Knowing today was my allotted day to write my blog, I spent all morning avoiding it and playing mindless games on my iPad. I knew what I was doing. I knew what I was thinking. I wasn’t happy with myself.

I was allowing my thoughts to come against me. I was judging my value based on what I could do and at this moment I valued myself pretty lowly.

What will people think of me if I have no wisdom to share? If I can’t say how my faith is helping me right now? What if I’m not interesting or likable or beautiful? What if I’m just plain and ordinary and boring? What if all my fears about myself are true?!

I looked up words like pride and false pride, thinking I would write about them. But those words didn’t quite fit what I was dealing with.

So I settled on performance anxiety. For me that means fear of putting myself out there to be judged by others only to doubt my ability to meet expectations. So I avoided it until I realized the only way to get through it is to come clean and examine my thoughts.

In my life, what have I learned? I am both God’s well-loved daughter and his unique creation! What I do flows from who I am. No one on earth is exactly like me. Yet I have the same Creator and can have shared experiences with others. Those experiences can manifest with helpfulness, companionship, fellowship, encouragement, commiseration, and/or compassion. (Wow! Those are pretty great!)

So, even when my thoughts feel devoid of value I may end up being pleasantly surprised when those same thoughts touch someone’s life. That, my friend, is priceless.

My advice to you? Don’t let your fears keep you sitting alone in your chair playing games on your device-of-choice. Be fearless and be yourself knowing you are created to be uniquely you.

Grace & Peace

Sandy