life’s lessons creep up on us.

I don’t know what is it recently, but I seem to have lost the ability to apologise for myself.

I don’t know if this is a product of turning 30, or from having gone through a lot over the past few years, but I seem to have decided subconsciously to own myself in all the good and bad and not apologise for it.

I’m not sure why somewhere in the past I decided that who I was was something to apologise for and hide and I am not sure why I spent years avoiding allowing all of me to exist.

But while meeting new people in a new job, (over video call- because 2020) I have noticed that I am not scared, or ashamed or shy about sharing my life, my talents, my experiences with people. I haven’t been overwhelmed by the fear of what they might think.

I say I am unsure where this all came from, but as I type that I think I have some idea. Each time I have burnt out, each time I have experienced what has left like my world collapsing, there is the small strong voice of God saying the following:

You are loved.

You are wanted.

You are beautifully and wonderfully made.

You are known.

And each time those words seem to have dug deeper into my being, deeper into the core of who I am. Those words are often linked with realisations about the way I have spoken about and to myself, realisations about the behaviour I have accepted from myself and others. But each time it has been like my acceptance of myself and my love for myself has grown.

I know that I have grown from the things I have experienced. Some of it has been insanely painful, some of it has been full of joy. But I have grown.

Somehow in the midst of it all with those words being whispered in my ears it has meant that I have found peace and sometimes joy in among it all.

And that has led to a confidence I never previously held. A confidence in myself and in what I might be able to bring to the world.

A confidence in God and his faithfulness and goodness.

Sometimes things creep up on you in life, and this has crept up on me; an understanding that I am no longer the insecure women and girl I have always defined myself as. Maybe it is age and maturity and life experiences, but mainly I think it is the faithfulness of God who continues to declare truth over His creation. Who continues to speak out light when all I see is darkness, and who is patient and kind in waiting for me to catch up.

R/