"You shouldn't have gone in there. I told you not to go in there. She get's angry. She has a temper." These were the words that my 8 year old spoke to my five year old daughter after she ran from the kitchen. She was running because I yelled. Again. This was last night. Those words stabbed me in the heart, knotting me up inside. I physically cringed at those words. Is that how they really see me? Is that how they feel about me? Do I have a wild temper so commonly that my son's first reaction is to utter those words? I am trying to change this. I know I have a temper, but I hadn't realized how prevalent it had been in the last 3 months until those words crossed his little lips.
Remember my last post? The one about spreading kindness, recognizing the hurt in others? Well, I am still learning. Sometimes I stumble, fall. Sometimes I fail, fall flat on my face. But I keep trying.
I have the spirit of a ferocious warrior. Often unyielding. Harsh. But I have another piece of me that is also very predominate. Often I put up a façade of armor, including but not limited to my smile of hidden pain, my jacket of deception, my boots of anger. I have my father's temper, though most would never believe that he had one. I guess he too has mastered the art of armor façade.
I should be clothing myself in love, in the armor of God. Clothe myself in righteousness and truth. I hate my temper. I hate my bitterness. I earnestly pray for God to take more of me out and to pour more of Him into me. I try to combat Satan in my life by praying and reading the Word of God. Arming myself with the power of the cross, dressed in robes of absolution, fighting FROM victory, not FOR it. (A lesson I learned, through tears, at church last Sunday.) But I am me. I am imperfect and harsh and right now, in this season, I am bearing the weight of grief through anger. Justified or not, it is a tool that Satan uses against me. A tool that I will not sharpen any longer. It is a tool that I am surrendering to God. I don't want to be sharp and hurtful.
I am trying to learn to be more gentle. More gentle with my children. More gentle with myself. But I wrestle with myself. In these moments, I know that the "What Would Jesus Do" answer would be to breath, pray and respond in love. But my human, failing self, the piece that Satan preys on, the part of me that wins more often than I would like to admit, that piece answers with grimace, scolding and anger. And then the vicious cycle begins. I answer in anger, I loathe myself, I pray for forgiveness, I ask my kids for forgiveness, they shower me in love, I go back to the kitchen to only respond in anger again an hour later.
This is a process that I repeat over and over. It is a trial that God has me repeat over and over again. It is like the "Friends" Phoebe Buffay song, "Lather, rinse, repeat. Lather, rinse, repeat. Lather, rinse, repeeeeeeat. AS NEEDED!" It is a trial that I will continue to repeat until I have learned my lesson. When I learn to respond not in anger, but in love, when I surrender, the trial will pass and peace will replace the anger.
Sometimes I justify that anger. After all, I am a stay at home, home schooling mom, working my tail off, FOR THEM. Am I justified in my anger in not having 5 minutes of peace? Even after they are in bed, after the 89 trips back up the stairs in response to all the "Mommy Calls," I collapse, exhausted and unable to formulate words, much less any physical motion, onto the sofa, begging the universe for a little bit of peace, only to find my mind way to busy planning tomorrow and the next day and the next, to be able to even appreciate the quiet that I may just be able to grasp ahold of right this very second if only I was quiet enough to see it! But in the quiet, thoughts of deception float in, seeding themselves deep in my subconscious. Memories of "should be's" and "have to be's" creep in and remind me, that no matter how I respond, I will probably just fail again anyways, so why bother?
Facebook and Pinterest shows us what everyone wants you to perceive as "perfection" in their lives. It gives us impossible standards to live up to. I see all of these other women home schooling their kids and their Instagram photos show peaceful kids, neatly copying their handwriting assignments on perfectly white paper, in tidy little living rooms, unassisted and think, "Why can't I achieve that?" I see "pins" of unnaturally neat houses, riddled with children, perfectly framed art on the walls, savory dinners on their tables and think, "What am I doing wrong?" People post their "perfect" selfies on Facebook and I think, "I wish I could look like that." On Facebook, there are thousands of photos of couple staring lovingly into each other's eyes and I think, "My marriage is far from perfect." Look at the cover of any women's magazine and the most predominant image will be of a stick thin model type, in too-tight clothes, perfectly straight hair, cheek bones sky- high and legs for days and I think, "I will NEVER live up to that!" But what we don't see, what we fail to realize is that these too are facades. How many selfies did that girl take and deem "un-postable" before she got "just the right shot''? That perfect-looking living room was a staged shot with white carpet, and really, who has white carpets when they have kids? That picture-worthy home school family, that little slice of "perfectness" lasted all of about 30 seconds when mom bribed them with cookies after they took that "natural" photo, all the while, the kitchen behind the camera looks like a science fair project gone awry! That model, maybe she purges to have her body be "cover-ready" and maybe she feels a little bit of shame every time she even THINKS of indulging in a little sweet treat. That picture perfect couple, maybe their marriage is on the rocks and that photo is their way of projecting to the world that everything is just fine!
We have these pre-conceived notions drilled into our brains from an early start that we should hide our fears and pain, not to air our dirty laundry. It is embedded into us what a lady is supposed to dress like, act like, talk like, be like. You know what, my friend recently said it well, I love Jesus, but just maybe I want to cuss a little! I can be a lady AND wear jeans to church. I can homeschool my kids AND long for a 9-4 break every now and then! I can be attractive AND not be a 00. I can be a loving wife AND still screw up and be rude everyday when my husband comes home and I am exhausted. I can have a loving, nurturing home AND have it be a mess with toys askew and dishes running amuck. I can be an amazing mom AND lose my cool in anger occasionally.
Why are we so hard on ourselves? When did it become NOT OKAY for us, as women, as moms, as wives, to stop and breath and take time for ourselves, to fill our cup? When did everyone else become more important than ourselves? Just because we are a Christian, a mom, a wife, a daughter, an employee, a friend, a sister, a care-taker, a church member, a youth leader, a basketball coach, a volunteer, a girl-scout leader, whatever it is that you have found that you yourself have become, doesn't mean that we aren't important!!!
Society is screaming to tell us that we are not smart enough, not pretty enough, not thin enough, not successful enough, not fulfilled enough...buy this, come here, go there, buy that, be this, become that. We have forgotten what OUR dreams and desires look like. They are not what everyone else tells us they should be, they are not found in keeping up with the Joneses. Often times our dreams can be found where our gifts lie.
Part of our calling is to use our God-given gifts. We all have them. We need just tune in, recognize them, tap into and use them. Just because someone else tells you that something in particular isn't your gift, doesn't mean that God hasn't put it on your heart that it IS your gift!!! We need to stop letting everyone else tell us who we are, who we can be, what we want, or how to get it.
If I think that God has granted me with the gift of a voice and I love to sing, but everyone else tells me that my gift is ACTUALLY archery, they are dis-servicing me! We can find dreams in our passions and gifts. Even if other people do not see our gifts as gifts, but we feel it, we need to follow that in service to God. It is not for other people to tell me that my gift is not actually my gift, that I am better suited in another area. Perhaps you may think it, perhaps you may even tell me that you think I may have ANOTHER gift, but don't tell me that my gift that I feel in my heart is a God-given gift isn't my gift! If I decide that Archery is my gift and I want to go and start a career in archery, well then that is my decision too. But I don't need anyone telling me! We are grown people and we can make that decision on our own.
After my grandmother passed, so many people told me that I should go to nursing school, that I had missed my calling. Even her Hospice nurse told me that I could have a great career as a nurse and that he would write me a gleaming letter of recommendation. But guess what? I flat out told EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM that they were WRONG! What I did for her was a heart thing. A God thing. She cared for me, fed me, bathed me, loved me. So I felt that it was right to do the same things for her. God put it on my heart to spend those days caring for her. It was something my husband did not understand. It required that I transfer much of my undivided attention away from our kids to her. It required long days and sometimes all night care, away from home, my husband and kids. It was often strenuous work, physically and emotionally. But it was something that I knew I had to do. Something that I could only EVER do for her. I can not honestly say that I know that I could ever do it again, for anyone. It took a toll. It made her passing easier. And it made her passing harder. I had no regrets when she passed. I knew that I had given her my all. All my heart. All my time. All my love. But it also gave me a great emptiness and huge chunks of my days after felt unfulfilling, even with my kids when she was gone.
I could have listened to everyone and said, "Why, yes, I think you are right! I did miss my calling. I would be great at it!" But I know myself well enough to know that they were not right. Maybe I would have been good at it. I would have hated it, but maybe I really would have been good at it. But, I don't want to live a life doing what other people want me to do, living the dreams that they have built for me, singing the songs and dancing the dances that they want me to preform. I want to do me. I want to be me. I want to fill my desires and dreams with the peace of knowing that it is a calling that God wants for me. Not anyone else.
I also think that our gifts grow and contract and change with our ever changing seasons of life. Perhaps God had given me the gift of caring for my grandmother when that season in my life called for it. That gift served a purpose. I did it and I did it well. It served me, it served my grandmother, mostly though, it served God because I got to share Jesus and the gospel with her in those days. I got to pray over her and I solemnly swear that I believe that I prayed her into the presence of the Lord on August 28th when I finally surrendered her to God. But now, that gift, the gift of care-taking, no longer serves me. It no longer serves a purpose in my new season of life. Like the leaves that change on a tree with the season, they eventually fall away, and new growth occurs and new buds sprout, eventually new leaves take their place and begin the changing, shedding process all over again. Like the leaves, our gifts, too, can change and grow and fall away. New life can spring forth when we shed those old things, making room for new healthy, robust and evolving growth.
I am not quite sure what my new gift is just yet. I am still shedding my leaves of the last season. I don't think I have any noticeable growth yet. I am preparing for the long, barren winter, shaking the last of those leaves off, readying myself for the harshness that the cold winter months can bring. But come Spring, you can be sure that my buds will bloom, from the ashes will come beauty, new life with spring forth, new hope will arise and my leaves will be ever present again. What they will look like, I am unsure, but I know that they will be beautiful. They will be plentiful. I know that they will serve a purpose. I know that my leaves will provide shade from someone else's sweltering heat. I know that I will draw up nourishment from my roots and life-giving water will course through me, to each new leaf, opening it up to the sky. Those leaves will also help me collect water, strengthening me, as I strengthen them. I will reach to the sky, branches lifted high, praising the God who made me. But even still, those leaves, too, shall pass and another new season will show its self. It is in these bare seasons that we must not break down, but break free.
It is in these season changes that it is often the most difficult for us to identify ourselves. We know who we were, who we want to be, but not who we are now. When our leaves fall, when we are left with nothing but our bare bones, we must find our strength, discover and be proud of who we are at the core, when we are not able to hide behind our foliage any more, when our facades are stripped. It is in these times that we need to have a little bit more grace for ourselves. Gently remind ourselves that we are free and perfect and that sometimes when it seems that we have no gifts left at all, that life its self is gift enough. That we are enough. Our very existence is a gift. If we could grant ourselves a little bit of grace, be like a tree and bend with the wind, rooted in Christ, then even during these season changes, we can stand tall, unshaken yet flexible.
I am learning to have more grace for myself. God has incredible grace for me, every single day. Even when I don't deserve it. Especially when I don't deserve it. I am working on being more graceful towards others, too. Forgiving as I am forgiven. But I am not the most graceful version of myself that I could be. But I try. I try to remember that I am in a season of change in my life, that I am not perfect, neither is anyone else. That only true perfection is in Jesus. I can't be perfect, but I can be as most like Jesus as I can be. I can breath and pray and have grace. I can remember that I am a gift and I was formed with the Perfect Hand of God. And THAT is enough.
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