Have you ever been in a season of “not good enough?”  Sometimes this is self-imposed whereby we recite the lies inside our heads that we are somehow lacking.  We don’t feel beautiful enough, skinny enough, interesting enough — we gobble these untruths as if they are good for us.  We tell ourselves that we are just being “honest.”  We are realists, not divas. 

Whoever said that self-depreciation was healthy?  It’s not!

God made each of us beautiful.  Not perfect, but beautiful.  

As a mom of three girls, I can tell you there is nothing more hurtful than to see their eyes downcast when, from time to time, they disparage the image in the mirror.  Measuring themselves against a worldly standard, they believe that perhaps they are not tall enough, complected right, their hair too wavy or straight… All I see is their incredible beauty.  Yes, I am biased.  But to me, any one of them could hands-down beat out the flash-in-the-pan upstart young women that don the magazine covers in the check out aisle. 

Not feeling good enough, of course, can come delivered in other ways too.  It can come handed down from generations who choose to believe they aren’t smart enough to go to college, or that being practical in life or in love means never getting your hopes up. People are taught to downplay their expectations, so that they don’t get disappointed. 

Or, maybe your expectations are just fine, but you’ve been disrespected, verbally or emotionally abused, and now it is ingrained in you that it’s best not think you are anything special…. Or else.

All of this, saddens me.

I wonder what God thinks of these scenarios?  He put His best work into creating us just the way He wanted.  We were made in His image.   But the world says we should all look like pixie sticks with big, false eyelashes and hair down to our butts.  How is this right?

My point is, I am enough. You are enough.  All God’s children are enough.  God put within each of us special gifts and qualities that are unique.  He expects us to use them, express them, be all that He created us to be. He doesn’t make junk.  

The world will evaluate our worth just like the pharisees looked at Jesus.  They couldn’t see His value because He didn’t fit a cookie-cutter mold.  He didn’t look like a king.  They were threatened by His image, by the magnificence of His common yet divine touch.  People loved Him, followed Him, worshiped Him… and they couldn’t understand it.  

The world is always ready to tell us what it means to be special, gifted, and beautiful.  And for some odd reason, we listen to it. 

I’ve been through seasons of hardship and heartache.  Things don’t always turn out the way we want.  We don’t always look our best. Our eyes get red and our make-up runs and our nails break and we need a dye job.  Sometimes our clothes aren’t exactly hip and our shoes too flat or clunky.

But we’re beautiful, even when we don’t feel like it. I don’t care what Cosmopolitan says.  God says we are.

To me, beauty —real beauty, is in your spirit.  It’s in your faithfulness, your honesty, the fact that you aren’t out there pretending to have it all together, or that you aren’t ashamed to admit that you have $18.38 to get you through til pay day.  It’s in your character, the unwavering way you stand up for your friend, your marriage, your co-worker.  It is praising God even when life has handed you lemons — not sugar to go with them. Just lemons. 

I’ve been told a time or two that I’m not enough.  It hurts like hell.  It’s double-dog-dare-ya time when you hear that echo in the back of your mind while sitting by yourself on a Saturday night in a movie theater crowded with couples.  It’s hard to fight the labels we are given while the world would rather list for us all the reasons why we should be different than we are.

All I know for sure, are the things that God says that I am.  I would rather be full of faith, knowing that He has plans for me, than to pour myself into some crazy outfit and sit on a bar stool somewhere to be told by a complete and utter stranger how “purdy” I am. That’s not the validation I need.

(Forgive me if that sounds trite)

All I need is the validation of knowing that I am on the path God put me on, and that it is leading me to better days. 

Girl, if you are reading this, and your hope or joy is running on empty, if you are feeling woefully or even partially insufficient, I want you to go right now and look in the mirror.  Look real hard.  And say this out loud:

I am a child of the Most High God.  I might not have it all figured out, but God does.  He has me. He knows me. He loves me! 

Stand in who you are and who God made you to be.  You are fearfully and wonderfully made.  

You are beautiful.  You are enough.

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