I want to take a moment and be honest with you. I really hate that I do not have it all together. It frustrates me to know that I can’t go through life making things work out. Why can’t I say the right things and do things correctly and consistently? No, of course not! In a perfect world, I could strut around confident that my attire was not wrinkled. I could walk into a room full of strangers and not get choked up in my words and make a fool of myself.
Wouldn’t that be great? I can see myself now. I could go about my day perfectly dressed, smelling great, my hair fixed up neatly. I could start a task and finish it. I could even do it and finish it with no complications at all. Man, I would be impressive! And you! My, you would be a sight! Your children wondering around composed and happy. You follow alongside them happy, accomplished, and carefree.
You’d never have to worry about your ability to do things. Everyone would complement you, and you’d be an inspiration to all! Wouldn’t that be great? Instead, I must worry about my shortcomings. The things I know everyone sees. The things they say about me but would never tell me to my face. Unless it’s that one person who feels the need to point out all the negative things about yourself you already know.
You not only have yourself reminding you about your flaws, but now, you have another person coming to remind you, more than once or twice. How do we get through this? It is so discouraging, isn’t it?
Life Isn’t Black And White
There are times where I am doing well. People are not mad at me, my children are behaving and happy, my house is clean, I don’t look like a slob in a messy bun, and my husband and I are on the same page! Other times, I say something completely wrong. I may offend someone, unintentionally and unknowingly, until I get a cold response one day or they completely ignore me. My kids fight with me, and I feel like I am the one who has failed them. My husband and I cannot seem to figure things out at the same time together, and I find myself wanting to hide away and give it all up for a day or two.
Don’t get me wrong. My kids make me happy, and I love being married to my husband. It’s not them. I really believe I just can’t reach my kids or please my husband the way I want them to be. As I get older, I realize that I really don’t have it all together, and I don’t have answers like I thought I did at one time.
Have you ever found yourself on one or two spectrums, depending on where you are in life? On one side, you see yourself as someone who can’t get anything right. You continue to try, condemning and comparing yourself to others along the way. On the other side, you know that it will never work out no matter how hard you try. So, you throw your hands in the air and do the bare minimum required to get you through and try to survive.
I have been on both. And I was just recently on the “doing and condemning myself” side of the spectrum. Being ourselves is hard! There is no way around it. You and I don’t have things figured out. That’s a fact. If you know that you are not void of making mistakes and I know I am not, then it should be logical to remember that no one is perfect. But we can’t seem to remember that! Sure, we recognize it when we give grace to other people. But when it comes to us, the first thing our minds race to is how we see other women. We look at how they are living their lives. We don’t see them in their raw state, but we don’t think about that. We judge based off what we can see.
Critiquing Ourselves Isn’t The Answer
Honestly, if we continued to judge and compare ourselves to others based on what we saw, we would be in a constant state of depression and hopelessness. While we are sitting in the middle of our chaos, drowning and suffocating, we see a friend or another woman triumphing and excelling in their life. What we don’t see is the process they have to go through. That’s just it, though!
We are a process! I’m an imperfect soul trying to make it in life. Trying to glorify God and am in a constant state of growth. And that’s okay. You and I aren’t the only ones, sister. We are in a continuous state of change, in a world full of people in their own seasons of their lives.
Proverbs 1:5 says, “A wise man will hear and increase in learning. And a man of understanding will acquire counsel….”
Let’s give ourselves grace and patience. Let’s allow ourselves to grow, love growth, and stand with one another in love and harmony. Don’t condemn yourself. Don’t beat yourself up. And feel free to ask for prayer and help. Let’s support each other and find someone who can lift us up and who could use some encouragement themselves. I can think of a couple of women I can reach out to. Can you? If not, don’t be afraid to pray and ask around. In the meantime, feel free to reach out to me. Do you need prayer? An encouraging word? I may not be there to sip a cup of tea with you, but I can pray with you, and we can encourage one another. Thinking of you today, like always. We’ll get through this together. One step at a time.
