i wish i was like her...

I confess that sometimes I wish I was like her...

We have all done it. We have all walked into a room and measured ourself against the backdrop of women (or men) spanning the room. We've decided we don't like certain people before ever knowing their name, hearing their voice, or listening to their story.

We start doing it at such a young age and it breaks my heart.

We compare ourselves; and regardless of whether we feel 'more than' or 'less than' it makes it really difficult to 'love lots'.

When we constantly compare ourselves to those around us it not only eats us up inside, but it deteriorates relationships, sometimes before they have even had the chance to begin.

In college a roommate introduced me to the artist Ani Difranco. Now of course I can't condone everything she writes or expresses, but one lyric of hers has always stuck with me.

"Women should be allies, not competitors"

And to that all the angels in Heaven shouted, "AMEN!"

Deep breath, ladies. Meet me at the table here and let's talk through this.

I'm 28-years-old and I had yet another realization in this department over the weekend. I got the opportunity to meet a beautiful, kind, creative woman. I really like her.

Although, for the sake of honesty and the purpose of this blog, I have to share that when I first saw her picture, before ever meeting her, part of me didn't want to like her. Why? Because I thought she was beautiful and fashionable.

And I suddenly felt "less than".

I know. I'm embarrassed to even put it to pen. Insecurity is never flattering. But maybe, just maybe, someone else can relate.

Of course, I had enough sense in my head and enough Jesus in my heart to push past those initial feelings and really give her a chance.

Like I said before, she is wonderful.

Then I got to hear her share with a group of people that being a stay-at-home-mom is her dream job. She said that her whole life she has always wanted to be a wife and have babies and stay at home raising them.

There it was again. That pang inside that felt confusingly like annoyance. I did a quick inventory to try and understand what I was experiencing. Annoyance wasn't the right word at all. What was it? What was my deal? Surely I was more dignified than this.

ah.
there it was.
I didn't feel annoyed. I felt threatened.

I felt threatened by a beautiful, fashionable, kind, gentle, Jesus-loving woman who was just sharing her truth with us. And here I was doing the worst thing possible in that moment--I was comparing.

Instead of allowing myself to move from threatened to shamed, I embraced God's gift and slipped on over to the land of enlightenment. We need to use these moments to learn more about ourselves and more about the God who created us, or what purpose will they serve?

Why did I feel pain when I heard her share such a beautiful truth about herself? Why would I feel threatened?

So I sought the Lord with these questions, and here's why:

Because God made me differently. And sometimes in my mind different feels like 'not enough' or 'not right'.

You see, I did the stay at home mom thing, and while I LOVE my daughter Lydia with a fierce passion and intensity, I didn't LOVE being at home every day. I longed for the opportunities to use the gifts God had given me and those opportunities just weren't available inside my home. I wanted to to work outside of the home. I wanted a different kind of variety in my week than what I had at home.  I had a longing for something else, and on many occasions I felt terribly guilty for this.

I have chosen the above words carefully, because the last thing I want to do is hurt those who love staying at home with their kids. If you stay home with your kids and that is what you want to be doing, good for you! That is so awesome. I love that for you. I really, truly do. There is nothing that I do that makes me better than any mom who chooses to stay home with her kids. I"m sharing this side of the story so that both the stay at home moms and the working moms can sit across from each other and say together, "Yes, sometimes I feel insecure that I'm not as good a mom/woman as you..." and we can say back "You're wonderful. You're beautiful. You're a great mom. You're a great woman."


So let me share an example: when I hear women say, "I want to stay at home with my kids, because I want to raise them." I feel a little hurt, because whether or not that woman means to say it, I feel she is indirectly implying that in fact I am not doing that--I am not raising my kids--because I work.

And that hurts to hear.

Some women are implying that. Of course I have experienced that, but many women are not implying that. And maybe they just really need to find a better way to say that. Just like working moms need to find better ways to express their desire to work.
So I take a deep breath and remind myself of the truth around my life: I am raising my kids and I am loving raising my kids, but I am also 100% loving the work that I get to do every day. I love my time in my office. I love the projects I get to work on and the space that I have to be me, to think, to write, to focus, to breathe, to plan, to prepare, to teach. I love it. I really, really love it. And then, when I go home at the end of the day I am a better mom than if I had been there all day. It's better for me, for us, for my family. It isn't better for everyone, but it is better for me.

When I'm home all day every day I get kind of ugly. Oh I don't mean sweat pants and un-showered ugly, I mean heart ugly. I get impatient and irritated. I get exasperated with and overwhelmed by the house and all of the daily tasks that need done. But there are women who do this, they are home every day, and they do it so gracefully and they love it. THEY LOVE IT. And if I am not careful I find myself comparing myself to them, wishing I was like them, and then resenting them because I am not.

This is why I think it is important to share our stories. So we can understand each other and be patient with one another as we confess to the truths of our hearts and our lives. I keep thinking back to a great lunch I got to have with a beautiful young woman from the local college right before the weekend began. She trusted me enough to share her story with me and to engage in meaningful conversation. In turn, I shared with her my issues of insecurities and anxiety and the intense desire to measure up. It was beautiful. Totally, wonderfully, beautiful and I loved every minute.

As I reflect on the weekend I think back to my lunch conversation with her. We began to discuss Proverbs 31. A lot of women love the Proverbs 31 woman passage. That's great. You should! It is beautiful and poetic and amazing.

But I raised a question to my lunch guest a bit nervous about how she might feel about it. I'm not out trying to shock people or make them feel uncomfortable. I just said that while I love the Prov. 31 woman passage I sometimes feel like it can be used to shame women.

She totally understood.

And let me give just one example before I wrap this up today, if I haven't lost you to boredom already...

Proverbs 31:25 She is clothed in strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.

These words are at my bedside. So I see them often.

Sometimes we use this passage to describe women based on their character or the actions and things they have accomplished in their lives. If you survey it from earthly standards, there are a lot of undignified women out there--and often, I would fall into this category.

But I don't believe that a woman's strength and dignity is dependent upon her sole ability to manage those. It simply wouldn't be possible to do.

I believe that a woman is clothed in strength and dignity, because God is her creator, Jesus is her Savior, and the Holy Spirit is her stylist.

Ladies, we are so much more than our fashion sense, our career, how many children we have or do not have, whether or not we stay home with them, or what we've accomplished. We are more than our imperfect moments of jealousy, impatience, emotional instability, arrogance, and greed. I confess to each of you that I am often guilty of comparing myself to other women and it does not bring out the best in me. Instead of trying to measure up to each other, we should just rest in the peace, hope, and promise of Jesus that as daughters of the King, He will clothe us in strength and dignity.

When our identify rests in Jesus, we'll lose the need to compare because we'll find we are standing on common, holy, ground.