I saw a shirt at Old Navy once that said, “Be Amazing.”
It felt like way too much pressure. And that’s coming from an Enneagram 3. My husband says 3s are driven by “the need to be awesome.”
It might have felt that way because I was in the middle of power Christmas shopping that should have been spread out reasonably over 5 days, but had been crammed into one due to sickness.
That same sickness forced me to bow out of a speaking engagement and left my house a bit of a disaster (pro tip: if you keep wearing shoes in the house, you don’t feel all the stuff you haven’t swept off the floors). I was just proud to be upright and not in yoga pants.
It felt like that again later, on day 15 of my husband’s 16 day trip around the world (Lord, have mercy) when I was just happy that I was awake and communicative without the help of legal stimulants. We only ate 2 frozen pizzas and a deli chicken. This I call victory.
What the World Tells Us
It seems everywhere we look, we’re being told we can do it.
We can be amazing, and awesome, and over the top sparkling, beautiful, jaw-dropping.
Ordinary is for suckers. Lazy people. Those who don’t really care, who don’t want their lives to count. I shouldn’t just survive when my husband travels; I should thrive.
And we have our moments – all of us do. We have shining moments when we reflect the glory of God. We have red-letter days, it’s true.
But living there? Gosh, it’s exhausting. And truthfully, I don’t think it’s what the world needs.
What the world needs is not more amazing.
What the World Needs
The world needs people who are living and loving faithfully, authentically, with hope and perseverance and grace. People who have shining moments and messy moments and are ok with all of them. This is what our souls need too – we need the freedom to be who we are.
The world needs people who get up each day and choose to live the ordinary moments with trust that even this is significant.
We need people who accept who they are, with all their good and bad, beautiful and messy, all together. People who believe it’s all worth offering, and then offer it.
We were created for great works, but also for ordinary ones.
Sometimes we will amaze and other times we won’t. There’s nothing wrong with not being incredible at every moment. It’s called being human.
So please. Stop telling me to be amazing. Tell me just to be me, and I will gladly oblige.
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Beautifully expressed truth and encouragement, Gina. As a woman with the “achiever” strength, this post allows me a very deep, long breath of fresh air. Thanks.
So glad it blessed you Terry – yes, I need to remind the achiever in me that life doesn’t always have to be lived at 100%. 🙂
A-MEN! and Amen!!
Just yesterday I was thinking of the casting crowns song (which I love) that says “we were made to thrive.” We’re kind of in a season of not thriving and I asked Craig “Do you think that’s true? Are we supposed to thrive? Is it even possible?” There’s definitely a pressure to do more than just survive.
It’s been weighing on my heart recently. So much so that I actually broke down and wrote a post about it at https://cunninghamtwo.wordpress.com/. (The first one in a long long time.)
Thanks for sharing!
Loved your post Stephanie! You should share that on Facebook. But you don’t have to add a tagline. 😉