The Awkward Years

Once upon a time I was a greasy faced, pimple poppin’, chubby (maybe still am), awkward 12 year old. It seems like now-a-days that 12 year old's do not look anything like the other 12 year old's in my day. You can’t understand what real awkward is like or truly looked like unless you lived pre social media, smart phone, there’s an app for that age. Which is probably the majority of people reading this, HA! Don’t get me wrong, there were “those” girls that seemed to bypass the awkward phase and that wasn’t fair, but these days it seems like NO one goes through that anymore. Completely and truly unfair. Awkwardness builds character… said no one ever. Or at least that’s how I felt  about it. You couldn’t pay me enough money to go back and relive those days. 

Really though… I can’t say that being a greasy faced, pimple poppin’, chubby kid made me who I am today, other than the fact that it taught me a lot of lessons. Maybe it kind of made me who I am today, I don’t know?? Do I want to admit that? I don’t know that either.

What it did do was drag my confidence through the dirt, and planted seeds in that dirt along the way. Seeds that I didn’t know where there until later on in life. Thankfully I grew out of that a little bit – until I decided to perm my hair in the 11^th grade. What was I thinking? I can still vividly see my yearbook picture in my head. Sometime though, over that summer I grew into someone I was always afraid of. Those seeds I unknowingly planted years before started to bloom.

All the praise hands that it wasn’t blooms of more spontaneous awkwardness.

I grew into shoes of confidence I didn’t know I had. I determined that the summer after 11th grade, I didn’t have to live in my shy bubble of being intimidated by my lack of confidence in myself. That summer also brought some other life altering moments. 

Leading up to my senior year there were some decisions I was facing. My senior year was coming up and I was either dropping out of school (seriously thought about it) or switching schools. Dropping out wasn’t an option to my parents, so switching schools it was. The SCARIEST THING IN MY LIFE EVER. Yet, it was also very exciting. The person I grew into that summer wasn’t afraid of what was ahead. Walking into that small school my nerves were all over the place. It was so small that everyone knew about me coming before I stepped foot in the school, ha. That was also so welcoming though, as I was embraced by so many people. As that year went on, I was a part of events and clubs that I would have never stepped foot in, in my old school. It was truly a life saver for me. Not a single person knew what I was going through, or who I was for that matter. The most freeing part of being there was I felt like I could be my 100% self and it was okay. That year literally changed my life. The dreaded awkward years (not just at age 12) before that, I truly believe were purposeful to who I became that year.

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems as though people don’t know how to embrace their awkwardness. We didn’t know the perfect way to wear our make-up or style our eye brows. I don’t recall seeing mom’s more obsessed with their own outward appearance instead of being a constant appearance in their kids lives.  Oh, I’m sure it happened, but it wasn’t the norm – at least where I grew up. I know for sure we weren’t running around taking obsessive selfies of ourselves that are so filtered you couldn’t see that the morning’s makeup was already smudged off. I should probably add that the Polaroid wasn't that fancy at the time, either! People had birthday parties at the park, or their house and it didn’t cost hundreds of dollars to put one on. We were more worried about calling our friends on the land line after school to see if we could come over and play OUTSIDE until it was time for dinner. 

Today, we’re more concerned with how many likes, or followers we have on social media. We are more fascinated with how perfect our make up and eye brows look. Did we contour enough, not enough, too much? We obsess over how "perfect" other people look behind their camera lens. Kids goals these days are based on what someone looks like on the outside, rather than what is going on on the inside. From young teens and on, sexually exploiting yourself is the normal way to take a picture. 

As mom's, do our kid’s outfits match before I take this picture? We reflect a life on social media that just flat out isn’t always the full story. So many of us compete with a story that is half told. We believe the lies that say you're not the perfect mom if you don’t have a fit size 6 body, with a baby on your hip that you had 6 months ago. You’re not pretty enough if your body doesn’t look like the hourglass shape. You’re not good enough if you work outside the home. You’re not good enough if you eat out 3 times in one week instead of cooking all 7. 

How did we get to this point? Do people even know what it means to be happy, like really?  I’m not hating on social media, it does a lot of good things. But on the other hand, it has DESTROYED our definition of identity.  As parents it is easy to find ourselves caring more about what our kids, friends think about them or us instead of caring about the image we are portraying to our own kids. We are so afraid of our kids getting made fun of that we will buy whatever we have to, to make sure they look the best, have the best, and so on. Don’t get me wrong, I want my kids to have those things and will do what I can in my power to keep them from being made fun of.  This is a hard concept and balance for us social media age driven parents. I’m right in that playing field with you. So how do we get out of this fake world we live in and back to being awkward?  How do we stop pretending to live behind a phone or computer screen and live as who we really are? How do we teach our kids and others to find who you are and embrace it. There is only one you, don't pretend or crave someone else's life, and more importantly don’t disguise your own.

Our culture is so self-driven and motivated that we have become so tangled up in our own web that we block others out. No one like spider webs, am I right? The worst thing ever is walking through one of those nasty things. 

Love yourself, it’s okay. It’s important that we take care of us so we are able to take care of others. However, when we become more obsessed with our own identity we forsake the ability to help someone else discover theirs. If I’ve told my oldest once, I’ve told her a million times. “Life is not all about you” and it’s not all about me or you either. 

Teenager – your awkwardness is really okay – unless you perm your hair in the 11^th grade like a poodle, so don’t try that at home or pay someone professionally for that matter. Discover yourself through YOUR awkwardness, not through someone else’s distorted and filtered image on social media. 

College student, single lady, wife, mom, whoever you are… let’s start a revolution. Let’s love ourselves first of all. Just like we are:  short, tall, round, skinny, flat butt, Kardashian butt (real or not), toned, flabby – own it. Diet and exercise for yourself and your own health, not for the applause of others. Don’t compare yourself and your abilities (or lack of, if that’s how you feel) to anyone else. Don’t worry if you forgot to wax your eyebrows for the 4^th day in a row.  So you’re not into all things Pinterest, who cares – there are hundreds of women like that in this world. 

Let’s stop defining who we are by the culture around us and start defining ourselves by the confidence within us.

If for a second you think you don’t have any, you are so wrong my friend. You may have to search for it, but I promise you it is there. Maybe you need to go back and look at the seeds you also planted while you were being drug through the dirt and find your moment.  If you’re still plowing dirt, keep plowing. Be real. Be loving. Be kind. Be quick to forgive. Be awkward sometimes. Be unfiltered.  And know for every filter you add to your picture, there are hundreds of women doing the same! 

Take 5 minutes and write out YOUR story in the comments below! I would love to read them!

My Journey of Thorns

Am I the only person that has ever been convinced that I wasn't MY own problem? Satan wants to trick us into believing that everyone or everything else is the problem, and not ourselves. We cannot live a successful life, especially Christian life refusing to believe that we may be our problem. Satan doesn’t make his entrance in our circumstances loudly. He is quiet, and sneaks in, in our vulnerable moments that we refuse to allow God to take care of (even unintentionally).

He sees an open door that we haven’t fully shut and begins to dig a comfy spot to take root in. As those roots grow they spread, and they spread deep. Deep in the places that we have suppressed. Deep in the places that we try to forget. Deep in the places that we mentally block out of our minds as though they never happened.

So many times something that started off so small grows into something so significant. My marriage is a good example (for me - not because it's bad, because it's NOT!). Every time I withhold any ill feelings towards Chris (because bless his heart I love him and want to slap him sometimes, too 😂), even over something so minor and insignificant, it always grows and spreads into something more. Simply because I didn’t confess those things, or talk them out of my emotional system. They stayed there and took root. 

I’m not talking about sin in our lives; I’m talking about brokenness, and unconfessed emotional damage that we allow to build up on the inside. Those things that start out very insignificant to our lives as a Christian. However, if we allow them to grow and spread, they will eventually play a significant role in our Christian life. They will affect every single part of us and every part of our lives. They will distort our focus. They will confuse our purpose. More importantly, they will affect the way we restore or destroy ourselves and those around us.

One of the hardest  things I have ever had to deal with is humility. Thankfully we have a God that is gracious and just and full of mercy. Someone asked me recently how I was okay with opening up and sharing so much of myself on my blog. I kind of laughed.  To look back on who I was versus today who I am becoming is night and day. I was VERY secretive about everything in my life. Not that I had anything to hide, I just did not open up to people about anything. What was on the inside of me stayed on the inside. I had even convinced myself that I was something that I wasn’t. I suppressed my emotions because I was too darn prideful to admit that I had any. I was too prideful to allow God to pluck those negative things out of my heart.

I have been married for 11 years, and to this day pride is something I still occasionally struggle with. It has taken me (longer than I would like to admit), to open my heart and receive those things that Chris was/is trying to tell me, instead of rejecting him in my prideful spirit. Sometimes love is tough, even as a Christian. We tend to only like to think of God as rainbows and roses or mean and against us. While roses are beautiful, we all know that there are thorns on those bad boys that will prick you and hurt you. I am in no way saying that God is out trying to hurt you… keep reading.

I am also in no way perfect in this area, but understanding what I’m about to tell you has brought out all of those good things that I was suppressing, too. 

When we suppress the negative things in our life, it also suppresses the positive things that God wants to bring out of us.

The enemy blinds us to that because he knows our what our potential is when we allow God to crack us open. In order for anything to be “cracked open” it has to be punctured or severed open. The process is painful, and it hurts... especially our pride (ugh). 

But beneath all of that pride is humility, grace, forgiveness, restoration, healing, joy, peace, LIFE.

Going through these last couple of heavy and intense months with my dad I had some choices to make. I had NO intentions at ALL of being so open with my dad’s journey. There was never a thought in my mind to do that so vulnerable and exposed. But I made a choice, and in that choice, things happened without me realizing it. I could have either suppressed those emotions or expressed them. 

Suppressing them would have only allowed anger and bitterness to take root. Expressing them blossomed into something more than I could have ever imagined.

The saying, “Every rose has its thorn” couldn’t be truer. This journey hurt and it was painful, but it was also beautiful. I don’t know your journey, but if it is painful maybe God is trying to crack you open, too. The enemy wants you to remain the victim because he knows on the inside is a victor. You choose what you will allow yourself to be.  

The Wrong Definition of Grace

For my entire life, I have been raised in and attended church. I couldn't really tell you too many specific bible stories or Sunday School lessons because there have been SO many and they kind of just run together.  One of the major things I can recall vividly, that has pretty much stuck with me my entire was the story of Grace. I am certain many people will agree, but it seems as though Grace was taught in such a way that you were almost too afraid to use it for what its purposes and intentions are for.

  Now, this is not due to one specific teacher or sermon I heard, as a whole, the church so desperately wanted to keep people on the straight and narrow (rightfully so) that the church didn't do a great job teaching about grace and how it was FOR the Christian, not just the non-christian sinner. 

After all, we're all sinners saved by grace; however, to me grace was really for the "real" sinner because it's just not okay for you to mess up once Jesus begins living in your heart. Stay with me here... 

The church is made up of people, human beings, that are imperfect and trying to do their best. In doing so, it is so easy to focus on something so much that you kind of miss the point. 

Fast forward 15-20 years, and the church as a whole has and is doing a much better, I will even say a great job on talking about and teaching on grace. I will insert, I do see some taking it a little too far; but they will stand accountable for that.  Back to where I'm going with this. I have struggled for as long as I can remember with failing, messing up, and doing things wrong, that I lost my focus on the healing and restoration that comes in grace.

Several  years ago, it was as though the light bulb went off and I understood that grace was for ME. If I blew it, I had a hard time letting God forgive me because I messed up and did not deserve forgiveness. (Please know, NO one has ever told me that, this was my own interpretation of how I let the enemy rob me in this area - super important to note!) 

After Chris and I married, it didn't take too long for the "disputes" to make themselves at home, if you know what I mean?! We both had a lot baggage we brought with us in our marriage. Not against each other, just in our own personal lives. As we started unpacking that baggage over time, there was a lot of forgiveness that took place. It was easy for me to forgive him, but forgiving myself and getting over my issues was not so easy.

It was a struggle. Again, grace. It's for me in my marriage? That just wasn't a concept that I had.

Fast forward a few years and we become parents. That baggage I brought in with me when I got married, yeah it came with me as I became a mom. Days and months, and years of feeling like I've blown this thing as a mom kept piling on.

Back I go to asking for forgiveness because I sincerely knew I had to ask for it, but forgiving myself, and accepting forgiveness...grace for me, again, it wasn't really a concept. 

I can vividly remember the day that I became aware that grace was for me. Grace was there to encourage me, usher in mercy that I really didn't deserve; but because God loves me he offers it to me. Grace was there for me to lean on heavily when I blew it and couldn't find all of the pieces to put back together. Grace was there for me to slowly start unpacking my baggage and leaving it at the altar. Grace was there for me to remind me that everything is going to be okay. Grace was there to soften my somewhat harden heart. Grace was there to carry me. Grace was there to erase those things that I couldn't stop reliving and playing out in my mind. Grace was there for me to rest in when my heart was weary.

Grace was there to stand in my place. Grace doesn't remove the consequences of our actions; but it loves us through them. 

Being a mom, has ashamedly brought out the worst of me at times. When push came to shove, those years of hiding from grace just made their way  forward and if I thought I needed grace then, did I ever need it now! 

Grace has also taught me, that when you stop picking out the flaws in everyone else, God shows you the areas they need grace in their life, too. Not because of their wrong doings, but because of the hurt inside. Hurt they haven't dealt with, refuse to deal with, or feel as though they aren't worthy. I'll even go out on a limb a say maybe it's because they refuse to believe in it.  

Grace exist for you in every aspect of your life.  It's not just when you say that first prayer of forgiveness. It's not just when you know you need to ask for it. It's not for just when you feel kind of guilty. It's for covering your multitude of sins. It's for covering those moments when you blow it. It's for the moments when you just can't get it right. It's for those times when you move forward 3 steps and back 5. It's for moments, when you didn't do anything wrong, you just need encouragement. 

When you let Grace work in your life, the way it was designed for, it will be easier for you to extend grace to those around you. 

One fear I always have if I'm flying somewhere is my luggage getting lost, stolen, or sent to another state/country. It's a scary and almost naked feeling to not have your belongings with you. In life, carrying your "luggage" around with you will only hurt and destroy you, after all your problems aren't meant for you to struggle with. 

"I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world." John 16:33