I am part of history; I am allowed to and will make mistakes. – Angela Merkel – The Chancellor: The Remarkable Odyssey of Angela Merkel
At 30 something, you will leave your house bare faced. You will again have chosen to opt out of wearing make up. As you walk to the station, you will say to your self as long as my skin is good, that’s all that matters. The truth is even if your skin isn’t good, there will be days you choose not to remember the concealer. You’ll laugh to yourself because it’s been so long and you’ve forgotten so much. You’ll laugh to yourself because if only 16 year old you could see yourself. Or 23 year old you. The one who often left the house without make up but used the commute to colour and contour. Who hid the dark circles under her eyes like shame. Now, you rarely go to work with make up. Tired or after a good night sleep, you’ll say your face will do. Some days it will be out of sadness and not caring. Later when the joy has returned and you find you are laughing again, you will choose to show the world your dark circles remembering mama has them and she is the most beautiful woman you know.
If I was ever to write a letter to my younger self, I will tell her, I know it’s hard and sometimes you hate everything about the temple that is your body, but later and it might take a decade or more you will grow to love the body you are in. I would tell her not to make different decisions to get her here. Cut your hair and keep it short even when someone confuses you for a boy. The Potter’s hands are on you. Choose to abandon your body somewhere in your twenties because beautiful doesn’t feel like it fits. The Father’s eyes are on you. Wear it short, wear it long. Just wear it for you. When you meet a man who sees you as magic and holds your heart for a while. Let yourself. In the hum of the years you share together, he will be an instrument God uses to help you find your footing. You will learn that confidence was never about the reflection in the mirror. You will learn it was always about the Maker.
My truth is that, like most people, I am tired. I struggle with feeling alone and overwhelmed, and I spend an excruciating amount of time analysing my demons and overcompensating for them rather than simply listening to God, loving God, and loving those around me as God has called me to do – Henri J. M. Nouwen – Love, Henri
So you’ll often rush out of the door to work with just a shiny face full of moisturiser. You’ll brush your eyebrows to make sure they are going in the same direction and you’ll say to yourself, your face will do. You will remember, you were knitted by the hands of the Creator and you are held together by His grace and mercy. When the devil tries to whisper his lies and you are tempted to compete and compare what you have and don’t have, you will repeat they are fearfully and wonderfully made. In the next breath you will say the same of yourself. The rhythm of those moments will be a becoming and ingraining. A fight to believe all his works are wonderful.
One Sunday afternoon over lunch, you will find yourself in a conversation telling the 20 something year old sat across from you that it gets better and mean it. Not in arrogance or false promise. Instead, you will more clearly see and know all God has been doing in you. You will tell her that there may be hard months where you beg with no answer for a peace that runs deep into your bones. That you will hope that your silence cloaks you with invisibility. Wonder why emptiness fills where confidence should be. And yet in the early months of that year, an alien feeling will come over you. You will settle into yourself without anymore fuss. You will reason that you talk to much and are careless with your words. As you say these words to yourself, you will feel God’s raised eyebrow and you will note the changes He has made of you. You will search for fear and find it has lost some of its power. It will not be sudden and some days you will fall into the old. But you will find yourself one Sunday afternoon over lunch sat across from someone familiar and realise by faith we have come far.
Dear reader, I typed these words maybe over a year and a half ago. It felt that as soon as I closed my laptop, the devil said game on. The confessions I wrote above were tried and tested. It turned out, what is settled can always be disrupted. So, I post these words still standing on their truth, but a reminder reader (and taking the words of Spurgeon included in my new year post), “you must continue daily to fight”. For me, I fight to remember His handiwork is beautiful and in that list is my name.
*dear reader, please note the title of this post is taken from Gardenia, a poem by Jasmine Mans. It’s beautiful, sad and worth a listen.
THE WEEK THAT WAS:
Words of note –
Civic lessons courtesy of Judge Fred Biery – ADRIAN CONEJO ARIAS, and L.C.R., a Minor Child by and through His Parent and Guardian Adrian Conejo Arias, vs KRISTI NOEM, in Her Official Capacity as Secretary of the United States Department of Homeland Security et al
Thankful for –
- Blue skies and sunny afternoons
- Nairobi convenience
after the wilderness 