When I creep into the room of my four-year-old early on a Tuesday morning, she’s still curled up in her pink quilt with blonde hair across her forehead. I open her blinds.

“Good morning, sweetheart.”

A smile spreads on her face before she even opens her eyes.

“Is it a preschool day, Mama?” Lazy she asks me, eyes still closed hanging on to her dream.

“Yes, baby.” She sits up quickly and she opens her eyes wide.

She’s surprised the by day and at her good fortune. She has won the four-year-old jackpot: spending all morning designing letter T’s with macaroni noodles, digging her hands deep in the sand and water table and creating hopeful mini-worlds with a dollhouse, two friends and a few baby-dolls.

And she’s surprised again and again. Tuesday upon Thursday upon Tuesday. She never fails to gasp and grin when she realizes it’s HER school day.

I divulged the contents of my soul to quite a few people this weekend. [and I'll stop beating the dead horse after this post, but I've noticed some very interesting things.]

Some in groups.

Some by themselves.

And some face to face during intentional meetings.

It always elicits some kind of strong response in a person. Tears fell on my behalf. And sometimes, faces quickly and subtly hardened by hearing my words, no doubt a reaction to past hurts and wrongs that I will never know.

Either way, a story of radical redemption is a surprise.

I want to always be surprised by radical grace. I never want to be caught in an Oh-That-Again attitude about the miraculous redemptive, over-the-top redemption that God gave me.

I want to be just as surprised in the gasping, grinning way as Naomi is when she wakes up on a Thursday.

Gasp.

Grin.

And then resting in the memory of that redemption.

Over and over again.

Lord, let me never become calloused to the grace You’ve offered, the sacrifice You’ve made or the road You’ve walked for me. Let me always be surprised and engaged by redemption. I don’t want to be be bored. I don’t want to be lazy and I don’t want to be comfortable in what You’ve done for me. Help me always to remember the radical nature of Your redemption.

Do you gasp and grin at God’s grace?

This post inspired by my dear friend, Judy. Thank you for believing in me.

I could have never been a spelunker.

[If you don't know what that means, look it up]

At 12 I attended a youth group camp out in the desert.

The first night, after setting up the tents, the youth group leaders ended a flashlight hike at the entrance to a cave.  Junior high girls huddled in small groups and stumbled over each other in the dark. Junior high boys thought it was funny to run ahead along the flanks of the group and jump out from behind Joshua trees to scare the girls in the moonlight.

Sweaty hands. Discerning the shadows. Hating the trip already.

At the entrance to the boulder-born cave I realized that I was stuck: I either had to enter with all kids and the few adults, or I would be outside in the dark by myself.

And I hadn’t known before that moment that I suffered from a light case of claustrophobia.

Needless to explain, my virgin spelunking experience was disastrous for my psyche. I still remember it: my waning flashlight, the tiny-tight spaces, and the closed in feeling that I would never emerge in the wide-open night again.

I did make it out [thus my ability to write this blog post 23 years later]. However, I still don’t like small spaces and I refuse to enter caves.

Yesterday a group of us walked down the hill to a grove of redwood trees.

“There’s a tree you can go INSIDE and stand UP in,” a friend of mine told us.

I turned the corner and looked at the cave-tree.  A large, dark hole opened up in the bottom of an ancient redwood at the end of the trail. “Go on in,” another woman said.”It’s amazing.”

Nothing dark and cob-webby is anything I would consider “amazing”.

I squatted at the entrance to the wooden cave and stopped.

What do I have to lose?

I’ve been practicing bravery, the art of asking and pure and unadulterated outward confidence (even if I don’t feel it on the inside). What do I have to lose with going inside a cave?

Light. Loss of sight. Bats in my hair.

My friend walked in ahead of me, I followed and Shannon came behind me. All three of us stood up in the black.

“That’s enough for me!” I announced in the echo and pushed Shannon back out into the forest. The memories of twelve-year-olds in the too-close desert cave interrupted the darkness.

But courage breeds courage. And everything I’ve been through this weekend has given me a little bit more.

In a silly way, considering my fear of small places, going inside the tree was a courageous act. And I had nothing rationally to lose.

The only thing I really had to lose was my fear.

And that’s something I want to lose.

I don’t want to be afraid of rejection, of beginning again, or of losing the time investment of the last 12 months.  Like taking a deep breath and standing up inside the dark tree, I’m trying to face my fears head on in order to diminish them.

The only thing I have left to lose is my fear and I’m ready to leave that behind in the moonlit cave in the desert.

What fear are you ready to leave behind?

I’m at the I-have-nothing-to-lose-anymore point in my writer’s conference.

[Actually, I think I'm at the I-have-nothing-to-lose-anymore point in my life but I think that might be tomorrow's blog post]

I should be pitching a book proposal to the editor I’m staring at from across the table. But instead I’m telling her my life story. And I’m starting to cry.

“I’m going to have to be honest with you,” I said. “I really don’t know what on earth I’m doing right now.”

I’m proclaiming self-doubt, a lack of confidence and vulnerability to this woman, who, if she fell in love with me, could hold the keys to my future.

I might be squandering the scant 15 minutes I have of her time to cry about the lack of focus in my writing. There is empathy in her eyes as she’s listening to my desperate rant.

“My story is good,” I tell her. “But I know it’s not enough.”

There has to be a reason to tell it. The story itself is not the purpose.

“What is God’s purpose for your story?” the editor-turned-therapist asks. “Once you figure out what HE wants to say through it, THEN you have your book.”

Then I have my book, huh?

I realized quietly that she doesn’t have the keys to my future. I don’t even hold the keys to my own future.

The keys to my future are held by a King who’s story He’s commissioned me to tell. If He wants to use me, I’m honored. HE will open doors. Why? Because He fashioned them Himself. He will bring opportunity. Why? Because it is HIS story that will be told.

And if He wants me to begin again, start again, commit again — then I will because it isn’t about me.

She grabbed my hand from across the table, closed her eyes and prayed for me. And while she did, I thanked God for grace and redemption once again.

And I thanked Him for a community of saints that transcends job titles and bottom lines.

How have you found community in an unlikely place?

Just when I thought I’d been brave enough, God asks me to be braver.

I’m here. And I feel like I’m in an alternate universe for a few days. I’m eating breakfast, drinking coffee and blogging next to some of my favorite people in the world. And they are writers.

I feel like it’s a second home.

However, I need to continue down the road of bravery that I began two weeks ago when I sent in my manuscript for editorial review. I’m actually going to be pitching it.

[insert nervous laughter].

My four-year-old has been in the habit lately of jumping as far off of any fence/bed/sofa that she can. Her skinny little legs fly through the air and land on whatever soft or hard place she’s targeted.  Little-girl shins tell the story.

She’s brave. But only because she doesn’t think she can get hurt.

I need her kind of bravery. The kind where I jump off of the bed, launch through the publishing waters and spill my story to complete strangers over oatmeal.

One guy was visibly affected when I answered his question

So what are YOU writing about?

Ahem, excuse me while I lay my heart bare.

His eyes got really wide as he scooted his chair back just a tiny bit. An accident I’m sure…

I’m not a little girl. And I can get hurt and it’s not a skinned knee.

Doubt is plaguing me. Fear has gripped me on more than one occasion, and seeping from my eyes is mental exhaustion. And I’ve only been here for 30 hours.

Is this even the right book to write now?

Courage.

Courage to tell my story over and over again without allowing it to become a callous. Courage to open up the envelope to my manuscript after it’s been quickly read by an editor. Courage to admit that maybe, just maybe I need to start over. Again.

I thought that I’d been brave enough. Doesn’t this by itself fulfill my bravery quota for my life?

Wouldn’t that be great.

But I’m realizing that God asks me to be braver every day.  And I think He asks me to be brave KNOWING that I will get hurt.

Have you been brave lately?

Today I’m getting up early to drive six and half hours north.

I’ll drive through Los Angeles in the dark. It will probably be sunny by the time I pass the exit for 99 which would take me through Bakersfield and Fresno.

And I will be on Interstate 5 for

a

long

time.

By myself.

With just my thoughts and a few podcasts, a cup of tea and the fog.

Can I tell you what I’m looking forward to the most?

It’s not leaving these two little girls or the husband who protects and takes care of us for five days. I hate that part of it. It isn’t even the long weekend reconnecting with my friends who are authors and agents and every other type of good writing thing.

I’m looking forward to the thinking.

That sounds all philosophical and deep, but in all honesty, when my life is busy like it has been I do not have the time to think through my life. For me thinking includes praying and talking with God and asking for wisdom

and asking questions expecting answers.

When my life is filled full like a glass of milk that my four-year-old pours, the liquid straining at the air threatening to spill over the sides, I don’t have any time to just think.

I need to think to write.

I need to think to communicate well.

I need to think to teach and to connect with my daughters.

I need time to think in order to be a good wife.

Most of the time my life leaves no margins to do the slow introspection that I need. It does not come quick. It comes in the long highway in front of me. It comes in the 45 minutes I take to walk the dog in the trails near my house. It comes in the long walk on the beach that I couldn’t sacrifice the time for last week (but oh, the pay off!).

Thinking.

So today, I’m thinking. And hopefully coming up with new ideas for old problems and fresh inspiration for tired words. I’d like to make friends with myself all over again.

Challenge for the weekend: Take 30 minutes to think. Get alone. Get honest and let your mind try to churn out solutions to the problems you never have time to solve during the week. You might be surprised at yourself.

Do you plan time into your schedule to think?

In the past I’ve been the participant in very bad things.

Hurt-filled, pride-swept victimizing,

vengeful, pain-inducing things.

Bitter actions.

Yet, I’ve been the recipient of messy grace,

wild mercy,

and uncalled-for love.

There is nothing redemptive about stealing, or hate, or betrayal. It is never right and it always destroys and kills.

[This is what I used to think]

Except forgiveness.

I’m learning that in wrong, even in the worst of all betrayals there is still a good to come, that forgiveness is God’s way of reclaiming the wrong in the world.

It allows the person whose job it is to forgive the chance to grow and change. The wrong, even as evil as it is, can be redeemed in the heart of the forgiver.

But a person has to forgive. He has to get past the wound.

It’s vital. If not, that wrong thing stays where it is and does what it was born to do: stealing, hurting, embittering.

But forgiveness gives you a one-up on the hurt. You can allow your heart to be stretched and fed and matured by opening up yourself to forgive.

That is what my husband did for me. And continues to do every time he thinks about our lives before 6 years ago. In some huge way, he (and everyone else who has participated in forgiving me) has helped to redeem the evil and make some good come from my horrible choices.

Forgiveness changes a soul. It makes you into someone you used not to be.

And forgiveness can also completely alter the heart-landscape of the person you are forgiving. Remember that when you feel like withholding the one thing that can buy back all the evil the hurt has caused.

Today there is grace to be given and there is hurt to be redeemed.

How has forgiveness changed you?

When I was a little girl my dark brown hair was straight and thick.

Even when I was a teenager and I begged my mother to grow my horrible side bangs out (don’t ask, a layered look leftover from 1985), I would wash my hair at night, comb it and go to sleep with it wet. When I woke up it would be completely straight.

Straight.

Never a wave or a curl. In fact, if I tried to curl it, the weight of my hair would pull it out by the time I walked in the door to church on a Sunday morning.

It wasn’t worth it.

When all my junior high friends were getting perms in the late eighties and I was feeling ugly about my own body, I knew that even if I pleaded with my mother for a perm, it would only destroy my hair. The spiral curls would probably not even hold.

Before the days of flat irons, all my friends knew the language of hair dryer diffusers and mousse and I, well, just continued to wash my hair.
Then, college.

Oh yes, my hairdresser convinced me that the Jennifer Aniston Friends cut would “look great on me.” And I will have to admit, I liked it at first, but the more I looked in the mirror, the more I understood I really didn’t have the body to support a pixie-ish cut. Something happened to my hair between 18 and 22.

It got wavy. Or, actually, frizzy.

My once stick straight, never-a-blow-dryer-in-my-drawer hair betrayed me.

For the last decade-plus I’ve tried every flattening product on the market, expensive and cheap. I’ve bought the the best flat irons, serums, gels, pomades. I’ve spent almost 13 years fighting against the natural progression of what my mind-of-its-own hair is doing.

Until recently.

I decided to embrace the waves.

I’ve found some hair products that make my waves less frizzy and I rarely use my flat iron anymore.  (I fight the urge to bring it with me on trips lately even when I know I probably won’t be using it. It’s like a blankie.) I put my hair up and let the loose waves fall.  It doesn’t always work; sometimes the frizz takes over and rules my head.

But I’m learning to stop fighting.

Even if I lose the extra 20 pounds I’m carrying and hit my pre-pregnancy weight, I still won’t fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans. My hips have changed as a result of two babies.

I have to give those jeans away.

Even if I try my hardest to keep my house in a spotless array of shiny-clean counters with nary a loose paper to clutter I still can’t maintain it. I have a (wonderful) husband who comes home from work each night and detonates receipts, mail and electronic devices over every square inch of available flat area.

I think I have to stop fighting the chaos.

I have to work with my hair, with my body, with the personalities in my house to live this life well. My idea of “perfection” is probably skewed anyway.

It’s more than being FINE with it. It’s embracing it.

To hug, to clasp, to hold, to envelop, to entwine.

Embrace.

I’m going to embrace my husband’s clutter and love him because of it. I’m going to embrace my post-kids, aging body because it means I’ve lived some life. I’m going to embrace my wavy hair because it tells a story about loving and jealousy and contentedness.

I’ll embrace the things in my own life that only scream imperfection to me, but shout LOVE to God.

He loves me because of my imperfections.

Because of my failures.

Because of my not-good-enough attempts.

He embraces me because of all of these things.

What are you learning to embrace?

Maybe you’ve heard enough about beauty.

One friend in a tweet said to me (or rather about me): “The next 2 days on I’m writing about struggling with beauty. And as I’m writing I might be swearing at you under my breath. I’m totally blaming you for trying to make me a better person.”

But I get a chance now. And I think this week has made ME a better person.

Some of you wrote last week about “developing early”.

[raising my hand].

I’m sure someday all of those stories will find their way into a book or a series of blog posts. It really is my final frontier of raw, gut-wrenching honesty and I’ve quietly avoided it for awhile.

I could tell stories about never finding bathing suits that fit in the 10th grade because of my chest, or not being able to run comfortably in high school PE (which probably contributed to my weight gain and sedentary lifestyle).  I could talk about the drift of most boys’ eyes downward, about the horrors of bra shopping, and about my friends (even up to a few years ago) asking me questions, “What size were you REALLY?” as if I was the resident circus freak.

[ouch --- even writing this much is really difficult.]

The shame when I would have to walk near a group of guys. The fear that some immature male wouldn’t keep his thoughts to himself. The feeling that I could never be me because I was always worrying about something else.

If you’ve ever hated a part of your body almost as much as you hated the men who made rude comments, you know what I’m talking about.

It is just something that I’ve tried to put behind me and forget about, especially when I lost 60 pounds almost 10 years ago and my bra size also drastically adjusted.

I didn’t

want

to

look

back.

Even during my last pregnancy four years ago when it was difficult to find even a nursing bra that fit, grown women (who were friends) would say things like,

Wow, Sarah. You really get pregnant all UP THERE, don’t you?

Yes. Yes, I know that. Don’t you think I have to face it every time I undress and walk by the mirror on the way to the shower?

[sigh.]

I haven’t really dove headfirst into addressing all of those old feelings yet on this blog because I’ve landed somewhere between a large-chested middle-schooler and a small bra-wearing gym-obsessed crazy woman. I guess right now I’m normal. But it is really hard to talk about because it’s so personal. It is about my body. My body. The flesh that houses my heart and my soul.

It might even be more personal than this.

So

I know what beauty ISN’T.

Beauty really isn’t a jeans size under 30 or a small, cute bra.  And it isn’t decided by the bulges when I put on last August’s bathing suit to face the paleness of April.  Beauty isn’t a wished-for clear complexion (seriously? I haven’t gone one month without acne since I was 15). It isn’t wishing I lived in the body of someone else.

And I know what UGLY is.

Ugly is turning over in bed after an argument when I know we should be working it out. Ugly is the back-0f-the-mind thought that someone is less than me. Ugly is being lazy when I know I should be washing the dishes. It’s being jealous for someone else’s success.  Ugly doesn’t rejoice with them. It’s having a busy heart when I should be focusing on my family. Ugly is immature men speaking lies and affecting a young girl’s sense of worth.  Ugly is me believing them.

I’m done with being ugly. Obsessing about my size, whether small or large, is ugly.

I really would rather be pretty.

And I’m tired of hanging the idea of beautiful on the doorknob of what size t-shirt fits.

What do you find hard to be honest about?

UPDATE! I’ve added a few more at the end so be sure to check them!

About 9 days ago I invited you to participate in a challenge. I asked you to write about beauty.  A lot of you took it, and can I say I had an amazing time getting to know so many of you even more.

This is YOUR beauty.

Grab your cuppa this morning and and prepare for some great reading. Go and leave some comments on these ladies’ posts.

• Jen (Frelle) at Pursing Harmony: Defining Beauty

I love what she says: “…I am full of beauty that is distinctly my own, and I try to radiate that into the lives of others with the love I show them.”

• Stacey at Proems on Not Yet: Beautiful Struggles

Stacey writes: “I want to see beauty as a feature of the heart and not just the body.”

• Kristine at Kristine Remixed: Beauty Deeper than Skin Deep

She asks, “...shouldn’t the opinion of the Grand Designer be taken as the final opinion on what’s truly beautiful?”

• Laura from My Heart is an Open Book: Picture Perfect

I love what she says at the end: “…As [God] chisels away all the junk, His true masterpiece is sure to emerge”

• Jen from Follow the Yellow Brick Road: Like This, Like That

Jen writes: “To see anything, anyone, as not beautiful, is to condemn them, and I don’t think that’s how it’s meant to be.”

• Traci from Ordinary Inspirations: You Can Feel Pretty as a Mom (A-Z)

Traci encourages, “Without being beautiful on the inside, we can’t fool anyone (at least not for too long) on our outward appearance.”

• Jennifer from Studio JRU: Beauty

She posts a photo and talks about “unfading beauty“.

• Reyna from Glamour Glory: Beauty Defined

She writes, “I think a true friend, one that loves you and wants the best for you is beauty defined.”

• Shannon at Min’s Musings: Beauty

Shannon writes, “I know in my head the world’s standards and the Lord’s standards. It’s just a struggle when it comes to resting the truth in my heart.”

• Kim at Happenings of the Drama Mama: Beauty

She talks about high school and shares, “I thought that being beautiful meant that you were in the “in” crowd and had a boyfriend so since I did not have any of that I was not cute.”

• Heidi from Find Me… The Real Me: That is Where the Strength Is

Heidi writes about poise: “For it is here that you come to identify the real beauty of your strength; the real key to your strength and power.”

• Mary at Mary Hess: It’s Scandalous, Really

She says about her journey, “When I looked at myself in the mirror, I saw plain.”

• Terri Lynne at Mommy to Brooke: Beauty

She writes, “I think showing the beauty of Christ far outweighs any worldly beauty”

• Mandy from Brokenness to Beauty: Beauty

Mandy says, “[God] makes no mistakes – and even though I do – I am still part of his beautiful, wonderful, marvelous creation.”

• Janet at Writing for the Pursuit of Sappiness: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

Beautifully, Janet tells us, “But, what I do know is that the moments I have felt the most beautiful are those where mirrors do not exist.”

• Kathleen at Simple Silly Life: Dwell in Beauty

Something she says got to me, “Trust me, finding the real, true, inner beauty is worth the harrowing journey.”

• Laura from Laura Parker: Life Overseas: Lessons from a Skinnier Woman

She tells a story of a woman in a black bikini, “Secretly I wanted her to reveal some flaw–in appearance or in character–so that I could feel better about myself.”

• Noemi from Enjoy Simplicity: Finding Beauty

Noemi talks about developing early, “I wanted to run from myself.”

• Mela at What I Say in Between Songs: Song – You’re Beautiful

You can listen to Mela’s song in her sidebar and she writes, “I wanted an anthem for girls… that reminds us to guard our minds against all the messages that can beat us down.”

• Mom Loves Being at Home: Beauty…What is it Really?

She writes,”Treating others well is beautiful, taking care of our family is beautiful, showing others the love of Jesus is beautiful, and living our lives in a way that is pleasing to God is beautiful.”

• Denise from Keeping up With the Joneses: Beauty is a Homeless Man

(I’m still crying from her post) Denise tells the story of George. She says, “But George, a homeless man, was Jesus with skin on. And Jesus was beautiful.”

• Tessa from TV Clips: Beauty — Often Noticed, Often Felt

She talks about beauty: “It’s not always the ‘pretty’ things.”

• Lindsey at Living in Grace: The Mirror
  

Lindsey talks about beauty,  “…Beauty is a pure, clean heart. Beauty  is one that is surrendered to God and knows how much He loves her.”

• Melissa from In Fields of Grace: What is Beauty?

She writes, “It’s so simple, really. I feel beautiful when I am not striving  to be beautiful.”

• Gitz from Gitzen Girl: Beauty: Unqualified and Beauty: Surrendered.

Gitz writes from the vantage point of illness. She finds beauty in heart change and in adjusting to life with a different appearance as a result of medication.

• Chrissy at Life’s Not Always Fireflies and Hummingbirds: Beauty and the Beast

I love that Chrissy says that “mere mortals” may not give her a “second glance. But God does.”

• Prudence at Prudy Chick: In the Eye of the Beholder

Prudence writes, “I may …never think of myself as fancy, but [my husband] does and that makes all the difference in the world and makes me feel loved and beautiful.”

• Cari from Strings Attached Ministries: As Beautiful as Splintered Glass

Cari writes, “Beauty isn’t about having it all together. It’s about being brave enough to show the cracks to the world and let God shine His light through them”

• Nikkie from Hope, Coffee and Melody: Visiting Beauty

She talks about beauty, “Submitting my heart (sometimes over and over again each day) to the One who created it.”

• Mel at Faith, Family, Fitness and Fun: We Are Full of Beauty

I love what Mel did: “I took the list of all my flaws and threw it out the window. ”

• Mandy at All Things New: Defining Beauty

Mandy talks about the mirror, Italian women and her own daughter’s beauty after an accident. She says,  “I leaned hard into God to help me find [beauty] — for her, for me.”

• OneGirl at It Just Takes One: What is Beauty?

She writes, “Beauty is in the letting go. Beauty is in hoping.”

• Rachelizabeth from The Science of Music: Thoughts on Beauty

I love what she says, “When you find beauty in everyday things, you find God.”

• Janet from Janet Oberholtzer: Beauty

Janet writes, “I would rather seek soul-deep wisdom than skin-deep beauty.”

• Melissa from Melissa Brotherton: Beautifully Broken

She talks about beauty being brokenness. “God has broken me. I’m not capable. I’m not self-sufficient. I’m not independent. I’m not strong.”

• Sarah at A Little Whine and Cheese: The Beauty of Baby Steps

With a smile (it seems) she compares the end of her pregnancy with beauty, “In the end, I’m grateful for the baby steps. For time to let the anticipation build, and to be really proud of finishing something that wasn’t easy.”

• Mary at Giving up on Perfect: Beauty and Losing it, Week 4

Mary talks about her 5th grade self and says even though her husband calls her beautiful and her mother calls her “Beautiful Baby Girl“, in her heart she’s still “that ugly duckling and will never be a swan.”

• Mandi from Overflow of a Hart: Beauty

She shares in several short posts how 3 different women have shaped her ideas of beauty. She says, “It’s the beauty on the inside shining through that makes someone a truly beautiful person.”

• Charissa from Everyday Adventures: Beauty Defined

She writes, “He has taken all of the ugly moments in my life- physically, spiritually, emotionally, and draped them in his beauty that pours out from the cross.”

• Hope, Surfacinghl: on beauty

She writes about high school: “looking back, though, at that young age, i knew me. i liked me. i was happy. And i think that’s pretty beautiful”

• Colleen from Adventures of a Small Town Girl: Beauty

Colleen reminds us that we are all beautiful and that God gave us Beauty “in place of ashes. He wants us to own it, to rejoice in it, and in Him.”

• Sara at Simply Sara: Beauty in Brokenness

Sara writes, “But there IS a beauty that can only be found in brokenness. A beauty that has the chance to be seen… if only we’ll let it.”

• Kati at B’ahava: We are Full of Beauty

Read Kati’s beautiful poem about beauty and letting the “masks fall off“.

• Linda Z at Thoughts on These Things: Beauty Marked

I love the story Linda tells about beauty, “As much as the infommercials tell me that I can be flawless and airbrushed, toned and tanned, I am a flawed person.”

• Julie at Jewlz Sightings: A Mosaic in the Making

She says, “Therefore He takes the pieces that fit my life and fashions them to one day display my own Mosaic...”

• Claresa at Finding Inspiration: Confronting Beauty

Read Claresa’s head-on confrontation to beauty in the form of a letter (very creative!)

• Melissa at How High is Up?: Beauty from the Ashes
• Patricia from My Cup Overflows: Flaws

Here are the ones that were emailed to me. If I’ve left you off somehow, email me right away and I will get your link up.

What has this week helped you learn about yourself?

Can’t See Beauty in the Mirror

I see beauty all around me.

I find it in painted sunset skies and majestic mountains. I recognize it in the joy-filled eyes of the poor. I discover it in the authentic sharing of hearts.

I see beauty all around me. But I can’t see it in the mirror.

My self-image—that picture inside my heart of how I view myself—has long been distorted from a lifetime of feeling not enough. No matter how hard I try, being good/smart/funny/pretty enough has always felt far beyond my reach.

Looking back over the past two years, I can see, as if in slow motion, how that belief was reinforced even more.

My husband’s 18-month affair with my friend shouted that I wasn’t desirable enough. When he left me after nine years of marriage, I heard that I’m worth leaving more than I’m worth fighting for. And when he told me on his way out that he didn’t love me and probably never did, it reiterated that I’m not valuable enough to be loved.

The fragile remains of that picture in my heart loudly shattered into a million pieces.

I am not enough.

Slowly God has been restoring my heart and, with it, the picture I have of myself.

I know He wants me to see myself as beautiful, but the reality is, it remains a daily struggle for me. Like Haiti in the aftermath of her earthquake, all I see in my reflection is the broken, messy, ugly devastation of my life. And I can’t help but question how there can be beauty in all this rubble.

God responds by lovingly and gently showing me.

As I hear from people who’ve found hope and strength from hearing my story, I get glimpses of the ways He’s making life out of my brokenness.

But I know God doesn’t only want me to see the beauty in how He’s using me. He wants me to see the beauty that’s in me.

If I’m being most honest, that part is probably going to take a while. Possibly a very long while.

I know a healthy self-image will come solely from staring long and hard into Jesus’ face. I catch my true reflection only when I see myself in His eyes.

It’s there I see that I am enough because He is enough.

It’s there I see that I am desired, valued, and fought for.

It’s there I see that He recklessly loves the beautiful mess that is me.

Alece Ronzino (aka Grit and Glory) blogs about her heart, her ministry, and her 18 month journey through the aftermath of learning about her husband’s affair with raw honesty. She is currently living in the States but will return to her home in South Africa to head up the ministry she founded and leads, Thrive Africa. Thrive disciples and equips believers and leaders in South Africa through AIDS prevention, pastoral development, youth camps and missions trips.  Visit Alece at her blog, visit Thrive, and browse at the Thrive Shop. You can also give to Thrive Africa by clicking here. Follow Alece on Twitter.