I've begin to realize that a lot of it boils down to this: I have an unhealthy obsession with trying to please people and measure up to them or their standards for me. I want them to like me, accept me, enjoy me, laugh at me, be happy with me. I want them to accept me. I look at their Instagram feeds, I see them laughing with friends and tweeting about their fabulous life, I watch them cut me down and I still think: "If I was just like her... I would be enough." That's hard. It's hard to wake up every day hoping to impress the world and be someone you're not. Hoping to be enough, do enough, say enough. I'll let you in on a little secret: You can't.
But that didn't stop me. Some days, it still doesn't stop me.
It will rush back to me, all those moments where I was being belittled by my classmates, teammates, friends, teachers. Sometimes I feel like looking back on the past is like walking through a dangerous field of hidden land mines, I'm never sure where to step, where the next weak spot will be. I have to cautiously navigate and wade through some days because the slightest thing is a deadly trigger, a crippling blow that completely shatters the sensitive walls and barriers I've put up trying to protect myself. There are mornings where I wake up and I can feel it lingering at the corners of my mind as the fog of sleep clears. Sometimes all it takes is a simple comment and suddenly it's as if a floodgate has opened up and a tsunami crashes over me, paralyzing me to where I am back to that place, ensconced in darkness, worrying and wishing and hoping that I would someday be adequate.
I remember bawling into my dads shoulder one night in middle school, "I just want them to like me! I want them to be okay with me so that I can be okay with myself." It was as if my worth depended on them, as if they gave me permission to be someone great, to be vibrant, to shine, as if they gave me the right to be and feel like I was enough.
I wish I had had the courage to be okay with who I was. I wish I had taken the time to surround myself with the sorts of people I am now blessed to call friends, ones that remind me and encourage me and value me when sometimes I forget to do so myself. Ones that overall, point me to Jesus, where I am reminded that I will ALWAYS be enough for Him.
There are days that I wish I could visit myself in the past, build a time machine just so that I could go back to me in my middle school days, the ones where my self confidence was non existent and I tried far too hard to please others. I would find myself crying in the bathroom, hiding in my bedroom or fuming with God in a heated journal entry and I would say to her: "Dear Kelly, you're wonderful. You're smart. You're funny. You're witty. You're silly. You're talented. You are enough."
But more than that, I wish I could remind her of how brilliant she is and I would want to tell her this: God loves her. He accepts her. He made her and knows every single one of her flaws, and He said: You know what? I love Kelly so much I am going to send my son to die for her, to take her place, and I'm going to forget all her sins, her ugliness and I am going to love her. You also know what? I am going to make her in my image. She will be the best thing ever because she has a mighty God in her and He loves every little thing about her, even if she doesn't see it.
There are so many words I wish I could say to that person, the one that spent hours journaling horrible, horrible things about herself. Hours standing in front of the mirror envisioning what parts of her would look better if she could just do this... To the girl who would dread getting out of bed in the morning, or walking into a classroom where a mean girl sat, mentally picking her apart. To that girl who just wanted desperately to be accepted. I would simply want her to be able to say: I am enough.
I wish I could go back to every one of those moments where I felt inadequate, lonely, imperfect or worthless and whisper: "You are enough." In fact, I wish I could shout it from the mountains: "YOU. ARE. ENOUGH!" Screaming it so loudly that every person felt it and knew it. Every harsh word would quickly be swallowed by the booming echo of truth that resonated throughout that dark valley of hurt. I wish I could open up a stand on every street corner of every high school and with a megaphone shout it to every person that hustled by on their way to class, choking back tears or avoiding the eyes of their peers, struggling to keep it together for just one more day.
You are enough.
I dislike that this world hardened me for so long. I hate that I spent much of my life wishing I was something I wasn't. I cringe at the thought that there are people out there who feel the same way I did for much, much too long. It makes me hurt with everything in me to think that people will hate the person they see in the mirror every day of their life. And even if it's for one day, that is one day too many.
It hurts me even more to know that the influence that we allow others to have over us. There will be days where its as our whole life revolves around pleasing friends, peers, teachers or parents and those are the days that turn into nights where you can hear their words running through your mind, as if they were on a loop. As if they had the power to judge you, as if they were perfect. As if they took one moment to consider the potential, the beauty, and the wonderful creation you were. As if they took the time to consider the GOD who made you and who you were made after. As if they had any right to judge you for being who He created you to be.
I've come to this conclusion: I am going to love myself. I am going to love others. I am going to accept the fact that we are ALL full of flaws and we ALL make mistakes but we are ALL the same. We are all imperfect. And that is enough for me to have in common with someone to love them.
We are all enough.
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