Wherever you go. However you get there. There you will be. 

You bring all of you wherever you go. 

We cannot “escape” ourselves.

We take all our insecurities, fears, hopes, dreams, everything, all of us, with us wherever we go. Which sounds so straight forward but I think sometimes people think they can leave part of themselves behind.

It doesn’t work that way. The good news is, I have learned that we can renew our minds on God’s Truth and be transformed. We can retrain our brains with awareness and intention to be a different way. We can learn to like ourselves in all our humanness wherever we go.

I think too often we try to eliminate our humanness. I am learning that we need to accept our humanness and live more into it.

We can never completely “fix” or heal or “solve” ourselves, but we can expand our capacity to accept ourselves as we are in all our humanness. We can stop beating ourselves up for being the way we are and instead practice self-compassion and kindness.

Life is hard sometimes. We will get overwhelmed or anxious or sad at times, but we do not have to be “taken down” or defined by it. The issue is we have trained ourselves to be in the habit of living in overwhelm or anxiety or sadness, but the good news is we can retrain our brains. We can practice awareness of our negative thoughts then choose to think about the possibility instead. We can practice awareness of the unhelpful, depressing stories we are telling ourselves then choose with intention to tell ourselves a hopeful, beneficial story instead. The thoughts we think grow in our minds. We can choose to think about and then see all the negatives in life or we can choose to think about and then find all the positives in life. We can choose to fear and doubt then feel stressed and worried or we can choose to love and have faith then feel loved and hopeful. We choose with the thoughts we allow ourselves to think about.

For so many years, I had the expectation of getting to the point where I got it “right” and stopped messing up and stopped being overly emotional and stopped disappointing people and was a better wife, mother, daughter, employee, everything. I had unrealistic expectations and was constantly upset with myself. (If we could get ourselves to the place where we no longer messed up, we wouldn’t need God anymore.)

I also thought I had no control over the thoughts that came to my mind. I thought the thoughts I thought were true because I could find evidence for them. I let unhelpful negative stories play on repeat in my head because I did not know the power I had to choose what I thought.

I had to decide to intentionally take my thoughts captive. I had to practice intentionally choosing to replace the negative unhelpful thoughts with God’s Truth. I had to practice intentionally choosing to renew my mind. I had to practice choosing the think the thoughts I wanted on purpose. I had to change my thinking about my “mistakes,” about my way of being. I had to retrain my brain. I had to practice being gracious and kind to myself and accept my humanness.

Something that helped me significantly was realizing God accepts me just as I am. He accepts me if I never “improve” or get better. God loves me just as I am. I sang that hymn hundreds of times growing up, but I never really believed it until a few years ago when I decided to believe it with intention on purpose. As I practice believing God loves me and accepts me just as I am then it is easier for me to accept and love me just as I am.

We keep becoming more of who God created us to be as we accept ourselves as we are and trust Him. The funny thing is, I have found that when I stop trying so hard to change/be better and trust God more, then He does the transforming work in me. He makes me “better.”

Earlier this week in Jesus Calling it says, “Understanding will never bring you Peace. That’s why I have instructed you to trust in Me, not in your understanding. Human beings have a voracious appetite for trying to figure things out, in order to gain a sense of mastery over their lives. But the world presents you with an endless series of problems. As soon as you master one set, another pops up to challenge you. The relief you had anticipated is short-lived. Soon your mind is gearing up again: searching for understanding (mastery), instead of seeking Me (your Master). … As you look to Me, you gain awareness of this precious Peace.”

When we stop trying to “master” life and we trust our Master, it opens us up to know His Peace and Love and Hope. When we accept the reality that we will never “get it all right” it opens us up to accept and enjoy life as it is. The goal in life is not to reach some level of perceived perfection because that is all it would be a perception.

The goal in life is Love. Relationships. Connection. Joy. Peace. As we know God and trust Him. Then using the unique way He has made us to love and serve others. Accepting that this is how the world is and this is how God made it, He allows all of it. Accepting that problems are inevitable and I can choose to show up in love trusting that God is in control anyway. Remembering that God is with me and for me and working for my good.

We accept God’s unconditional love for us. We receive God’s love deep in our soul, grounding ourselves in His Truth, then from the place of knowing we are loved no matter what, we practice loving ourselves and others as we are.

I like the idea of practicing. We practice trusting God, and we get better at it the more we practice. We practice receiving God’s love, and we get better at it the more we practice. We practice accepting our humanness, not beating ourselves up for being oh so human, and we get better at it the more we practice. We practice loving and accepting others as they are, and we get better at it the more we practice.

We keep becoming more of who God created us to be as we accept ourselves as we are and trust Him. When we stop trying so hard to change/be better and trust God more, then He does the transforming work in us. He makes us “better,” not perfect. We do not eliminate our humanness. God expands our capacity and helps us to live more fully human.

Wherever you go.

Life is so much more enjoyable when we live this Way!