“Cease striving and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:1 NASB1995)
Since I started this blog in 2011, I have written many times about anxiety and how I often find myself living from a place of fear. It’s like my default mode, and I don’t recognize it until I am deep into it, exhausted and overextended and trying to get out. It often happens when I seek to help someone, to be needed, to fill a gap for people I wasn’t meant to fill.
If you’ve read my blog for long, you know that I’m an introspective person. Recently, I set out to discover why I keep reverting to this mindset. I find myself wondering, Have I prayed enough? Have I done enough? (See that—doing is the problem, but I keep trying to do more.)
This brings me to a story from my junior high days. I would have been thirteen, in the eighth grade. That year, my coach worked with me on my jump shot, my three-pointer, and my free throw. The next year, a new girl moved to town. Even I had to admit that she was much better than I was. Her natural talent shined.
During this time, I lost the attention of my coach. So I gathered my courage one day and asked him, “What can I do to get my starting spot back?” I realize now, as an adult, that I was asking the wrong question. What I should have asked was how I could continue to improve. But I didn’t. I had been replaced in the starting lineup, and I didn’t like the way it made me feel.
The coach answered from a basketball strategy perspective—practice hard and continue to improve, but there would be no guarantee that I would get the spot back. This is where my fourteen-year-old brain connected the dots and heard something he didn’t say—You’ll never be good enough. But if you work hard enough, you just might be.
I’m sure he had no idea how I interpreted that conversation. And it wasn’t just his words that shaped who I would become. I was already a performer, a perfectionist, focused on achieving and outcomes. His words fed into that mindset—if I could just do enough, work hard enough, perform well enough, achieve enough, then I might be good enough to earn [fill in the blank].
I carried this belief with me into my marriage and numerous friendships. If I just give enough, sacrifice enough, am needed enough, then I will be loved and valued and worthy. And it worked, for a while. Until my marriage fell apart, and no matter how much I did to show I brought value to the relationship, it wasn’t enough. Because the problem wasn’t my worth, but I couldn’t see that then. Instead, my brain concluded, subconsciously, that I wasn’t valuable.
As you can see, this struggle isn’t new, but it’s one that I now recognize. And recognizing it is half the battle. When I feel rejected, I can do a few things.
- I tell myself what happened: I was rejected, overlooked, etc.
- I tell myself how I feel: hurt, angry, etc.
- I remind myself of the truth: who I am in Christ.
It is this third point where I find my anchor. In Romans 8:38–39, Paul says that nothing in creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ. The truth is, Jesus sees me as his beloved (Colossians 3:12), God’s workmanship (Ephesians 2:10), adopted through him (Ephesians 1:5), and chosen in him (Ephesians 1:4). Nothing another person does can change any of those things. I don’t have to earn what Christ has already given me.
Even so, it’s a constant battle. I know how to strive, to earn. I don’t know how to rest in this truth. But with his help, I’m learning.
Dear Lord, thank you for the truth of who I am in you, and that I don’t have to earn your love. Help me to anchor myself in you and not what people think about me. Amen.