Life is hard enough already without continuously beating ourselves up with all the things we think we do wrong.
Well, I'm here to tell you to give yourself some grace. Life is full of struggles, issues, failures, mistakes, and problems. Everyone deals with some level of this too. You are not alone. We all have things we dislike about ourselves and we all make mistakes. But focusing on all those negative things only hinders you from experiencing the fullness of life. Trust me, I was and sometimes still is, the poster woman for having self-worth issues. I used to focus on all the countless things in my day that I would mess up on and the negative spiral of hating myself would commence. I would become this paralyzed ball of a person who hated herself and just wanted to crawl in a hole and never come out. It truly kept me from living my life. I would become stricken with so much emotional baggage that I couldn't experience anything the way I wanted to.
Not giving ourselves grace makes fills us with fear. The fear of failure. The fear of not being good enough so why even try mentality sets in and when this starts it's extremely hard to stop it. These fears have affected me so much in my life. It has prevented me from doing a lot of great things and has kept me from living out my purpose. But there's hope. There's always hope. I remember the day I started living life and stopped living out of fear of failure. The day I started forgiving myself for all the wrongs I committed.
So, I started my sophomore year of college in a new place, not really knowing anyone, and 2 hours away from home. I have more of a reserved personality and I didn't really enjoy talking to people I didn't know. The year continued and I became extremely lonely. I was not happy by any means and life was really tough. So, I knew I needed a change. So, in various aspects of my life I started doing things that took me far out of my comfort zone. I started branching out and meeting new people, I joined the dance team and service team at my church and the more I stepped out of my comfort zone the more happy I became. During this time, I realized something. I realized that my whole life prior to this moment I was living in fear of failure. I learned that If God forgives me for my sins and for all my failures, then why can't I forgive myself?
For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. - Titus 2:11
After realizing this both mentality, physically, and spiritually I felt so much freedom and a huge mountain was lifted off my shoulders. God doesn't see my failures the way I see them. He sees them as opportunities to grow and to learn. Yes, failures are still initially "bad" but they more so they are an opportunity to learn and the more you learn the more you can help others as well. The fear of failing was still there but the idea of giving myself grace was now connected and conquering the fear. Forgiving yourself and letting the small stuff go is a process.
You need to forgive yourself. You need to give yourself grace. You need to give yourself time. And you might need to do that a thousand times before you believe it's true.
- Jon Acuff
Give yourself grace. Start living out of love and courage. I promise you'll be better for it.
