Written on April 12, 2007 - again I decided to post this from my other blogsite just in case someone out there is experiencing a similar situation.
Earlier today I had a talk with one of my closest friends (she'd have shared this herself if she had more time). She said she'd recently beginning to gradually win over the devil. She said that she'd been pushing herself to the limit, wanting to be better and better. Yep, naturally depression came barraging her mind. Her self-esteem took a beating. It got harder and harder to feel satisfied with herself and to accept her weaknesses. Whatever she did, she felt as though it hadn't been good enough since she grumbled while doing it. She began to start looking for excuses for herself. She felt SO tired of everything that she felt as if she had wanted to die.
However, slowly, she began to be reminded that those negative thoughts were the fruit of the devil's work. The devil wanted to ruin all the good things she'd been doing by infiltrating her own mind with negative thoughts.
And then someone reminded her that no matter how "trivial" or "unimportant" the things we did, they mattered to GOD! She said that for some time it was SO hard for her to see God's hands, but when reading Anita's email, she said that she was reminded again of what she said herself once to us all (Bandung Girl Triad), "If you can't see God's hands, trust His heart." She said she'd been trusting God's heart all the time, yet sometimes she still felt tired and upset. However, she said that we were all only humans, so we need not try to be more than that.
Oh yeah, she wanted to share these verses:
Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions NEVER fail. They are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness. I say to myself, "The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him." The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him.
Lamentations 3:22-35
Ahhhh...lately I've also experienced something similar. I'd been condemning myself about lots of things, mostly about cooking and making stupid mistakes. However, once I let go my "crazy" expectations, my burdens began to feel lighter. Besides, I was also reminded that God LOVES ME THE WAY I AM. Jesus came to earth because of the sinners (that's ME, the ever-imperfect!!!)
I began to think, "If God loves me the way I am, how come it's SO darn hard for me to love myself the way I am, zits and all?" In this ever-competitive world, you want to keep up with everything...you don't want to be left behind, you keep striving to be better and better...to have more and more things...to have more and more knowledge...to expand...to stretch...but what do they all mean if they can't make you love yourself?
It never really crossed my mind that the devil may be the one doing this (trapping us with self-loathing, self-condemning, destruction of self-esteem), but I knew that I had to learn to love myself over and over again so that I could love others more, as well. Without any love for myself, how can I give to others?
Now at least I can say this: I am nothing. But I am loved. I am SO LOVED. I am LOVED ABUNDANTLY. VASTLY. I am LOVED FOREVER. God loves me the way I am. Arttu loves me the way I am. My WHOLE family love me the way I am. My friends love me the way I am. And I love ME, even I'm nothing, even I'm nothing but me.
I LOVE quality time moments. I LOVE the late night chit-chat between me and my husband. We can really have GREAT fun together by giggling over nothing or we can just talk about our own thoughts. I LOVE the fact that my husband cares enough about what I think and feel that he keeps on asking me about how I feel every now and then (and he also reads my blog, THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH FOR THAT, SWEETHEART!!!). I LOVE YOU MORE AND MORE because of that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! UR SIMPLY THE BEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSTTTTTTTTTTT!!!! MMMMWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH...Ahem...
Back on track...
Today I have made a new friend. I never thought I could find a friend this fast in this foreign country, knowing that I'd been such a hermit back in Indo (lazy and reluctant in socializing). God, it felt GOOD to be able to talk "intelligently" with someone else other than Arttu. It felt GOOD to be able to joke with someone who understood. It felt REALLY GOOD to talk to someone who'd been in the same boat, who'd been there, done that before.
Today...is...REALLY...WONDERFUL, AMAZING, MAGICAL and I wanna THANK GOD for everything!!!!
that's very true when you say that a part of feeling bad (the way you describe in your post) is from the devil. When I went through a tough time, it was terrible because it seemed that no matter how hard I tried, it was never good enough. Maybe if I had looked at it differently or through "God lens" I would have felt better.
ReplyDeleteTHANKS for the comment! :-))) Yeah, oftentimes we beat ourselves too hard. :-))) And when that happens, we can't really move forward as we keep on cursing ourselves. At least that's what happens to me. Only after I embrace myself fully and remembering God's grace, I can begin moving forward instead of just wallowing in the swamp of "self-beating".
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