What do Perfectionism, Control, Vulnerability and Love have in Common?

My pregnancy was the beginning of an unravelling – of finding the end of my rope – and the battle grounds to surrender.

I was blinded by my own abilities and talents, by my self-discipline and self-motivated ways. If something needed doing, leave it to me. If something needed changing, give me the steps to follow. From my career, to my marriage, to my health and even my faith, I had everything “under control.”

But the problem with control is that it’s simply an illusion, because we are only ever “in control” when things are within our ability to control them!

Read that again.

We are only ever “in control” when things are within our ability to control them!

 

And what is it we can control? Our thoughts, our perception, our attitude, our response and reactions. But that’s about it.

And the problem was, I spent 80% of my life worrying and striving to control things that were out of my control.

I strived to be perfect in everything: to have the perfect career, be the perfect friend, daughter, wife and Christian woman; to have the perfectly clean house and cook x number of days a week; to have the perfect body, eating habits and work out routine; to never get mad, angry or frustrated with people (to their face); to help out and give (time, resources, money) even when it was at the determinant to my personal priorities; over commenting in fear of letting people down; marking every Christian “check box” to keeping and progressing in my faith….

 

I was bound by (my) laws and rules and if I broke even one, I believed I was a terrible person- a failure and surely I needed to try harder.

I tried – and tried some more- until I nearly died. 

And if I boiled it all down, it was all simply an attempt to control what people thought about me and whether they liked me; things that are completely 100% of our my control!

The accolades and achievement were striving to feel worthy. The over committing was striving to be liked. The helping and giving was striving to be accepted. The perfect marriage and body were striving to be wanted. And the perfect faith was striving to be loved.

 

But what was the real motivator behind my behaviour- the master that held me slave to my striving: FEAR; Of People seeing me – really seeing me- of being found out, rejected and ultimately unloved.

Do we see the vicious cycle?

 

The reality is, perfectionism – the chase for perfect – is entirely unattainable because we cannot control the uncontrollable. And when we spend 80% of our energies trying to control what isn’t within our abilities, we have no energy left to work on what we can control. And we ultimately end up feeling like a failure at everything!

 

Perfectionism is a myth and a lie. It’s completely and entirely impossible to achieve and in chasing it, we’re setting ourselves up for failure in every area of our life. We will never win the race, we will never arrive and we will never find lasting peace, joy or contentment on this journey.

And every area we struggle in is an arrow pointing to a genuine problem with our heart- a referral pain to the deeper issue down below:

 

• Eating disorders
• Anxiety
• Achievement
• Accolades
• Addiction
• Workaholism
• Fear
• Worry
• Stress
• Glorifying “Busy”
• Indecisiveness
• Sexual Strongholds

What do all these things have in common? Control.

They were an attempt at grasping for control. And while I attempted to balance the spinning plates for years, they kept me blinded to the real problem – pain I’d simply kept pushing down deeper.

 

The problem with pain is that when unresolved it continuously resurfaces in our life, many times deceiving us, because it looks different the last time. 

My perfectionistic ways were simply masks – armour I was using to protect myself from being seen- from having to acknowledge and own the pain from my past.

 

When we choose to hide our real selves from the world- when we omit the messy hard parts of our lives and keep them hidden the world – we cloak ourselves in shame.

 

Shame is a word we all struggle to connect with or we reserve for people who have done “really bad things.” But the fact is:

Shame is universal. We all have it, but it’s triggers and how it manifests itself behaviourally looks different for everyone.

What it does have in common for all of us is feelings of fear, anger, sadness, depression, blame, disconnection and loneliness.

 

So if we look at the areas in our life where we feel like that, we’ll discover that truthfully, were blanketed in shame; there’s something we’re running from or something were choosing to hide, maybe even from ourselves.

 

And the key to removing the cloak – to breaking free from shame-  while simple in theory, can be extremely difficult in practice.

 

Vulnerability.

 

Vulnerability is the key to breaking the chains of shame- of all the negative feelings we’d rather run from.

 

If we imagine a graph, shame on one end, and acceptance and love on the other, then vulnerability is the dial the moves us from one to the other.

 

When we choose to allow our selves to be seen- when we have the courage to own our stories and share them with others no matter how marred or messy- we give others permission to own their own hard parts.

When we can learn to sit in our own dark cave and not run from it, than we can sit with others in theirs.

And what does that do? It connects us.

 

And connection is the key to feelings of love, acceptance, belonging, joy, meaning and ultimately purpose.

 

16-18 Whenever, though, they turn to face God …they suddenly recognize that God is a living, personal presence.  Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him.

So what does it take to do this? How can we begin to embrace vulnerability and own our stories?

It starts with taking an honest look in the mirror.

 

• What do we struggle with?
• What do we dread others finding out or seeing about ourselves?
• What parts of our past do we want to hide or are ashamed of?
• In what ways do we beat ourselves up, harm ourselves or push our selves into “behaving?”

 

It starts there, with a pen and paper, writing them down and choosing to no longer hide them; to own who we really are, right now in this current season, and trusting we’re not alone.

Take just one thing, go and share it with someone.

Might I suggest God first?

He is faithful and just to forgive us, heal us and make us new when we seek him with our whole heart.

 4 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.

 

But we must remember, our lives are in a perpetual cycle of learning, growing and ultimately of surrendering control; moving into a deeper relationship of trust and intimacy with The Lord.

 

God knows what we need and when. He’s not impatient or hurried to see us smarten up and get our act together. He is patience, steadfast, gentle and merciful, seeing us not for who we are now or defining us by our circumstance; he sees us for who we are in Christ- for the women we will become and for all he designed us to be.

 

The ultimate rose cored glasses if you will. Not because he’s a fool in love [but he is that too!] but because of our inheritance in Christ- the ultimate gift we’ve been given through his death.

 

God is slowly at work in our lives, ever refining us, purifying our minds and transforming our hearts to be more like Jesus, until the day of Christ’s return.

 

When all you see, Is who you don’t wanna be

If I’m honest, I balled my eyes out watching this. Buckets.

 

I did’t expect to be knees deep in tears on a sunday morning…

Sure I’m hormonal but that’s hardly the point.

The reality is, I can fake it ’till I make it and I’ve been doing it since I was a child.

 

In everything from my work, my dreams, my hobbies, my fears, to my battles and demons and the ugly in-between.

I can lie to the person in the mirror, when I hate everything it reflects. I speak truth over it – try and counter it with the mind- but does my heart know it to be true? No.

It doubts it.

 

Days will come when you don’t have the strength
And all you hear is you’re not worth anything
Wondering if you ever could be loved

Before you ever took a breath
Long before the world began
Of all the wonders He possessed
There was one more precious
Of all the earth and skies above
You’re the one He madly loves
Enough to die

You’re beautiful
In His eyes

-Beautiful | Mercy Me

 

More than how I demand perfection from myself,  I wage war with everyone else’s idea of perfect. Trying to be and please everyone but my Father, first.

Every under eye circle, every pimple, every wrinkle, every bloated tummy, every less than awesome outfit…. they taunt me.

Sure when I’m wrapped up pretty and “ready” for the day, I feel great and faking it comes easy. It’s the paint;  it masks my insecurity – how I’m truly feeling deep down inside.

Like it’s all a sham. It’s all a lie.

Because underneath, I hate what I see. When I unmask from the charade I pick myself apart and I will it to be different.

 

I skald uniqueness, rather than treasure my sculptor’s signature on me.

I hide my flaws of character, rather than wear my story with pride.

I compete with every impossibility, rather than love where I’ve been blessed.

 

 

And yet I know that I am made in his image. Every curve, every freckle, intentional and with purpose.

 

When I cry in despair, He weeps from my rejection.

When I damn my imperfections, he makes beauty from my ashes.

When I hide in self hate torment, he dances over me in heaven.

 

Lord, let me see me from your eyes. Remind me who I am.

 

In the mirror when all I see Is who I don’t wanna be

In the loneliest places when I cant remember what grace is

When I cant receive Your love afraid I’ll never be enough

If I’m Your beloved can You help me believe it

I’m the one You love and That will be enough.

-Remind me who I am | Jason Gray

 

 

 

To save her from herself

“She loves food!.” He exclaimed. “We’ve been together for years and I never even realized how much she loves to eat. She’s got massive will power though and she’s so disciplined.”

He spoke with such amazement, almost proud.

“How so,” I ask.

My mind starts whirling. Flashes of my war with food start racing and quietly I will his next words to be anything but my minds.

“Well for example, she loves this dish I make. So much that she forbid me to ever make it again. It’s so good!”

He goes on to list every delicious morsel of ooey, gooey goodness, laden with heaps of buttery delight.

“When I made it the first time, she ate the whole casserole dish! Not in one serving, but throughout that night. She loved it!”

I proceed to ask more questions, each answer pointing to the truth I so desperately want to banish…

…from her life. From my life. From the lives of every 1 out of 3 women who battle an eating disorder, and live in a war zone each and everyday.

The hardest part? This battle ground you can’t escape. Your body. Your mind. Your very skin.

They, me, us. Living each and every day in an invisible hallocaust, begging silently for someone to save us from ourselves.

I took the deepest breath I could and silently whispered a prayer. I would need the Holy Spirit to speak through me and prepare his heart for what I was about to share.

I told him my story; every aching and painful reality. The voices. The lies. The battle. The hatred and the agony. All directed at myself, the food that nourishes me and the body I have lived in slavery to.

“That’s not will power,” I explained, “That’s obsession; a coping mechanism she’s trained herself to do in defense. It’s how she’ll win the battle for today. Tomorrows another story.

You see, the lies, they never stop; We’re not good enough, pretty enough, skinny enough. And if we are that minute, we won’t be fine for long. Eat just one bite of the wrong thing, miss one day of working out and we’re well on our way to being a heffer tomorrow. We’ll never be good enough or worthy of being loved unless we’re perfect.  At least thats what we subconsciously tell ourselves, without even realizing it. We even believe the lies to be our own thoughts.

That eating of the whole casserole? That’s not love. It’s hatred. It the forbidden fruit she’s just tasted. And the lies they get louder with every bite. But she’s already screwed up and ate it. She knows she’s “never allowed to eat this or do that again.” But she’s already fallen off the bandwagon, she mind as well make it good one- an epic fail! So She’ll eat the whole thing

When it’s done, guilt and shame will follow her; a distended gut, her dunce cap of punishment. Mirrors will taunt and mimic her stupidity and her mind will whistle the tune of “ugly, fat, not good enough.” … for hours, for days, for weeks.. however long it takes her to “be in control again and appease the image in the mirror.

So, she’ll try harder. She won’t let it happen again. From the binge, comes the purge cycle, be it a physical purge, or simply an elimination of anything ” not healthy.” And working out will be her pennence, while she tricks herself into thinking she’s “got this.”

You see foods the strongest enemy and ourselves the tattling five year old. And exercise? Well it’s the best friend who’s really a frienemy, and disguises her evil motives.

It’s a battle she’ll never win, only succumb to more and more. Slowly but surely, she’ll kill every part of hope, every like she once had in herself, every food and movement that once brought her joy and made her feel alive.

This is 1 in every 3 girls reality; the war with food continues.

And the world thinks we’re healthy. We’re active and we’re disciplined. They praise us for our vainity and ask pointers for our ways. They feed the monster thats slowly killing us and ripping the very essence of our joy.

This evil epidemic has gone unnoticed, not talked about for far too long.. why? because we’re too ashamed to admit it. Too stubborn to “let go” and find freedom. Fear tells us it’s not possible and our coping isn’t so bad!

And as players in the game, we’ve fed each others obsession and quietly cheered each other on to the gates of hell..

A living reality that needs to stop. It’s time we shed light on the truth.

_____________

If you are facing a battle with food or an obsession with exercise, it’s time you face the truth. Reach out for help. Tell someone, anyone who you feel safe with whats really going on.There is help. There is freedom. There is another life with healing!

If you have a friend, an acquaintance or a family member that deals with an eating disorder; or you know someone who you suspect is struggling, please tell someone.

While attacking them face on is not always the best tactic, reaching out to someone who loves them with the truth is paramount. Quietly, in secret, that women is begging you to save her.

She may not have the words to ask or the willpower to leave the battle herself, but acknowledgment is the first step to healing and you may be her only chance.

My Journey with Food

The truth is I’ve struggled with food my whole life. It’s been a love hate relationship I navigated liked stormy seas, either barely treading water or sinking miserably. I spent more years of my childhood than I can count on one hand staring at my body in the mirror, analyzing it’s every curve and cupping my waste between my two hands to ensure my fingers touched. Nearly 30 hours a week in a body suit didn’t help [once piece dance garment].

I can hardly remember conversations from my teen years, muffled and stolen by the obsessive calorie counting that controlled my every thought. Over and over I’d list off the food I’d eaten, counting every morsel that passed my lips.

It got so bad, that I could convince myself I’d eaten a cake by simply staring at it long enough. By my late teens, I stopped perspiring and would get sent out of dance class for not working hard enough. “If I wasn’t sweating, how could I be giving it my all?” My teacher would protest. My attitude didn’t help much. I was permanently moody from the hunger pains I learnt to praise- markers for a day of neglecting food, well done.

There were points in my life where I’d come back from the deep end and realize how deadly and scary my obsession had become. A period of time would pass, where I’d allow myself to eat more normally and enjoy food as my family and friends did. But soon enough I’d reach a tipping point, where I couldn’t face my naked self in the mirror and I’d be back on the roller coaster of unhealthy eating habits. Binge and Fast; the premise of my journey with food for nearly 15 years.

As my relationship with God matured and he began to refine me [more like do an overhaul] , he showed me quickly how deeply engrained my obsession with food and vanity had become. A lie had been planted by Satan many years ago and over time, I had allowed it to become “truth”, even accepting Satan’s voice as my own. While many of the lies were surface things, such as believing I couldn’t be loved if I didn’t look a certain way or that I was much “bigger” than I truly was, the root of the lie was so much deeper. It preyed on the vary thing that kept me furthest from God for years: acceptance, my need for control and my desire to “have everything together and wrapped up pretty.”

I had come to believe that if I didn’t look perfect on the outside, people would begin to question my inside. They’d know I was weak. They’d know I was broken. They’d mock me. And no one would be my friend.

I viewed perfection as my credibility in all things.

I had come to the end of myself and knew that if anything was going to change, it would have to be God led and inspired. I’d already tried everything I could think of, from learning about nutrition, forming healthy eating and workout habits, going for counselling, reading every self help book I could get my hands on and owning up to it to family and friends. In essence, I tried everything I could try, but in my own strength. And none of it worked.

So I laid it at his feet, repented of my foolish and all consuming sin [allowing a silly thing like food to take priority and focus over God in my life] and prayed that he would heal me and restore me to full health. If there was anything he needed me to do, I’d do it. Just simply say the word, Holy Spirit, and I will jump.

The first leg of my recovery came from an encounter with Lisa Bevere and the transformational healing that took place through her book, “You are not what you weigh.” In it I discovered how I had allowed food to become an idol that I worshipped over God; that I trusted it and myself, more than I did Jesus. And so long as I tried to control the situation and find my identity and worth in it, I’d be in bondage. I was choosing to be in slavery, rather than accept the easy yoke of Christ! I experienced the power of true repentance and the healing that follows, as God opened my eyes, freed me from my obsessive thinking, changed the way I saw food and restored my digestive system back to health. [I had stopped producing electrolytes, my metabolism had slowed and I had developed gluten and dairy intolerance] It truly was a miracle, God orchestrated.

But like the onions that we are, God is never truly done. ‘Cause when one layers been shed, there’s another to be peeled, until we finally reach the core or the root of our problem.

I experienced months of new found joy and contentment with food before old habits crept in again. And with a few busy months behind me, including 2 weeks of travel, I found myself feeling sluggish, opting for chips and a second serving of ice cream, rather than a run and my go-to protein smoothie. I felt jailed by my cravings, unable to say no, with little motivation to eat clean or work out.

I prayed for guidance and felt the Holy Spirit nudge me towards a juice cleanse. Nothing serious; just a simple 3 day detox to rid myself of the cravings. This had nothing to do with loosing weight and my heart was entirely in the right place. I’ve learnt my lesson. I want to walk in obedience, turning from the things that steal my focus and attention from God.

Those three days were nothing short of war; a test of my faith and perseverance! I was permanently “hAngry,” my days were packed back to back with disappointing and frustrating meetings, my vehicle broke down, nearly leaving me stranded in the middle of the highway with no hazard lights and I had no energy to answer the incessant phone calls and texts from everyone who needed me [many of whom I love dearly and truly needed my prayers and support]. Every fibre in my being wanted to scream from the rooftops how terrible my days were treating me and drive through dairy queen to make myself feel better; but instead I chose to hang on, keep my nose in his word and give thanks.

And friends, I’m so glad I did. ‘Cause on the other side there was light and clarity.  I see now why Satan fought so hard to derail me in those 3 days.

You see, I discovered something; a root of ingratitude and poor return for the kindness and love that God has shown me. I’d become numb to some of the basic blessings that I should be giving thanks for every day, like food, water and shelter.

I’d taken for granted the feeling of being full, even despising it and abusing it’s gift – keeping me healthy and letting me know when my body needs fuel or has had enough. There are people every day, starving for just ONE morsel and here I was wishing away the feeling of being full because it meant bloating and uncomfortable jean buttons!

I didn’t appreciate that food is the fuel that allowed me to stay focused during the day, get to and do the things I needed to and be joyful all the while doing them! It gives me the energy to share Jesus with others, show compassion to those who are hurting, love until it’s uncomfortable and show mercy to difficult people.

Without fuel, I’m an empty, angry, defeated shell. How ever then, can I be a light and disciple without food?

Lord forgive me for not seeing this sooner and thank you for unveiling my eyes. Your blessings are abundant both profound and simple. Yet every one of them intentional, with purpose and a mission. May I never again take for granted the blessings of food, the fuel it provides and the community that is built enjoying it together. I praise you and worship you in Jesus’ name, Amen!