You look into the mirror, causally putting on that last bit of mascara. Looking up and slightly to one side to stretch and really open up the eye, your mouth slightly agape, you make several brush strokes against your lashes. Who knows why, but it goes on much smoother that way. Your lid bats down slowly and with a bit of pressure against the wand and you give one more swipe. No. Another. Okay. Now, even out the other side.
You break the mascara stance and pull back from the mirror relaxing your posture. You pop the wand back into the tube screwing it closed and then toss it into your makeup bag. Just like every morning for the last thirty years before, it’s a second nature routine. You look back up as you rummage through the bag for your apricot blush, and catch a passing glimpse and it stops you mid-rummage. Your eyes fix deeply on your own face. Something out-of-body-like freezes you in place for a moment.
It’s as if you haven’t looked into your own eyes before. The woman staring back in that split second looks like a stranger. For a milisecond of time, you really don’t know you. And it’s not poetic or philosophical. It feels concrete.
The crook of your nose just a little to the left side, the curvature where your eyelids meet on either side, the little scar directly above your right eyebrow that has been there since you were just five-years-old all seem new. While playing tag in the living room with your brother, you fell and hit the edge of the oak coffee table. You know it and remember it vividly, but seeing the faded evidence on your skin of that moment, just now is different. Maybe it’s a freckle or the shape of your left eyebrow not completely symmetrical to the right. You look intently at her in the 10X side of your beauty mirror and wonder, who is she?
Is that really me?
All at once, you see a shell, a body, and while it is your own face peering back, suddenly your person seems foreign.
You wonder if people see you that way – the same way you saw yourself when that glimpse froze you in your tracks for just a moment. You wonder if people see beauty in the way your eyes wrinkle up and a vein pops out on one temple when you are really laughing. Those are the things you notice in others. Do others see those little things in you? It is those small things that uniquely separates your sister or your friend or your husband from everyone else. Those are the things you love so much. In your mind’s eye, you see them – a birthmark, a small scar, a button nose, one tooth that turns just a bit, strong forearms or strawberry highlights, all adding authentic identifiers to that person.
I love his hands, the shape of them, the masculine toughness that they are. I noticed them when we first met back in 2017. They are rugged, but well kept, always with trimmed nails. I love when he smiles after a real unfiltered laugh, how his eyes light up and I can see the dimples in his cheeks peeking through his unshaved face. Man, I love those dimples.
My oldest daughter has the most beautiful olive skin tone and cocoa colored hair, nothing like her mama’s naturally ashen blonde. When she smiles, her deep brown exotic eyes smile too in a way that perfectly accentuates the mystery and depth behind them.
My youngest has freckles that blanket over the bridge of her nose, and add to her natural sun-kissed beauty in the summertime when they really pop the most. She has the tiniest little nail beds that make her hands petite and feminine.
You know those little attributes that come to mind when you think of a person – your people?
My son is tall and has a presence that although towering now at almost sixteen, is not overbearing, but instead comforting and protective. I know his presence will speak to the protection he will give to his own family one day. He has long eyelashes that women pay money to have.
When others see me or think of me, what do they see? Have you ever wondered too? After all, we don’t have an impression of our own self – not in the same way at least; because we know all of ourselves. Our inflection and self awareness doesn’t allow for us to really see the way others do. We introspectively see all of our flaws and weaknesses. It’s a strange and different type of knowing than others have of us. Others infer what we are thinking, our motives and who we are based on body language, tone of voice, our habits and routines, responses, touch and eye contact – all things external.
Beyond the surface, those quirky characteristics that are physical and tangible, what do others see underneath all of that? More importantly, how do they feel when they think of us? Is there warmth, esteem, and comfort or a cold distance and discomfort?
Obviously, we will never be everyone’s favorite. We will irritate some, and sometimes not by our own doing. People have preferences and that translates into people they prefer.
But overall, how am I perceived?
It’s a question I’ve lamented over. And it’s a question I’ve dismissed with an indifferent brush off my shoulder. Sometimes confidence guides my steps, other times insecurity and self doubt plague my steps. And it isn’t always one extreme of the spectrum, as most days I fall somewhere in the median of a heathy balance.
It’s a curious thing really – how I can give so much grace to others; how I can see all their beauty in spite of flaws or ways they may occasionally disappoint me. It’s telling how the adorable quirks or physical characteristics that I notice, that set them apart, are still always present in my mind’s eye despite all the downfalls they may perceive about their own self. Isn’t it funny that way?
Some days, I’ve felt like a complete fraud, an imposter even. I become so fixated on my own performance and merit, what I am offering, that I forget that people see me in the same way that I see them. Just as they are – comforting, humorous, mysterious, gentle, wise, lovable…
There have been times in my life, I’ve felt at any minute, people will see behind what they’ve inferred about me. That they’ll see all the times I’ve screwed up, the insecurity, the fact that many times I’m just winging it over here and I have no idea what I’m doing. As if, should I give this advice, write this post, warn against something or make my opinion public, that others will instantly think, who is she and why should we listen to anything she has to say?
They’ll think I’m strange, not good friend material, too excessive, not open enough…and the list goes on.
Man, we humans are a complete mess right?!
Yes. We are complicated and sometimes much too self involved. Sometimes, it seems almost uncontrollable. Our thoughts run wild and we wonder if we are the only ones on the planet with these issues.
Since God’s word says there is nothing new under the sun, we have to be reminded again we aren’t the only ones. We all have moments of imposter syndrome where we wonder if we’re cut out for what our spirit says we should do or be or move toward. We all wonder if we’re good enough, wise or skilled enough. We wonder if we’re likable and lovable. And sometimes when we don’t feel like we even know ourselves, we have to find counsel from those who help to remind us.
That counsel can come from those in our lives who extend grace, who always show up with encouragement and who have proven to be a really good friend. These good friends who also lean into the Lord, who make him a priority and Lord in their own lives, help us to stay grounded in who we are in Him too.
Our ultimate counselor is the Holy Spirit. He is also referred to as the Helper. Jesus promised to send him – the Holy Spirit – to every one who puts their trust in and follows Jesus as Lord. If God’s Holy Spirit resides with us and in us, we can be reminded who we are and how we’re seen by our God.
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+16&version=ESV
Did you know that the Holy Spirit brings back to our remembrance the things Jesus has told us in his word? And I would add when we are listening and really seeking, exactly when we need it.
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
Staying drenched in his word (the Bible) keeps it fresh in our minds as we face daily challenges or those frozen-in-your-tracks identity crises. When we read and study, the spirit of God reminds us what we’ve read when we need it.
Remembering that I belong to the King of the Universe solidifies my identity, even when I try to impose my performance levels onto my worth and value. When I can’t even understand my own thoughts and emotions, his word reminds me who I am. I am separate from my feelings.
You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans%208&version=ESV
Because I am his daughter, I have inherited his royalty. I have been adopted into his family by being born again, out of spiritual death and into spiritual life. It is because of who he is that I now am seen as righteous (perfectly good). Not because of my performance and what I offer to those in my world, but because Jesus’ perfect life is seen on my behalf by God.
For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons (and daughters, my emphasis) of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans%208&version=ESV
When we are tempted to doubt our own worth, doubt whether we are doing enough or are good enough, it helps to remember that this is all temporary. What is not temporary is the fact that we have already received all the acceptance and security that we’ll ever need. We are good enough because of who our savior is and what he gives us in exchange for our faith and belief. That locked-in security has nothing to do with our external appearance or our performance at work.
Life with him forever, as a daughter, accepted, made right, never alone – that is who you are and what you are given when he is your father. Heirs….wow.
When you find yourself frozen for a moment and wondering intently who you really are, know that in Jesus you are beautifully and wonderfully made. Stop the imposter syndrome in its tracks and remember that you are a daughter of the King. This knowing also resets us when we do fail at a task or let a friend down, by empowering us to do the next right thing – trying, attempting or beginning again, working to strengthen our skill set or asking forgiveness in humility. The need will vary, but the power comes from God when we lean into him. He will strengthen you for the work you must do, but your success or lack of success in that work will never make you any less his.
Mining Beneath the Ordinary 