"Decide to Decide"

As promised in this post, this is going to be part one or "chapter one" in a book study series from the book entitled The 10 Best Decisions a Woman Can Make (Finding Your Place in God's Plan) by Pam Farrel

"It's not enough to be good if you have the ability to be better. It's not enough to be very good if you have the ability to be great."
- Alberta Lee Cox

So many of us women are completely bogged down with unrealistic expectations that we impose on ourselves and also feel at times are imposed on us by others. I don't know about you but I am definitely guilty of this. Success is apparent all around us. If you are on facebook or a stalker in the blog world, you are surrounded by seemingly "perfect" people. Their to-do lists are checked off, their homes are immaculate, they are cooking gourmet meals. Their children are well-dressed with diapers changed and hands and face squeeky clean. They are also very well-educated...after all, children read at 6 months old these days. They all sew, bake, raise farm animals, eat organically and memorize scripture to rival the apostles themselves. Their wardrobes are impecable and their homes are magazine worthy. And not to mention that they are funny to boot!

It's easy to see why so many of us feel the need to measure up and also why so many times, we get depressed when we don't. With these completely unrealistic expectations we put on ourselves, many of us just give up and rather than making life happen, we resort to just letting life happen.

Basically, we stop deciding to decide. What we don't realize though is in the not deciding, we ARE still deciding. We're just deciding to live life with a very different outcome.

What we need to do is to start seeing ourselves through NEW EYES.

Those eyes belong to the Lord. Though we may get down and disappointed in ourselves and feel like we are letting everyone down around us, including him, he's still there...and girls, God isn't as easy to disappoint as we are.

"If God created us, if God desires friendship with us, if He really is all-sufficient and self-existent in and of Himself, then can it really be so easy to disappoint Him?"

Let's decide right now to make things different.

First of all, we need a new mirror. Right now, when we look in the mirror all we do is compare ourselves to our family members, friends, neighbors, women we don't even know in books, magazines, TV, BLOGS ;) and the like. What we need to do is switch it out with one that reflects God and a clear reflection of how HE sees us.

Can we really have it all???

"Sometimes we are our own worst enemy."

"We wouldn't care so much what people thought of us if we realized how little they do!"

"We are our own harshest critics."

So true, right?

Think of women that you know that you THINK have it all (I can think of a ton of them just on my facebook friends list). Now...do they REALLY??? I guarantee that there is something that you have that THEY wish they had. We are all in different stages of our lives. We all have different circumstances. And honestly, what is wishing we were someone else with someone else's set of circumstances going to gain us? A big fat nothing except for maybe a trip to GUILTY, Party of ONE on the breaking of Commandment # 10, mmmmkay? So really girls, let's get off it and start counting our own blessings...cause you'd be a crazy person if you said that you didn't have any. Name them one by one, sister friend!!! There is ALWAYS going to be someone thinner, richer, prettier, funnier, better at cooking, decorating and the list goes on. But what is it going to gain you or me to pout about it?

Yeah, you said it. So....I'm thinkin' that we need to DECIDE to DECIDE to focus on the positive's in our lives. Choose to see ourselves as God sees us. Count our blessings and get rid of that old mirror of crazy comparisons.

Here's a funny "Martha Stewart spoof" letter that a friend of Mrs. Farrel's had sent to her - I think that you'll find it as funny as I did! :)

A Letter from Martha Stewart
Monday, 9:00 A.M.

Hi, Sandy:

This perfectly delightful note is being sent on paper I made myself to tell you what I have been up to. Since it snowed last night, I got up early and made a sled with old barn wood and a glue gun. I hand-painted it in gold-leaf, got out my loom, and made a blanket in peaches and mauves. Then, to make the sled complete, I made a white horse to pull it from some DNA, I just had sitting around my craft room. By then, it was time to start making the place mats and napkins for my 20 breakfast guests. I'm serving the old standard Stewart 12 course breakfast, but I'll let you in on a little secret: I didn't have time to make the table and chairs this morning. I used the ones I had on hand. Before I moved the table into the dining room, I decided to add just a touch of the holidays. So I repainted the room in pinks and stenciled gold stars on the ceiling. Then, while the homemade bread was rising, I took antique candle molds and made the dishes (exactly the same shade of pink) to use for breakfast. These were made from Hungarian clay, which you can get in almost any Hungarian craft store. Well, I must run. I need to finish the buttonholes on the dress I'm wearing for breakfast. I'll get out the sled and drive this note to the post office as soon as the glue dries on the envelope I'll be making. Hope my breakfast guests don't stay too long - I have 40,000 cranberries to string with bay leaves before my speaking engagement at noon. It's a good thing.

Love, Martha

P.S. When I made the ribbon for this typewriter, I used 1/8 inch gauze. I soaked it in a mixture of white grapes and blackberries which I grew, picked and crushed last week, just for fun!

:) Pretty funny, huh?!

"Why do we as women feel bad about ourselves when we see other women using her God-given gifts and talents well? Why do we sometimes feel that if we are not doing the same thing in the same way, we must be a failure? Why do some of us fall into a pattern of jealousy or, worse, apathy, if our life isn't what we see in others' lives?"

We need to decide to decide that we won't fall prey to the negative but instead choose to focus on positive change in our lives...living not only the dream that we want for ourselves but even better, the one that God has for us!

Let's find out....(ask yourself these questions)

....what is significant to me personally?

...what is my unique contribution to the lives of others?

Think about it.

Hmmmmmmmm...I am thinking about my own as well...it's tough to put yourself on the spot sometimes. These are not ready wit questions.

"You are MORE than a resume."
(thank goodness because mine is pretty bleak)

"Significance is subjective. What is significant to one person will be [completely] insignificant to another." (oh boy do I know that first hand)

So often we feel like our lives are being judged by the people in our lives - our husbands, friends, co-workers, parents, church members, bosses, children and so on. All of these people look at us from their own point of view and because the judging is subjective, each gives us a different score. That can be a major distraction for us. When you start listening to everyone around you and the definition of significance keeps changing depending on who you are talking to, you find yourself confused, frustrated, not knowing who to please and as a result not pleasing anyone...not yourself...and sometimes even not God.

Find your true significance in God and God alone. His view of you is concrete and GENUINE SIGNIFICANCE is rooted and grounded [only] in Him.

"When I see myself through God's eyes, I realize that his plan for me is found only in obedience. I am nothing more than a servant and nothing less than an ambassador. I'm not the master so I don't make up the rules. There is one God and it's not me! The more God can trust me, the more that he will entrust to me."

"If I am busy being someone else, than who is being me? If in fear, I do less than my calling, I miss out on the adventure of being me. "

"Decide to make the decision: God, I will be whom YOU created me to be. "

"Today, decide to DECIDE. Don't let life happen, MAKE life happen! "

Confession time: I just want to give you a chance to get to know the real me and how much more intimate can you be than when you are talking about spiritual things? I don't know if this study has touched your life in some way today. If it hasn't, it's ok. God doesn't speak to everyone in the same way. He's definitely speaking to me though. I've gotten to the point where I am so consumed with comparing myself with others to the point of envy and guilt for not being able to live up that I really have given up on life in a lot of ways and therefore have just been LETTING life happen as opposed to making it happen. My desire is to change that about myself; to start making life happen on the day to day. I've been succeeding in small doses this last week and I can feel the Lord helping me along the path. I've been crying out to him for so long and it feels really good knowing that he's here beside me helping me dig out of this pit I've thrown myself in. I definitely can't do it alone. Life is so much better when you DECIDE to follow Jesus...

XO,