Living Your PurposeSample

Unleash Fear and Suffering and Embrace the Beauty

Over the past few years I've been challenged to redefine my idea of beauty. The internet is inundated with unachievable beauty standards—thanks to photo filters, celebrities’ obsessions with Botox and cosmetic surgery, young-adult models posing as adults in lingerie, Instagram tutorials on how to get a better tush, and, of course, Photoshop! So what is beauty, anyway? Because I’m really confused. 

What if true beauty has nothing to do with what our eyes see? Can you step into this mind-set a moment? Feel beauty from within. Close your eyes and feel into a particular situation that comes to mind. Look past the surface and see your knotted threads representing parts of yourself that have touched your community, sometimes unnoticed but always known by God. What spiritual beauty do you revere within yourself? Your ability to forgive? Your willingness to put in the extra effort when you want to call it a day? Your healing touch to friends and family? Your faithfulness in riding out storms, remembering the character development that your inner-author is co-writing with God? What about this one: your ability to get up every day amidst a health crisis, bad marriage, or undesirable work situation and give it your best effort, while simultaneously listening for God’s voice? Wow! Now that’s a beautiful life effort. I give you a high-five and a heart-eye emoji for recognizing beauty amidst despair. 

I appreciate John O'Donohue’s statement from his book Eternal Echoes: “The irony of being here is that sometimes it is precisely what you want to avoid that brings you further towards creativity and compassion." Spiritual beauty and new beginnings are found in the things we tend to avoid. Our tendency is to panic and flee from what is difficult, challenging, or messy. We’d prefer for life to be tidy, non-chaotic, and relatively carefree. That’s understandable. But, as Jennie Allen reminds us, “God wrote suffering into our stories and wants to redeem it for His glory.” There’s no avoiding it, ladies, so let’s face the messiness of life with curiosity and surrender, believing the knockdowns are all badges of honor. Believe that the ashes of your trials will provide the new foundation to begin again. When we emerge, refined and dusted off, our compassion, empathy, and strength is increased. 

Poet Kathleen Norris said, “Prayer is not asking for what you think you want, but asking to be changed in ways you can’t imagine.” That is a bold and confident way of living. When we ask God to co-author our story, we are admitting we are open to some surprises along the way. And He is faithful to sit and write alongside us, till the end.

Questions to ask yourself:

·  Do you spend a lot of time looking at Facebook, Instagram, or entertainment news and then compare yourself to others, thinking you should be different than you are? What if you lessened your time idealizing others and started the practice of value visioning—look at photos of yourself at all ages and recognize the value and beauty you radiate. Write down only positive words that come to mind while looking at your pictures.

·  Have you been in a situation where God traded the ashes of chaos and deconstruction for a beautiful new beginning? What in particular was deeply moving about the process?

God, give me the grace to believe that I represent beauty, in all its forms, and there is nothing gained by valuing skin-deep beauty over spirit-beauty.