Mirror, Mirror

I saw her today and I saw it all over her face.

When the whistle was blown, they began. It didn’t take long till the more athletically built girl was in front. For being in fourth grade she had an excellent stride, her blonde hair tied up in a scrunchie and the end of the ponytail bounced along as each of her feet hit the pavement. The smile on her face told the observer that this was easy for her. She had done this before. Her Nike sneakers and name brand leggings showed off her already forming leg muscles proving that this wasn’t her first run around the playground.

But as my eyes glanced over the pack of young girls running around the schoolyard, that’s when I saw a different girl. One I related to more than the leader of the pack. No it was her in the very very back that caught my eye.

She had brown wavy hair that stopped at her shoulders and a nose gave the impression it grew faster than the rest of her face overnight. Her hot pink t-shirt and white New Balance sneakers reminded me of all the awful run days in gym class that still haunt me to this day. Her feeble attempt to keep up lasted only 1/4th of the assigned route around the schoolyard. She only passed by 4 cones before she stopped running and started walking.  I saw how quickly she accepted the lies in her head as truth and how they aided in the destruction of her ability and self-image.I know because I’ve been there too. Except her body towered over the other girls with her shoulders and chest showing evidence of the change that was already beginning in her young body. Even with no boy around, I knew she was in the top 5% of students for height. I had the opposite going on at her age.

My tiny frame has always been the topic of conversation most of my life. It’s either out of concern, jealousy, or playful jest among adults (especially those with white or silver hair). My pediatrician wanted to give me hormone pills because some of my features weren’t developing at a normal rate, according to him. I was 12. I’ve been called “pencil legs” by more peers than I want to admit and have been accused of being bulimic and anorexic the majority of my life.  I think the first time someone asked me is when I was 10 and didn’t even know what those words meant not to mention the seriousness of that question. And I know what it’s like to be an adult and people still ask you if you ever eat or someone saying a snide comment about how little I am.

So, I guess I don’t know exactly what that little girl was thinking but oh how I can relate to her. The insecurity on her face mirrors mine each spring. I love warmer weather but I still get nervous the first time someone sees me in a tank top after a long winter. I wonder and set a mental timer to see how long it takes them to make a comment about my arms or legs or both.

But thankfully, I’ve learned who really gets to define my small frame and on an average day I keep God’s word close to my heart and my mom’s own words echoing on repeat. “You’re just right.” Words have power and my mom always made sure I knew that while I was little, I was just right in her eyes. Even now I tear up while typing at the power these words have had over me as I have often been teased for being, to someone else, not just right.

In 1st Timothy 2, Paul warns women to not get caught up in what they look like or what they see in the mirror. He goes as far as to request women be properly dressed, modest, and having no braids or adornment in their hair. Be a woman of good works, he says, as it is proper for women who are making a claim for godliness.

Does this mean we aren’t allowed to braid our hair or wear headbands and fancy clips around our curls? NO! I believe it is to be a heart and motive check. Same as today, our confidence and status can always play with our desires, wanting it to be from the created things we wear than our actual Creator.

If I’m being honest struggle with this. Far more than my “pencil leg” issue is my face and body acne. I have been in a war against my skin for 19 years and I am exhausted by it. Makeup is my best friend. Makeup completes me and makes me look more like me, than my actual nude face does. See how twisted this thinking is? At the heart of who I am, I am telling the creator who designed me in love, he done messed up. He got some stuff right (have you seen my hair?! 😉 ) but not everything. His perfect design looks different than what I think is perfection. 

This is very heart issue that Paul is writing about. What our minds are thinking about ourselves is truly saying what our hearts are screaming and believing.  Paul, with God’s inspiration, tells us to put off these false lies and beliefs and put on good works. Be more busy about doing God’s work in our workplaces and in our living rooms, spend more time glorifying and praising Him and spend less time in front of the mirror. Or even hiding from the mirror. Spend more energy on telling others what God has done for you and less time braiding your hair.

So how? How is this accomplished? It looks different for everyone. For me, it might look like fasting from makeup, for someone else it might mean giving your monthly clothing shopping allowance to your local church instead. But whatever it is, be about His good works. Find a habit or a lie that you’ve believed for so long and crush it with the truth. Replace it with something you do FOR Him and can only accomplish BY Him.

So to the girl on the playground, in the pink shirt, don’t worry. Next year you will no longer be the tallest and the most awkward. But to tell you that those thoughts will stop, as a result, would be another flat out lie. Those lies will change course and attack maybe your gifts and talents, or maybe another physical feature that doesn’t look like the world standards of beauty. Sweetheart, there will always be something and someone who isn’t content with who you are. Not everyone will like you on the outside or the inside. But your Creator loves you SO much and he is whispering to you every time those lies sing in your head, you are just right. You. Are. Just. Right. You are precious. You are worth dying for. And you are mine.