Writing the "perfect" post

I remember reading Rachel Madden's post on this topic and just getting it, you know? It made so much sense to a fellow (recovering) perfectionist. I want to have the perfect post, a beautifully crafted manuscript of exquisite aesthetic value (getting my money's worth out of that thesaurus ;) ).

I'm almost drooling thinking about it. Sigh...

Perfectionism is a pretty lie. It reminds me of a South American Dart Frog. Those vibrant colours are gorgeous but they are oh so deadly, much like the toxicity of perfectionism I discussed a few weeks ago. 

So, if I can't write the perfect post what can I do? 

There's the usual tips, like breaking up dense text with pictures. You can see in my earlier posts that I didn't always add images but now Creative Commons is one of my bestest friends :)

But really this post is about not worrying and giving up the desire to be perfect. Sorry.

Let peace, rather than worry, rule your heart.

Collaboratively I bet we could write pages and pages of the little tips and tricks we know about blogging and writing a killer post. But how often do we say "don't worry about it?" I don't mean in that namby pamby blasé way but a down to earth, God centred plea to just stop worrying. Seriously. Stop. 

My second semester started a few weeks ago so my blog has gone on the backburner for a while. This is generally considered to be a reasonable thing to do but it's still been a nagging worry.

Instead of getting on with my studies I'm wasting energy worrying. I'm constantly justifying my actions and reminding myself why blogging can wait another day, another week (or two.. *cough*). But it feels like I'm letting someone down. I don't think it's a specific person, more likely that nasty idol of perfectionism. 

Me, hiding from the nasty idol. 

"At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Saviour appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Saviour, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life." (Titus 3: 3-7)

Jesus came to set the captives free (Luke 4:18). Through Him we are freed from those passions and pleasures and by working out our salvation (Philippians 2: 12) we become more like Him: righteous, holy and sanctified. 

My prayer: Lord, let us no longer be deceived but earnestly seek your face, to walk the narrow path and be filled and renewed by your Holy Spirit. 

God bless and have a wonderful week (or two/three/until I have a breather from study)! Oh and, as a moment by moment lesson in letting go, I accidentally lost half this post . . . half of my beautiful, exquisite post *sob.*

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Photo credit:

1. Image by Sascha Gebhardt. Used under CC license. 

2. Image by New Life Church Collingwood. Used under CC license. 

3. Image by black panther. Public domain. 

Shaking the hold of perfectionism

I used to see perfectionism as something of a virtue. It was one of those qualities you'd admit with a wry smile and a quiet chuckle. It wasn't a bad thing per se. Sure it could be a little exasperating for people around you at times, and that was unfortunate, but it was just part of you. You couldn't help it, right? 

We should come with a warning label. Seriously.

In the past I would meet such admissions from my fellow perfectionists with that same wry smile. But more recently I have responded with a sad expression and a shake of the head. Whether or not I actually say it aloud I have come to the stunning conclusion, by the grace of God, that perfectionism is just no good for you. 

In fact it's toxic. As toxic as any other sin. 

A lot of Christians around the blogosphere write about perfectionism. I was surprised by this as my perfectionism had seemed unique. Turns out I was wrong... Again. 

But I suppose that feeling of uniqueness is what happens when something becomes, or seems to become, part of you and your personality. It is so ingrained that you can't imagine life without it. It's unique, it's special, it's ME. 

So why would I throw a piece of myself away? 

That bring me back to my original point about perfectionism being rooted in sin. The easiest way to see it is the standards we set for ourselves, and more importantly why we set them so high. 

We believe that our lives must be perfect. We must achieve the perfect grades, be the perfect friend, family member or romantic partner. Getting something "wrong" is a disaster, a blemish upon our record. And just to clarify "wrong" is defined as anything less than perfection.

Our value and self-worth lies in getting everything right (perfect) and we will bend ourselves over backwards to achieve this. Take the example of when I was determined to get both of my friends to church, even though dad had told me we could only take one. I had to be a "good" friend and couldn't stand to be seen as anything less than exceptional. 

In all of this you can see I'm something of a silly goose but that whole toxic sin part may not be obvious so I'll make it clear: In seeking perfection I am living in rebellion against God. I am embracing the lie that I that I can save myself. Afterall all I had to was get everything "right." Jesus is great and all but I can do this on my own, thanks all the same. The consequence of this is that I am telling God "your love and your salvation is not enough." Rejecting God and His truth is living in rebellion. 

Perfectionism has had a hold on me for a long time. It's hard to let go. But I remember those moments of brokeness before God where I've told Him how much I hate it, that I despise it and curse it as sin. God hates our sin, but He loves us. It may sound odd but I want to hate my sin more than I want to hold onto it. 

So how am I shaking the hold of perfectionism? By choosing to hate it and love God and His way more. His way is the narrow path, where I must daily crucify my flesh and choose to follow Him. At this point putting to death perfectionism feels like I'm killing part of myself but even then... I don't want it anymore.

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Photo credit:

1. Image by geralt. Public domain. 

2. Image by Anthony Will photos. Used under CC license. 

3. Image by benhewittcreative. Used under CC license. 

4. Image by jill111. Public domain. 

IntenseDebate and the Mystery of the Disappearing Comments (UPDATED)

Comments missing or showing up as deleted on my blog? Here's why

Short version 
I made a mistake.

Long version 
I've been having some problems with the IntenseDebate commenting system. I was following this solution from iSophie. In an attempt to recover my precious missing comments she recommended deleting the Blogger form comments and the IntenseDebate comments should reappear...
Yeah, that didn't happen.

So, IntenseDebate comments from several posts are still missing and now all the Blogger comments have been deleted... by moi. And no, you cannot recover deleted comments unless you moderate your comments (I don't) and keep the notification emails.

I'm sure the tech heads will get a good laugh out of this rookie error ;)

From what I've read around the interwebs my changes to the mobile template should stop this problem from happening in the future. However if it continues to occur I will admit defeat and uninstall the IntenseDebate plugin.

So, if your comments are missing or that oh so lovely "this comment was deleted by the blog administrator" is showing up I'm sorry! I'm a blogging newbie and made a mistake.

To be honest I'm just really proud of myself for getting through this whole experience without crying or beating myself up for not being perfectly wonderful at something :)

Happy blogging!

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UPDATE

The IntenseDebate comments can now be viewed on previous posts, huzzah! However, I still cannot "un-delete" the Blogger comments I removed earlier. Who knew, deleting something actually, like, deletes it.

The only way I could get back my missing IntenseDebate comments was to tick the "Remove forever" box when deleting a comment. See below.

Removes comment but leaves some details (read more below)

Removes all traces of the comment.
Necessary to regain lost IntenseDebate comments.

Note: In the original post when I said I deleted my comments I did not select the "Remove forever" option. This removes all traces of the comment including the "this comment was removed by the administrator" notice, the commentator's name, etc.

So I'm sorry to all the readers who have had their comments removed. I truly appreciate them and very much enjoy interacting with you all. Please feel free to add your comment again (although of course I don't expect that!).

Ideally this will be the closing chapter to IntenseDebate and the Mystery of the Disappearing Comments.

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Photo credit:
1. Image by www.pexels.com. Public domain (CC0).
2. MB. Comment taken from Josh Duggar and Forgiveness.
3. MB. Comment taken from Josh Duggar and Forgiveness. 

Three things I wish I was better at

Despite what you may think I am not perfect. Shocking, I know. On a daily basis I am confronted with this horrendous fact. Oh how it irks me.

Yeah. The sad thing is I'm only sorta kidding. 

So, in an effort to engage in some good ol' self-deprecating humour I thought I'd share Three things I wish I was better at, ideally in a fabulously (perfectly) humorous fashion.

Number one

Painting. I like painting, I enjoy a variety of arty activities but I would hesitate to say that I have a particular talent for any of them. That being said, I also don't work my butt off to produce stunning works of art like abstractedallure, Janis Cox and A. L. Romero whose blogs I all follow.

According to my source image this is a delightful waterfall scene. 

Methinks dad was correct to suggest that I lighten up the foreground.

(It's making me feel slightly ill sharing this with you all. I seriously struggle not being good at absolutely everything in the universe.)

Number two

I almost wrote "photography" because as you can see from my delightful waterfall/forest impressionist (yeahhhh, let's go with that) painting it is not my strong suit. However, I have no particular interest in photography so it doesn't really count. 

Part of me wishes I was better at sport. I live in a sport-mad country and being the book-loving, studious, nerdy girl that I am kicking a footy around isn't my idea of fun. But maybe Phys Ed wouldn't have been quite so torturous if I was better at all this sport stuff? 

Number three

Being at peace. This is actually something I'm getting better at (yay). Unlike my football skills (aww). It's a fairly broad one but I do believe that the more we can be at peace the better off we'll be. Lord willing we will all reach that perfect place of peace one day.

Oh, and, as many of my readers are American when I say "football" this is what I'm talking about:

This is AFL (Australian Football League)

This list could have gone for foreverrrrrrr. But three is the magic number so I'll leave it there. While I would love to be super talented at absolutley everything it wouldn't make people love me any more. In God's eyes, I am His masterpiece and all my shortcomings are covered by the riches of His grace.

What are some things you wish you were better at?

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Photo credit:
1. MB
2. Image by Tom Reynolds, via Wikimedia Commons. Used under CC license. 

When God tells you to rest

Ah, rest. That elusive concept that Jesus talks about a couple of times but I'll think about it later. I've got other things to do, God. You understand right?

I mean, I've got good, holy Christian things to do. Like helping lead the youth group every Friday night, and then there's all this admin stuff I said I'd do for the Christians on campus. Oh and I said I'd meet with that friend on campus, man they are going through a tough time right now. Prayer group is coming up this week. Wow there's so much going on around the world, gotta pray for all those people. And that family's moving house earlier in the day so I should be able to fit that in... I'm sure I'll have time to study in between. Gotta get those marks for His glory! 

On and on it went.

On and on.

And on.

Needless to say I eventually crashed. It wasn't pretty. 

And what am I doing now you ask? Weeeeeell... Much the same thing. 

But! I have cut back on some things (youth group and the admin stuff being the major ones). So God's getting me there and I'm starting to listen. Sometimes.

The truth is we're not superhuman. Disappointing I know. Sometimes we need to take a break, we need to rest, we need to say the dreaded 'n' word (*whispers* no...) and let the Holy Spirit minister to our weary souls. 

My dear 'friend' Perfectionism doesn't like letting people down and is desperate to get absolutely everything right, as she sees it. Thankfully, grace says differently. Grace says it's ok I'm not perfect, that I don't always get everything right. If I did I wouldn't need Jesus!! 

So let's listen to grace more often and tell Perfectionism to go away? 

Guess which way Perfectionism wants you to go??
Image via Pixabay

For further reading I highly recommend Solio Deo Gloria's post on 'The Cost of the Cape.' You can find it here.

Additionally, if this is something (perfectionism) you particularly struggle with (1) you are not alone and can read one of my post's on the topic here and (2) you may benefit from reading the Sandford's chapter on 'Performance Orientation' in their book Transformation of the Inner Man.

Hiding from the cold and drowning in assignments

McTed and I are working very hard on three different projects before we leave for camp. So my little corner of the internet may be quiet for a while. I do prefer to post more regularly than this but sometimes one is drowning in assignments and unable to do so.

P.S. One of my assignments involves creating a poster... While I appreciate and enjoy the creative elements involved this sort of thing it generally sends my little perfectionist voice into overdrive. So I'm planning to stick this verse up somewhere (and possibly tattoo it onto my eyelids):

"And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." 

-Colossians 3: 17-

I am so great, I am so great na na na na na...

Love does not boast

Try to imagine me singing that in a high-pitched annoying voice. Think, 'younger sibling besting you at cards.' And yes he often beats me at cards.

So beyond my inspiring and insightful title this post stumped me. I read up on boasting in my Bible, did a bit of research and in the end this is what I came up with but feel free to disagree, you know, lovingly ;) 

If one boasts, one implies that one is superior to others. And that's not particularly loving, to make someone feel inferior. It can be done in a cheery, light-hearted manner (think mischievous rather than malicious), as per the title. But I doubt that's what Paul's trying to communicate to the Corinthians. 

"May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Galations 6:14) 

What does this mean? I'm still puzzling it out but my sense is that just as we are saved by faith, and not by works ("so that no one can boast"), I believe "love does not boast" is the same as saying "love is humble." Writing this I feel like that's super obvious and you're wondering when I'm going to get to the point (never! Mwahaha! Wait, is that loving or...?). Grace gives us no room to boast. It's handed to us by God on a cross-shaped platter (did you understand the imagery? DID YOU?!). We don't even have to reach for it, God pretty much puts it in our hand. And thus we return to the age old battle between perfectionism and grace...

Spoilers: grace wins every time.

It's like part of me wants to work hard and reach for some (unattainable) goal or target just so I can say, "Ha! I did it! Me!" (I am the best, I am the best na na na na...). Sounds a bit like boasting huh? So, then, what does its loving counterpart sound like?

I'm actually not sure what it 'sounds' like but I know what it looks like. It's me, finally giving in, at some odd hour of the morning, lying flat on my face before God and saying 'help.' It's laying down my pride, my desire for perfection, and opening myself up to our loving heavenly Father. It is not hiding behind tears and false humilty, or beating myself down. It's submission, no matter how loud that rebellious voice howls. It's everything I'm not but everything that grace allows me to be. I know at heart I'm a rebel but I also know that God loves me anyway. 

In this interpretation, the loving part is not letting boasting interfere with our relationship with God. When I am proud, when I hide part of myself from God, the part that desires to boast in my own abilities, I hurt God. 

Wait? You do what now? 

I hurt God.

Nah, still not getting it.

Yes I don't fully understand it either (for further reading I recommend Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge). However, I am learning, as I grow closer to God, that He wants me to love Him and it hurts Him when I push Him away. For an imperfect comparison, think about how much it hurts when someone you care about distances you emotionally when they're upset. God cares about us and wants to build a relationship with us. Yeah, I'm still struggling to wrap my head around it and I doubt we'll be able to fully appreciate it before this world ends and the New Earth begins. 

P.S. I hope you don't mind my sense of humour and rambling in this post. It's worse when I'm tired!  

One of a kind

Love is kind

See what I did there?  With the title?

*crickets chirp*

Hey, it's hard to come up with catchy titles involving the word 'kind.' Let me know if you have a better idea (or a better pun).

So what does it mean to love other through kindness? Well in the past* this has meant me bending over backwards to 'love' others and, at the extreme end, endangering my own mental and emotional health because I'd decided to take everyone else's problems on my shoulders and am being crushed under the weight of a self-imposed obligation.

This not love. This is pride. This is my pride, cleverly hiding behind perfectionism which in turn is lurking behind a self-righteous mask of love. One day, after church, this really hit home. I had a standing obligation with a friend to give her a lift to church. That weekend I also contacted a different friend and invited her to church. She was happy to come (yay! Christian brownie points) but required a lift. Without hesitation I said 'Sure!' and merrily took on this obligation.

Now our car can only fit our family and one other. But I'd invited two friends. Do the math. Unfortunately I don't drive (yeah, it's pretty bad in a country that's not exactly pro public transport) so it would be up to my parents whether they were willing to drive uphill and downdale to get everyone to church. Understandably, they decided against such a plan. What ensued was my pride and perfectionism taking over, under that clever mask of love and kindness, to get both my friends to church.

Why didn't I just listen to dad when he said, "You can only have one." Oh no, that will not do at all! Cried she. I must have both my friends there because I've invited them both and I can't say no now and they need me and they need to be there and I have to love them and, and, and... You get the picture.

I did, however, manage to get both of them to church by arranging a separate lift for the other friend. But this experience had been so draining on me, because of the self-imposed obligation to be 'kind' and 'love' them, that I wasn't even there for them, mentally. I was so stressed and distracted I couldn't really focus on what either of them were saying or how they were really feeling. To top it off I also had to attend a meeting that week after the service, so I had a to rush out with my family and my friend to drop her home and then come back for the meeting. In the meantime my other friend had been taken home and I now had to try and concentrate on the youth leader's meeting.

So it wasn't a great afternoon. As I reflected on the day I felt convicted by God that this had been an issue of pride. God showed me that I had been more concerned about appearing like a good friend rather than actually being one and genuinely loving them. Now that's not to say I'm heartless and don't love my friends, because I truly do and I'm not beating myself up, but I was motivated by my pride, and not godly love i.e. love is kind.

As the author of this website explains, loving others by being kind doesn't mean giving people everything they want and bending over backwards to please everyone. So these days I don't impulsively say 'Sure!' to something before checking what else I have on that day. When the anxious perfectionist voices start ('You have to see them, they're your friend. Aren't you a good friend?') I call their bluff and let them sit in my head and grumble away. I don't have to listen to them, I don't answer to them. Instead I take my thoughts captive to Christ and look to the Lord for the reassurance that I am doing the right thing.

If you ever struggle with worries and thoughts that can become overpowering I recommend this blogpost as well by Eva Bridges (on my computer I have to scroll down for a bit before I actually see the post). I found it encouraging to read that other Christians struggle in this regard and how they can choose to listen to the lies or take the thoughts captive.

Read it here: http://69.195.124.224/~desertn0/take-every-thought-captive/


*She says while acknowledging that this issue is still somewhat part of the present.

Running late?

Love is patient

It's not even half an hour into my day and I'm already getting impatient. If anything this just reinforces my need for grace because it seems impossible to express love through constant patience, particularly when I lose something. It doesn't matter if something super important or something relatively inconsequential. As soon as I can't find it the inconvenience drives me absolutely barmy and patience is the furthest thing from my mind. So, clearly losing things is something to bring before God in prayer. Is there something in particular for you that causes the same reaction? Or am I just way too obsessed with the inconvenience of losing something?

In terms of how it affects my ability to love others... Well all you have to do is try to help me find it and our relationship may be at risk. It's bad. Really bad. I don't know what it is but I do know that God will help us through anything if we submit ourselves before Him in prayer!

The other challenge for me today was running late this morning (my fault). At the start of this debacle it wasn't so much impatience as blind panic. I had an unusually long day yesterday and tiredness tends to make emotional difficulties more problematic than usual. 'Oh, I'm running a little late' can rapidly spiral into, 'I don't want to go into uni. I want to go home right now. I can't face anyone.' This hasn't really happened in recent months but as I said, tiredness tends to make me a little more vulnerable.

The strong temptation this morning was to hold onto these thoughts and feelings instead of turning away and going to the Father. Even when a behaviour is bad for us sometimes we like to hold onto them because they are familiar and we feel in control. This sense of control is, I believe, a trap that keeps us away from God. We prefer to lean on our own understanding rather than humbling ourselves before Him and trusting in His promise of a "peace that surpasses all understanding." 

This is a photo of one of the scriptures I regularly declare (in simple terms, 'say aloud'). I keep it near my desk as study's a big "worry" trigger for me.

So, how did this affect my ability to love others? Well on a human level it meant my wonderful father, who dropped me at the train station, received something close to reproach for (supposedly) making me go to uni instead of thankfulness, and distrust when he said I'd be ok (considering he prayed for me as well I had more than enough reason to trust him). On a spiritual level it led to me putting a 'block' between myself and our heavenly Father.

Once again I am reminded of my inability to be perfect. This is a challenging idea for me. Because I cannot meet God's standards He sent His Son for me. I don't have to do anything, nor can I do anything 'good enough' to justify my salvation. To a long-standing perfectionist this doesn't seem to make sense but it is the truth.

God can help me grow in patience but I'll never be perfect. I might have to tell myself that over and over again but I trust that as I grow in my faith in God's grace it will gradually become easier. We are told to "take captive every thought" and this means identifying a wrong thought (wrong as in it's a lie/against what God says) and submitting it to Jesus in prayer. Once again this means swallowing our pride and denying that 'wonderful' sense of control. But it's worth it.

"...the truth will set you free."

(John 8: 32)

Applying 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7

In my previous post I cited the ever popular Corinthians passage on what it means to love someone:

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” (1 Corinthians 13: 4-7)

For the next few weeks or so I would like to systematically go through each of the characteristics of love and spend some time reflecting on them and how we can better implement these principles in our lives. I’m using myself as something of a guinea pig for this series (am I a serious enough blogger to have a series??) and I want to see how I actually go about loving people.

Some questions I would like to reflect on, and I’d love any of my readers to join me in this little project, are:

• Did I love by being (patient, kind, etc) today?
•  Some examples of when I did
•  And, because it’s quite likely this will happen, some examples where I didn’t 
• What made it difficult or challenging to love people in those circumstances? 
• Is there anything in particular that I’d like to bring before God? For example, did I find myself being patient in most circumstances except when I was running late and why did this cause me to stumble?

Now as I have blogged about perfectionism before I am so totally going to submit myself and this ‘series’ before God. I want to do this so I can share my experiences and hopefully encourage others.  I do not want it to become an episode of ‘MB trying to satisfy her pride by setting ridiculously, unattainable standards for herself.’ Because that’s never fun. Trust me.

Let us do this to glorify God, to decrease ourselves so that the Lord may increase. 

"It's got to be-e-e-e-e, yeah, perrrrfect"

It is a source of some amusement that, as a perfectionist, that is one of my favourite songs. For those on the outside the word "perfectionist" is used as a friendly jibe. "Oooo you're such a perfectionist! *tehehe*" But for those of us trapped in our beautifully (except for that slight smudge on the wall over there. Hideous) crafted prisons perfectionism can be debilitating.

Perhaps it would be helpful to put my perfectionism in context. I am a university student, who has lost countless hours of sleep trying to get an assignment juuuust right. I tend towards the creative side of things, and have fallen into despair when I couldn't make that thing exactly the way I wanted to. I am a sister, daughter and friend, who has had several near-meltdowns when I've been unable to make a commitment. I am child of God.

"...for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus" (Romans 3:23-24)

But, I'm not good enough! You may cry (and when I say 'you' we both know I'm talking about me). No, you're not (re-read v. 23 in case there's any confusion).

Ok, so I'll be perfect and then God will love me and the---

Stop.

"...for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God..."

Let that sink in for a second.

By this point I'm hoping it's abundantly clear that no matter how good your marks are, no matter how fantastic that cake you just made looks, or how good of a friend you think you are it's not enough.

And that's ok.

Ok?! Thats not ok!!!

Oh, but it is.

"For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5: 7-8)

There is nothing you can do to earn God's love. And there is nothing you can do to lose it.

I have this conversation with myself on a near daily basis. The only thing that cuts through the fog and the murk created by these lies I tell myself ('You're not good enough.' 'No one loves you.') is the "sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." (Ephesians 6: 17).

For further reading (especially for any mums out there) I highly recommend "I Must Be Perfect" by Rachel Madden on Devotional Diva. Her honesty and 'realateiblity' (that's a word now) are part of what prompted me to share my experience. You can find the link here.



*Note: None of my friends actually laugh like that. Well, at least, not in public.