In an effort to save time and energy, I attempted to "spot paint" the main floor walls of our house only to find that the paint from the five-year-old bucket no longer matches the faded beige of the walls. Now I have to re-do the walls entirely.
I have enjoyed two late-night munchy binges and two hearty fast food meals in the past two weeks. Consequently, I'm fighting with the same two pounds of excess body weight that I'd conquered "once and for all" last month.
When I left the hair salon after my last hair cut, two men gave me the up-and-down look...and they sneered.
The kids are struggling with spelling and the dogs are unruly and filthy. The house, already "spring cleaned" continues to taunt me with it's secret corners full of grime and people-live-here dirt.
Today, instead of going to church, we had a hockey brunch with friends.
And the voices in my head are getting louder and louder. Voices of accusation and condemnation. You. Are. Not. Enough. Not smart enough, clean enough, spiritual enough, beautiful enough, skinny enough.
I recognize that voice for what it is: an accuser. It taunts me with an unrelenting diatribe of libel.
I listen to it. Absorbing it's charges as truth. The slurs it paints me with are cruel and unforgiving: I would not say such things about a hated enemy.
Thankfully, the voice of Truth is as unstoppable. It is more gentle; it's tones softer and sweeter. It takes effort to hear through the rants of Accusation, but it is tireless in its' pursuit. It reminds me to be kind to myself ~~ as kind, at least, as I would be to that "hated enemy." It reminds me that no one expects perfection from me. No one cares, actually, for me to do/be/think any differently than I already do.
Truth reminds me that it's as unacceptable for me to judge Me as it is for me to judge others. God alone sits as judge.
God.
Alone.
He alone can see the secrets of my heart and mind. He alone knows the whole of my story and the whole of my destiny. Why shove Him off the throne of my life in exchange for moments...or days...or weeks...of self recrimination?
I hear this same struggle expressed through the lips of so many women in my life: beautiful, successful, treasure-filled women. We are wrestling with the idea of treating ourselves with simple kindness. We have no patience for "looking out for number one" or "putting ourselves first," but we are attempting to make tenderness a habit.
We can help each other with that, I think. We can be reminders to each other of Truth and all the freedom messages He is whispering every day. Reminders that we are doing enough, loving enough, working enough, being enough, lovely enough.
Reminders that where we are not enough, God is ~~ or, where we are not enough, we are becoming.
Today, while Accusation plays and re-plays his tiresome failure chant, I choose to turn my ear to Truth. To kindness. Away from harsh judgement. Toward grace.
~ We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. ~
2 Corinthians 10
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