feel this.  

More than 3/4s of my life I lived in that fear – what happened in this fictional story could truly happen to anyone. My mother was taken from me in my fearful, terrorized imagination many times as a child. But not in reality. My life has been filled with fear of the tragic taking someone from me. My mother, my dad, my husband, my little children, my teenaged children, my adult children, my grandchildren, my pets. 

Writing requires honesty, if you desire to share something meaningful. In the past, however, I haven't handled visits to my painful memories very well.  I thought perhaps I should avoid all thoughts of them. But, it isn't honest to share a picture of joy and spiritual freedom with no context. So, those painful fears are relevant. They are part of the story, the “before” picture, truth. If I refuse to “go there”, to recall what I've been delivered from... what I share will be as superficial and shallow as a billboard picture of a beach vacation. 

For many years, I believed that my fears and pain had to be someone's “fault.” Someone was responsible, if not for a direct action then for failing to take preventative measures. Blame was a close friend to me for decades. It was assigned to whoever was deemed the “root” of the pain I was experiencing. But, no one was truly able to insulate me from every discomfort. 

Most times, the people I held accountable were doing the best they could, with no desire to harm.  They had no control of the neuroses that could grow from nursing a tiny injury that I didn't seek to heal. Sometimes the smallest event can spread like a crazed fracture in a plate of glass tapped not so very hard but under just the right set of circumstances. 

Blame pours its inky black stain all over your images of that person. You cover them so thoroughly that their image no longer bears the truth. Nothing is able to shine through the opaque covering of a handful of actions or decisions amidst millions of intentions, actions and decisions that reveal the true character and identity of the ones you blame. 

So, while I must “go there” and remember where I began, that pot of ink is a boundary. I have no business opening it and no right to pour it over another. Yes, it hurt. But mine is not a life of stagnant victimization. It's a life of movement and growth, gaining strength and wisdom... which one cannot do if she covers every flawed human being in her history with the opaque black ink of blame. We are all flawed. Our decisions and actions may tap on another's pane of glass. Some of these are our children. If we teach them to blame, we help them to spill the ink, grow their fears, hide from wisdom and live at the mercy of the brokenness. 

We aren't whitewashing anything, just recognizing that the painful truths aren't the entire truth. Don't let your story end with ink stained hands, ink covered relatives, and bitterness and injury haunting you like wraiths. It isn't what God intended for you.

Summer, Sunscreen, and Sadistic Swimsuits.

Arrgghh. I'm 48 years old. My face has completed a disappointing eight year run. It's worse when I wear my glasses, but if I take them off, I look as good as I did 5 years ago. I had a nightmare a few weeks ago that my entire cheek area resembled the wrinkly bottom of my big toe when I've spent too long in the tub. I slather on that 25 SPF cream from Mary Kay.

I'll guarantee you have rarely seen me dressed for the weather, if the temperature is above 78 degrees. Smaller clothes do not adequately conceal my upper arms, my thighs, or the relaxed nature of my muscle tone. When people have called me uptight – they weren't referring to my muscle tone.

I vow I'll be ready for summer this year, every year. My aversion to sweating tends to interfere with my lofty visions of the knockout body, however. It's July, and I'm not ready – again.

I've waited and waited. My husband, the King of Workout Willpower to my Queen of Next Week, I'll Do Cardio a Minimum of 3 Hours and Eat Only Vegetables, I Swear, lounges in our pool in self confident comfort. He plans tubing outings on the river while I consider the unflattering visual of a swimsuit.

Yes, the swimsuit – let's talk about that for a second. A swimsuit bottom is designed to hold onto your bones or hard muscle, no matter how deep into the flesh it must venture to locate it. When you're 10, you are jumping off diving boards – it's an important feature. At 48, I just don't want it to slide off when I climb the pool ladder. The swimsuit top, however, is less obvious in its intentions. The strap around my back is always good and tight; I spend a lot of time moving it to the most flattering location amidst the back fat. The strap around my neck is a no win situation, mostly because of the inadequacy of the cup area. The cup area relaxes in the lovely summer weather, apparently unaware that it isn't on vacation, it's ON DUTY. As a result, I have to really tighten that neck strap to keep the cup tops in a semi-modest location. About 20 minutes into this wardrobe debacle, the strap becomes part of the spinal cord at the base of my neck.

My husband enjoys telling the story of me walking out of the water at Hammonasset Beach with a big smile on my face declaring the water beautiful, my bosoms completely revealed thanks to failure of structural integrity in the straps of my brand new one-piece swimsuit.

I've decided I'm as beautiful as I make up my mind to be. Why not? It has to be the form of denial with the most positive side effects. In my mind, I look like Liz Hurley at 35, and I unleash beaming, posh British smiles on passing strangers. I possess NO back fat, and believe that my outfit appears just as it did at home – looking on from the front, with my shoulders back in perfect posture, stomach sucked in til I couldn't breath. When I walk away, I believe no one can see me if I'm not looking directly at them. Yesterday, I decided I look better in my underwear and bra than I look in a swimsuit and... so, after my walk, in the privacy of my own secluded back yard, I stripped of my shirt and Capri pants and jumped into the pool. Woo Hoo!

I informed my husband the rest of the world could deal with my lack of perfection, or divorce me... but I'm not missing out on summer this year. I have all these tank tops that are almost brand new, and I can buy shirts with spaghetti straps, and sundresses! I'm packing up my sunblock and my inner beauty and taking them everywhere I want to go.

He laughed and said, "Good, you're much more fun like this!"

In truth, I was quite relieved he responded that way, but I was committed to do this for myself regardless.

Don't Wear a Disguise

When we put on our best clothes, fix our makeup and add the shoes for a business meeting, date, or dinner with the girls - are we really putting on our disguise?  When a woman is put together just so, hair, makeup, nails, shoes, and purse all given the same consideration as her clothes, who do we see?  Do we see the woman at all, or does our eye travel over the exterior and assume we know her.  Confidant, competent, smart, stylish, content. 

Is that woman carrying wounds?  Feeling like she's insignificant?  We assume not.  Yet what could better disguise a vulnerable heart than a Prada bag?

I have to tell you, in my 48 years, I've never appeared to be that package.  I have never had the patience to put all the pieces together at once, and I'd be more likely to wear Jaclyn Smith than to ever even sniff a Prada bag.  I've often believed the costume though.  I've seen her at the mall when I'm in jeans and tennis shoes, wishing I'd worn different shoes and taken time to put on earrings.

My disguise says something very different - 'I am wearing this shirt because it hides back-fat', or perhaps it says - 'Last summer this shirt looked OK on me.  I'm pretending everyone can only see me approaching and no one notices my back-fat.'  You will never see me and wish you'd worn something different.  You're welcome!  I'm all about promoting self acceptance. Glad I could help.

I belong to a phenomenal small group of honest women.  We vary in ages from 20's to 70's.  We're married, widowed, divorced & remarried.  We're thin, we're not. We tan, we don't.  We travel, we're homebodies.  We come from families of all shapes and sizes.  We've been cheerleaders, we've been invisible.  We're graceful, we're klutzy.  We have jobs, careers, make homes, raise kids, and are retired.

A couple months ago we began to share the book Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge.  It's changed us all.  Initially I was a little uncomfortable with the book.  It respected and honored emotions that I'd spent years trying to disown and detach from.

I was shocked to learn every woman at that table is vulnerable.  We have fears that we will never be "enough, or we are "too much" or both.  Our relational nature feels too messy and we put our heart Spanx on to contain and hide the mess, even from those closest to us.

Ironically, we say, "Just be yourself" to our friends and our kids.

One especially disturbing passage from the book is, "Much of what we call our "personalities" is actually the mosaic of our choices for self-protection plus our plan to get something of the love we were created for."

There is something significant in the fact that no matter how amazing the love affair, there is a longing for more.  Nothing quite fills the need.  This is the fruit of Eve's fall - not to punish her/us, but to save us - to send us back to the lover of our souls for the completion we need.

Eve's sin was believing God wasn't really there for her, so she had to take matters into her own hands.  It was mistrust.  She had to know everything God knew so she could feel secure.  We all handle that differently.

Some of us become driven and controlling because the message we believe is "No one will catch you when you fall.  No one will be there for you".   Some of us wear it as neediness - desperately yearning for someone else to fill us and unable to hide it.

But this empty space is in the shape of God.  Only He can fill it.  He made it for Himself.

Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul  by Stasi & John Eldredge

What's holding YOU back?

This past weekend, I attended a seminar that featured Elizabeth George as the primary speaker.  She spoke on loving God with all of our mind, and used one of my favorite verses as her reference - Philippians 4:8.  “Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are honorable, whatever things are right, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things.”

How much of my life would be different if I allowed my thoughts to be held in check against this verse!!!

I have a hard time making solid decisions (ones that I don’t unmake 15 minutes later) in some areas of my life.  If it’s a financial concern - I can make that decision.  If it’s a moral concern - I can make that decision.  When it comes to matters of ministry - I can be a mess.  It takes a Perfect Storm for me to have the confidence to take a stand, make a change, make a move, or put my walking shoes to go somewhere else.

Why am I so afraid?  I took a quiz in Oprah’s magazine this morning.  (Don’t judge me - you know those magazine quizzes are quite enticing!)  It was entitled “What is holding you back?” and it was part of an entire section dedicated to discovering and acting on the discovery of what your purpose is in life.

I had to take the quiz twice.  The first time I had nothing holding me back, but the questions were geared toward career changes - promotions, business start up, ambition.  Easy peasy questions.  Then I substituted ministry situations, as well as a recent acceptance that God wants me to use written or spoken words.  (I hope someday to complete that sentence.  It should say “use written or spoken words to…” and then a result or intended goal.  However, all I know to do today is use the words - God hasn’t filled me in as to what they are supposed to actually DO.)  What a mess I made of that quiz!  Of course, the quiz designer assumed a person was held back by a consistently recurring fear - of success OR of failure OR of disapproval.  I had them all.  My biggest fear of all wasn’t in the results, though.  I’m most afraid of ME.

Too much confidence outside a secular or practical situation is terrifying to me.  I know the downfalls of pride, arrogance, misplaced confidence, ego, incorrect conclusions, or mistaking a circumstance as a sign.  I’ve made every one of those mistakes in one area of my life or another.  I’d rather do nothing than mess up a situation with higher consequences than an angry teenager or a reluctantly cooperative vendor.  I’ll do background support instead of fully using my abilities so that the liability isn’t mine.  “Just following orders, here.”

Do your fears paralyze your drive?  Do your worries stop you in your tracks?  Does your chewing gum lose it’s flavor… oops - occasionally my mind goes on a side trip.  Do you find that by the time you’ve thought through all the variables, possibilities, methods and madness of something - you’ve become bored with the subject and you walk away - believing it’s not for you, or you wouldn’t have lost interest?  Are you looking for a reason to sit on the bench so you don't have to face the uncertainty of the game?

Is God able to use you, or do you believe rational lies  rationalize your way out of each and every opportunity that comes your way.  Fess up! 

Here is how my own trip to the bench sounds in my head. 

“I don’t want to get my ego involved or look like a difficult person, so I will just adjust to changes that I really feel are detrimental to the ministry I’m involved in.  I’m just me, what will they think if I start interjecting my opinions with confidence?  I’ll just be quiet.  I don’t want to seem arrogant or prideful, so I won’t refer to myself as a writer.  There have been centuries, no, millennia of compositions produced by people with amazing lives and important revelations - am I deluded with sinful self-importance to think I could say something that hasn’t already been said - maybe I should just point at other people’s writings.

“This is probably a waste of time to write about so publicly, because there is no usefulness to the tedious and boring sorting out of my psychological, emotional and spiritual baggage.  One day I’ll get blindsided with the revelation that I‘m foolishly diving into a writing pool that I‘m not qualified to swim in.  Am I boring God with my subject material?  Should I write something different?”

It is Satan that accuses the brethren.  He is called the accuser in Revelation 12, but his work is seen many places in the Bible. Elizabeth George shared that when her first manuscript was sent to the publisher - a publisher that requested she write the book in the first place (this wasn’t something she’d pursued out of the blue) it was turned down in a blaze without glory.  She went for a walk that afternoon and in her head, this thought started, “Who did you think you were… to write a book… who do you think you are to think they’d publish it…”  I could hear that accusation in my own head in a multitude of situations and circumstances.

God has an opposing view to Satan‘s accusation that you are mistaken to believe you have something to offer - Psalm 139.  If you want to know exactly what God knows about you - read that chapter.  He’s not only “in the loop” on who you are - he owns the loop.  Verse 14 says - “I will give thanks to you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are your works.”  Are you thankful for how God made you?  This is the chapter of the Bible God brought to Elizabeth’s mind to remind her that she was his wondrous work - fearfully and wonderfully made.  She had the talents he wanted her to have she didn’t have the ones he intended that she didn’t have. 

Not trusting our own discernment when it comes to our aspirations and heart’s desire is normal.  Gideon was visited by an Angel of the Lord and told that he was selected to deliver Israel from the Midianites.  Gideon balked, “Who, me?  Don’t you know that my family is the least in Manasseh, and I’m the BABY of the family!”

God assured Gideon that he would go with him, and yet Gideon had a hard time believing that he, of all the people God had to choose from, was selected by God to do this important thing.  He proceeded to make the angel wait while he prepared an offering.  Gideon didn’t just go out to the barnyard and bring in a lamb - he made bread, put the meat in a basket, put the broth into a pot and brought all of this out to the angel.  The angel touched the offering with his staff and it burst into fire.   Gideon was astonished! 

The angel commanded that Gideon pull down the altar his father built for Baal and present a burnt offering there.  Gideon was too afraid to do so in broad daylight, so he did it under the cover of night.  The community was outraged and when they found out who did this, they requested Gideon’s dad to present Gideon so they could put him to death for what he’d done.

Gideon‘s dad said, “If Baal is mad, let him defend himself.  If he’s a god, surely he can do something about this himself.” 

Gideon was still plagued by the doubt that God had this special thing for him to do.  He told God about it.  Time and again he pleaded for God to not be angry with him, but to provide additional evidence that He truly wanted Gideon to deliver the Israelites.  (I can relate to Gideon’s mistrust of his own senses, can you?)  Not only did God provide reassurance and signs for Gideon, but he whittled away the army Gideon started with from 22,000 to 300.  There would be no doubt at the end of this campaign that God had a plan that no rational general would use as his strategy.

James 1:5 encourages us to take our lacking selves to God directly… “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.”

So, when you find that you don’t have the wisdom to discern whether or not God wants to use you, whether or not you can accomplish his tasks, whether or not he has a plan for you - because of whatever roadblocks from your own past or background make you unfit for duty - take it to him.  Ask for wisdom, and he will give it - without reproach. 

He already knows what you’re feeling and thinking, so if you think you’re going to surprise him with an unknown failing in your character that will shock him…. You are no different than the 5 year old with chocolate all over his face believing that his mother doesn’t know chocolate is one of the desires of his heart - remember Psalm 139 where it says “Even before there is a word on my tongue, Behold, O Lord, Though dost know it ALL.”

You are fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are God’s works and you are one of them.  Only Satan benefits from making you believe that you are a useless mistake.  Only Satan benefits from accusing you of being sinful in acknowledging that God’s word is true and he can not only use someone like you, but he can and wants to use YOU.  It isn’t because you are perfect, because who exactly could you relate to if you were?  Jesus doesn’t need you to minister to him.  He‘s already aware of his own superspectacularness.  It’s when your broken humanity is changed by God into something new and surprising (not surprising to God, but to those that are NOT omniscient) that the miracle occurs.

He gives you the talents he wants you to have.  You possess what he wants you to possess to start his work.  While you may doubt your abilities in relation to others that you believe are better qualified, the truth is this isn’t a job interview, where God will pick just one - it’s a call to action.  If God is for us, who can be against us?  You already know who - don’t be his accomplice.

The Distraction of Something Good (or not) From What Is Best

This spoke to me.  I thought of teenagers and people less experienced than myself so easily drawn into the superficial distractions of life around them.  The list on this video doesn't draw me in, and I felt the attitude creeping in that is usually portrayed with an all-knowing  a "more knowing" look and thoughts of how frustrating it is to watch the "unknowing" buy into all this distraction.

However... my family is planning a trip to an amusement park to celebrate my brother's 40th birthday.  This past weekend found me in rare usual form when in the midst of getting ready for a family event.  Frazzled over gathering ticket money, arranging transportation, planning food, the phone ringing off the wall (if I had actually hung it up, which I hadn't... so it was ringing from virtually every flat surface in my house throughout the day).

Too often family events become my nightmare as people mess with the plan, rethink the plan, rethink the date & time, don't have transportation, can't afford the plan, want to dictate food assignments, can't afford the food assignments, show up late, change the menu the day of the event, or just talk every detail to death.  I am almost always in the position of being the only one willing to or responsible insane enough to sew it all together into a coherent activity.

I know this griping sounds ugly.  It looks ugly too.  I dearly love my family, but I resent being in charge of accommodating everyone's suggestions, which feel like demands.  Too many years of doing it and the family keeps growing - which just leads to more suggestions and more hoop jumping desires to strangle family members with said hoop.  I am literally numb, exhausted and angry - event after event after event.  And of course the guilt from those feelings eat me up.

After sharing yet another frenzied rant eloquent analysis of my frustration, I summed it all up to my darling husband this way... because he just never gets enough of the insanity that overcomes me a week before a family get together.. "Am I being wrong?  Am I being selfish?  I don't know how much is right?  I don't know if I'm being wrong!!!!  I just want to run away!"  I lost the ability to use any words I learned past first grade.  I've been found sobbing on my knees at the foot of my bed after yet another Thanksgiving Day breakdown.

I remember when my mother came out of rehab and she pulled back from us.  I heard a lot of "I have to focus on me.  This is MY time."  I understand that better now that I'm no longer 19, but there is still a feeling of oppression when I consider the role I've played in my family from a young age.  I'm sure I've lost the ability to discern how much is enough... apparently "Too Much" will eventually reveal itself - but by then - it's too late. 

Today I'm waiting for the plumber to show up.  Water is being conserved - no laundry, dishes, shower, housework - and I'm sitting in the grass in my front yard.  I'm providing amusement to a variety of bugs, and apparently a landing strip for skydiving spiders.  2 Daddy long legs have run across my composition book in the time I've taken to write this.  I feel as though I'm on vacation, it is that refreshing.  I should step away from the phone (a huge distraction for me) and have this little bit of time each day...

God loves a cheerful giver.  I'm not being cheerful about all of this.  I can twist it all up into a need for changing my attitude, or I could be honest.  Honestly, I'm not doing this to please God.  I'm doing it to make up for and fix all of the weirdness of my family.  I'm doing it to give my family, and myself, what I idealized as the normal family - when I was just a kid in a dysfunctional home with an alcoholic mother and no dad on the premises, watching television programs with moms baking pies and dads going to work, and Walton family holidays. 


My family is my distraction from what is best.  They haven't done this TO me, I've done it to myself.  Trying to transform a messy tangle of people into a family with idealized traditions and interactions is an exhausting job that I became convinced was a necessary one.


The main problem with being a people pleaser is that you can't please God... there are just too many people.  They want too many different things. 


I have to accept that my mother wasn't playing the role of martyr, and forgive her for running out of physical, emotional or spiritual resources while I was still in need - physically, emotionally and spiritually ... because that is the superglue that keeps me stuck here.  I have judged her in a way that I can't bear to be judged myself.