Hey guys :) I haven't posted in a while, I've been super busy the last couple of weeks. You should see my laundry, it is sky-high! Thank you to everyone who has been asking why I haven't posted lately, you are holding me accountable just like I asked you. Huh, someone cares what I have to say. Go figure!
After three weeks or so of saying nothing negative about myself (or anyone else), it's becoming much easier to be positive. I am noticing that I feel so much freedom in the fact that what God thinks of me is far more important than what anyone else on this planet thinks of me. As I was pondering this, it made me realize that everyone in the world strives for the same thing: freedom. To be free from pressure, addiction, abuse, you name it. We all want to be free from something that enslaves us. That is what I am receiving in this process, and it is so beautiful to me. I can't wait to see what is going to happen next!
I've said many times during this journey that we are God's masterpiece. He created us with His own fingers to make us His treasure, and He still keeps our names graven in His hands. I've been trying to think of an earthly view of a masterpiece, and what keeps coming to mind is a painting that we have all seen many times by Leonardo Di Vinci: Mona Lisa. This painting is so special because it took Da Vinci fours years to paint it and he died with the painting unfinished, yet it still has been called the most famous painting in the world. If ever we were to meet him, the last thing we would do is critique his work and tell him everything we find wrong with his paintings. That would be unthinkable, yet we do it go our Saviour almost everyday. When I think about how often I look at myself and wish to change, it makes me sick. God fastened me in His own hands, and He still continues to work on me and change me. And how much greater is my God than Da Vinci? Words cannot begin to describe.
I used to think that I thought very little of myself, and that I was even humble about the way I look. But now I'm realizing how very wrong I was. To say that I know better than the One who created everything is one of the most prideful things I can't think of. To to say that my nose should be smaller is to say that God didn't shape my face right. I'm sure the One who paints each sunrise knows what he's doing with a nose.
My nose will never be smaller, my hair will never be thicker, and I will never be a stick (which makes Daniel very happy, thank you very much!). We don't need to be someones idea of perfect, because God already made us that way. So the next time someone critiques they way you look, tell them to take it up with God!
Thank you all for your kindness and support.
-Tara
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Day Six: Control
God is so good to me, and I do not deserve it. These past few days I have been shocked at how many times I held my tongue and truly thought about the venom that was about to spew from my mouth. What have I to gain by tearing myself or others down? Nothing.
Big nose. Thin hair. Bad skin. Chubby legs.
Just a few of the hurtful things that people in my life have said to me over the years, and I'm sure that all of you could add a million of your own. Some of you know this and some of you may not, but when I was younger I used to cut myself. It is not something I am proud of, but I believe that God has called me to be transparent about it. I've been thinking a lot on what caused me to do it, and I've come to this conclusion: I wanted control. I was tired of other people making me feel things that I didn't want to feel. Being called names, hearing rumors about myself, even just a dirty look shot my way could make me was to crawl into a hole and hide. I didn't want to feel threatened or hurt or sad. I didn't want these people that hated me, for whatever reason, to win. Cutting made me feel like I had control of my emotions. I realize now that I didn't have control over myself, sin did. And for just a little while, I felt strong. But never in my life had I been so weak. By the grace of God I am free from those chains, but sometimes I still feel like that angry girl who just wanted control of her life.
Through this process I am starting to see how much what other people say effects me. But God didn't call me to be what some random person (who is probably even more insecure than me) wants me to be. He has called me to be His child. I want to be what my Father has made me to be. I will be His masterpiece. I may have been born with an insecurity problem, but by God's grace I will not die with it.
"You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them because the One that is is you is greater than who is in the world." John 4:4
-Tara
(P.S. Please continue to pray for me. It is very easy for me to get discouraged when I feel like I have failed. I do not what to give up on this. Thank you!)
Big nose. Thin hair. Bad skin. Chubby legs.
Just a few of the hurtful things that people in my life have said to me over the years, and I'm sure that all of you could add a million of your own. Some of you know this and some of you may not, but when I was younger I used to cut myself. It is not something I am proud of, but I believe that God has called me to be transparent about it. I've been thinking a lot on what caused me to do it, and I've come to this conclusion: I wanted control. I was tired of other people making me feel things that I didn't want to feel. Being called names, hearing rumors about myself, even just a dirty look shot my way could make me was to crawl into a hole and hide. I didn't want to feel threatened or hurt or sad. I didn't want these people that hated me, for whatever reason, to win. Cutting made me feel like I had control of my emotions. I realize now that I didn't have control over myself, sin did. And for just a little while, I felt strong. But never in my life had I been so weak. By the grace of God I am free from those chains, but sometimes I still feel like that angry girl who just wanted control of her life.
Through this process I am starting to see how much what other people say effects me. But God didn't call me to be what some random person (who is probably even more insecure than me) wants me to be. He has called me to be His child. I want to be what my Father has made me to be. I will be His masterpiece. I may have been born with an insecurity problem, but by God's grace I will not die with it.
"You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them because the One that is is you is greater than who is in the world." John 4:4
-Tara
(P.S. Please continue to pray for me. It is very easy for me to get discouraged when I feel like I have failed. I do not what to give up on this. Thank you!)
Saturday, January 7, 2012
Day Three: The Eye of the Beholder
Hello Beauties!
First off, I would like to thank Hannah Hobbs for giving my blog a wonderful makeover. Don't ask me how she did it, because I have no idea. Second, I want to thank all of you for the love and support you have all shown me. I was a little bit nervous as to how all of this would be perceived, but I have had nothing but positive feedback so far and it has been a huge blessing. I cannot express how thankful I am for your prayers and words of encouragement.
If you read my last post, you will know that I am on a journey to change the negative way I view myself and see myself as God sees me: a masterpiece. To start my endeavor off, I began with the simple (yeah right!) task of not saying any negative comments about myself for three days. I thought that this would be a small step, but after only the first day I realized how truly difficult it was. I did not realize just how often I cut myself down until I made a conscious decision not to.
There is a verse that I have really liked for a long time, but I feel that up until now I didn't really get what it was saying. It is Ephesians 2:10 and it says, "For we are God's masterpiece, He has created us anew in Jesus Christ so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago." I always focused on the "masterpiece" part because hey, how cool is that? I didn't take into consideration that the first part is meaningless without the second part. It's great to be a "masterpiece", who doesn't want to be thought of as a work of art? But that's not why we were created. We weren't created to be marveled at and praised, we were created to do the "good things He planned for us long ago." I stopped at masterpiece because that was the easy place to stop. But God didn't call us to do what was easy, he called us to do His perfect will. I cannot boast about being a masterpiece unless I am doing what I was created for.
For my next task, I will not only not say anything negative about my appearance, I will also not say anything negative about anyone else's appearance for three days. Why do we cut other people, who Jesus called us to love, down? It is all rooted in insecurity. Humans are sinful creatures, and it makes us feel good to think that we are better than someone else. On the outside, perhaps. On the inside, it makes us disgusting. This will not be an easy curse to break, but by God's grace I will try!
-Tara
First off, I would like to thank Hannah Hobbs for giving my blog a wonderful makeover. Don't ask me how she did it, because I have no idea. Second, I want to thank all of you for the love and support you have all shown me. I was a little bit nervous as to how all of this would be perceived, but I have had nothing but positive feedback so far and it has been a huge blessing. I cannot express how thankful I am for your prayers and words of encouragement.
If you read my last post, you will know that I am on a journey to change the negative way I view myself and see myself as God sees me: a masterpiece. To start my endeavor off, I began with the simple (yeah right!) task of not saying any negative comments about myself for three days. I thought that this would be a small step, but after only the first day I realized how truly difficult it was. I did not realize just how often I cut myself down until I made a conscious decision not to.
There is a verse that I have really liked for a long time, but I feel that up until now I didn't really get what it was saying. It is Ephesians 2:10 and it says, "For we are God's masterpiece, He has created us anew in Jesus Christ so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago." I always focused on the "masterpiece" part because hey, how cool is that? I didn't take into consideration that the first part is meaningless without the second part. It's great to be a "masterpiece", who doesn't want to be thought of as a work of art? But that's not why we were created. We weren't created to be marveled at and praised, we were created to do the "good things He planned for us long ago." I stopped at masterpiece because that was the easy place to stop. But God didn't call us to do what was easy, he called us to do His perfect will. I cannot boast about being a masterpiece unless I am doing what I was created for.
For my next task, I will not only not say anything negative about my appearance, I will also not say anything negative about anyone else's appearance for three days. Why do we cut other people, who Jesus called us to love, down? It is all rooted in insecurity. Humans are sinful creatures, and it makes us feel good to think that we are better than someone else. On the outside, perhaps. On the inside, it makes us disgusting. This will not be an easy curse to break, but by God's grace I will try!
-Tara
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Day One
Hello Readers,
I have been sitting on the floor with my laptop for about ten minutes trying to figure out how to start this blog post. Then I figured, we're all friends here so what the heck. I'll just take off and start typing. I'd like to preface this by saying that I am not entirely comfortable with the idea of sharing my intermost thoughts somewhere that everyone can find them, but in the past few weeks God has been revealing to me that it might be a good idea. And when God tells you something is a good idea, well, you don't argue.
I guess that most people would define me as somewhat of an outgoing person. I like to laugh, I like to be around people, and I will talk to pretty much anyone. Many people assume that if a person is outgoing, it means that they are confident. That may be true in some cases, but not in mine. My whole life, I have never been happy with myself and the way that I look. Whether it be my weight, my hair, my nose, my skin I can always find something that I wish I could change. And it wasn't until recently that I realized how unhealthy and how truely foolish that I was being. God did not make me this way so I would look in the mirror and critique it, He made me this way because it is in His perfect plan. This blog is called "I Am Resolved" so here it is, my resolution. I am going to change the way I view myself and start viewing myself the way my Lord and Savior sees me.
It sounds silly and cliche, but this is my heart right now. I have spent far too many hours of my life wanting to change, but never for the reasons I should have. I want to be a vessal God can use. I want to be a light in a very dark world. I want to be free from these chains that I have so carefully wrapped around myself, bounding me up and making me unusable. Up until now, I have been so wrapped up in myself that I have not seen all of these things that God has planned for me, and I want to break that curse.
You may be thinking, "Great, do it. Why do I need to hear about it?" Because I need to be held accountable. I thought about keeping a private journal, but I fear that if I do it will be far to easy for me to give up on what I've started. By doing it this way, I will be much more motivated to stick to what I want to do. And you people of prayer, I ask you to hold me up. I know that by myself am not strong enough to do anything, but with all of you, my husband, and God's help I desperately want to change.
For the first few days of my resolution, I have a task ahead that is quite straighforward. For three days, I will not say anything negative about the way that I look. Sounds simple, right? Wrong. I have a really bad habit of saying negative things about my appearance because I figure people think them anyway, why not beat them to the punch? This is so self-destructive, and I pray that the Lord will help me put a stop to it. Thank you all for your time and, hopefully, you're prayers.
God Bless,
Tara
I have been sitting on the floor with my laptop for about ten minutes trying to figure out how to start this blog post. Then I figured, we're all friends here so what the heck. I'll just take off and start typing. I'd like to preface this by saying that I am not entirely comfortable with the idea of sharing my intermost thoughts somewhere that everyone can find them, but in the past few weeks God has been revealing to me that it might be a good idea. And when God tells you something is a good idea, well, you don't argue.
I guess that most people would define me as somewhat of an outgoing person. I like to laugh, I like to be around people, and I will talk to pretty much anyone. Many people assume that if a person is outgoing, it means that they are confident. That may be true in some cases, but not in mine. My whole life, I have never been happy with myself and the way that I look. Whether it be my weight, my hair, my nose, my skin I can always find something that I wish I could change. And it wasn't until recently that I realized how unhealthy and how truely foolish that I was being. God did not make me this way so I would look in the mirror and critique it, He made me this way because it is in His perfect plan. This blog is called "I Am Resolved" so here it is, my resolution. I am going to change the way I view myself and start viewing myself the way my Lord and Savior sees me.
It sounds silly and cliche, but this is my heart right now. I have spent far too many hours of my life wanting to change, but never for the reasons I should have. I want to be a vessal God can use. I want to be a light in a very dark world. I want to be free from these chains that I have so carefully wrapped around myself, bounding me up and making me unusable. Up until now, I have been so wrapped up in myself that I have not seen all of these things that God has planned for me, and I want to break that curse.
You may be thinking, "Great, do it. Why do I need to hear about it?" Because I need to be held accountable. I thought about keeping a private journal, but I fear that if I do it will be far to easy for me to give up on what I've started. By doing it this way, I will be much more motivated to stick to what I want to do. And you people of prayer, I ask you to hold me up. I know that by myself am not strong enough to do anything, but with all of you, my husband, and God's help I desperately want to change.
For the first few days of my resolution, I have a task ahead that is quite straighforward. For three days, I will not say anything negative about the way that I look. Sounds simple, right? Wrong. I have a really bad habit of saying negative things about my appearance because I figure people think them anyway, why not beat them to the punch? This is so self-destructive, and I pray that the Lord will help me put a stop to it. Thank you all for your time and, hopefully, you're prayers.
God Bless,
Tara
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