27It took me a long time to be happy
with who I am and how I look; years in fact.
Saying I wasn’t popular in high school was an understatement. I had just come from home school into high school aka everyone had been friends since birth and I was a nobody. I was voted “shyest” my senior of high school which makes everyone I now know laugh. I just never said much because nobody cared to listen.
I am not pretty by the world’s standards. I haven’t been close to a size six since middle school. My lips are tiny, I have to wear pants labeled for “short” women, and my thighs at several points have been paired with the word “thunder.”
The only guys I’m good at talking to are those in the “friend zone.” In college, I ruined every possible relationship and I have issues with commitment ergo, I’ve never had a boyfriend. Then I watch all my facebook friends marry and have kids. The epitome of happiness in the female realm.
Yet, over the years I have found something that outweighs all the negatives I once found in myself: grace. In Christ, who loves me beyond those things, and even more, beyond the mess that’s not even visible to everyone. And if the God of the Universe could choose to love me despite, even for me, then I could, too.
Grace and the realization that these things will fade. No matter how many cremes we buy or how many surgeries, we are all dying. And in that process our bodies break down and our popularity may pass. Yet in Christ there is a hope of life beyond this earth. And in that hope there is also abundant life here that finds treasure in things outside of what this world values. We live in a broken system. Through Christ I have learned about things that are valuable to His heart; and it’s not the things that I once thought were valuable.
My days are far from perfect, but I have joy beyond measure in the shadow of God’s grace. I have a job that I love, amazing friends, and everything I could ever want. No, I haven’t shrunk sizes, magically grown inches taller, I am not a celebrity, nor do I have a boyfriend, but I have learned the secret of happiness.
Pizza, frozen yogurt, New Years Eve, Zac Efron… so many good things to celebrate this exhausting last day of school. I’m all smiles.
amberguessa asked: So how's school winding down?
It’s been fantastic! Our last day is tomorrow and despite all the challenges I’ve been through with this particular group of kiddos, I’m already a wreck when I’m reminded that I won’t see them every day next year. Throw in a super positive parent e-mail and my sentimental message to my students and I’m complete and utter mush.
I’m also sunburned because our field day was today… oops.
She prayed for snow
in the summer and a
harvest in the spring.
Turning the world
upside
down
was
kind of her thing.
Another Student:” WHAT?! Money is most important and work. Without it you’ll die.”
Me, internally: Yes, but without friends you die another sort of death, perhaps a worse one.”
I heard her
struggle through the numbered books; the one she wanted seemingly nowhere in sight.
“Can I help you find something, Ma’am?” The ma’am surprises me: I kind of like this Southern thing.
“Ugh! We’ve been search for the 599s but none of these books are here! She just wants a book on koalas!”
“I can imagine how frustrating that is,” said with sympathy, “Let’s check the other children’s section.”
“There’s another section?!” She goes on to say that she doesn’t usually come and I long for her to bring this little girl here more often, to open the world to her.
After three minutes I send this woman off with over 15 books on koalas. She oozes thanks and I can’t help but smile. Suddenly I realize it isn’t the same satisfied smile I get after I finish shelving the books or organizing shelves. It’s a smile in my heart that I get when I help someone. It dawns on me that I’m deeply satisfied when I help someone.
My smile turns into a grin. You learn a lot of things at the library and not all of them are about koalas.
