Ode to Myself

I’m really proud of you.

You really desire the good of everyone around you. Sometimes the follow through is lacking – maybe you’re scared, too shy, unsure of what to do, or distracted – but your heart is sincere.

You have so much joy inside of you. For the little things. For the big things. For sights, for smells, for textures, for sounds, for tastes. It radiates from inside and in turn infects joy upon those around you.

You do a lot of things well. You cook, you sing, you draw, you write, you knit, you sew, you play sports, you tell funny stories, you talk to people, you lead things, you organize events, you listen to people…you’ve gotten compliments on your handshake, for goodness’ sake!

Even the things that you don’t find yourself to be talented in, you have given yourself space to slowly improve over the years. You play plenty of chords on the guitar now. When you’re in a car by yourself, you harmonize to almost all the pop songs on the radio. You feel less awkward when meeting people and you’ve learned to ask questions, be comfortable with silence, and not try to solve people’s problems.

You’re so smart. You’ve never had to work very hard and you still excel in pretty much all subjects. You don’t give yourself credit for this because all you see are the geniuses around you. Perhaps they are smarter than you in some ways, but that doesn’t affect the caliber of your own intelligence.

You bring people together. You connect a lot of people who don’t take the time or don’t have the time to keep up with one another. You allow yourself grace to not reach out to people that you don’t have bandwidth for, but when they re-enter your life, they are always a welcome sight to be invested in and cared for. That is not something everyone does or can do.

You are a problem solver. Sure, you spend time despairing over big, overwhelming issues that seem impossible to overcome, but you also take the time to break those things up into steps that you can take to make things better. You have continuously been frustrated with the lack of communication in your family over the years, and instead of just allowing the sin of generations to continue, you have slowly been the one to extend conversation first and take the initiative in asking how they are doing.

You have a lot of humility. Without expecting anything on the other individual’s part, I’ve seen you apologize to people who have shattered your heart into a million pieces, because you see how you have also caused pain to them. Over the years, you have struggled and struggled and struggled with the sense of entitlement, and more and more, you are willing to suffer and ache and mourn, trusting that life and hope will come to fruition, not here, but when you return to Jesus.

You trust people with wisdom. You recognize that people have hurt you in very deep ways, and you give yourself space from these people to mourn and heal your own wounds. At the same time, you recognize that the broken relationship is a result of sin, and that this is not how it was meant to be. And you seek reconciliation with these same individuals, give them space to have an impact on your heart, even though you know that they could hurt you again.

You’ve grown up. Things you thought you could or would never do – drive a car, be financially independent, have a career, lead groups, take your car to the mechanic, schedule doctor’s appointments, look for houses to rent, job search; you’ve slowly jumped into all of these things, and granted, made mistakes, but done them well!

You have learned to be honest with your feelings. You smile and laugh without reserve about the things that make you happy, but you also cry shamelessly about the things that cause you pain, and rage openly about the things that cause you anger. You’re still learning to share these things with others so that they can walk with you in your emotions, but you improve with each passing day.

You desire justice, to do what is right. And you realize that this has been perceived as extremist or overzealous. And you also realize that you don’t meet your own standards or desires for perfection or equality or justice. But that doesn’t stop you from dreaming of what the world will be as God intended it to be, and you strive to be a part in making that vision a reality.

All this and more and more as you walk faithfully with each passing day, entrusting your life to Abba.