Being domestic has never been one of my strong points. I have epically failed at making bread, doing laundry, and embroidering. Yesterday, I was super excited because I made ham salad from scratch and I even made omelets the night before last. But last night, after a fairly long day, I came home and attempted to make some form of supper for the love of my life.
We only have random groceries in the house and all of the hamburger was frozen. I looked into the cupboard and found Sam's waffle iron. After making waffle batter from scratch, and not feeling too good about it, I poured some in...and they tanked. Soggy on the outside and burned in the middle, I broke down and cried in the middle of the kitchen.
I feel like every day spent living in the human existence is spent trying to prove to everyone that you are not a fake. We tell white lies, photo-shop any pictures being put on facebook, use big words, and pay $70.00 a quarter to belong to a service club. We join groups and commit to more projects than we physically have time for, just so we can prove to everyone that we are a valued part of society; that we are important; that we are worth something to someone. Humans spend so much of their time focused on who they dream of being, instead of who God created them to be.
I have never been perfect. I've been 20-40 overweight most of my life. I have a fairly decent singing voice, though its nothing super special. My parents were always frustrated with my constant clutter. My office is a mess. I hate doing dishes. I'm a 24 year old with zits. If family history is any indicator, I will probably struggle to conceive any children. I'm whiny. I'm paranoid. I don't like vegetables. I swear more than I should. I say mean things about wonderful people and I don't like Glee. I'm not smart enough to have a job that changes lives, and I'm not talented enough to do the one thing that fills me with passion and joy.
That is a fairly short list of my imperfections, but the sad this is, I could go on and on for even longer, making a list of all the things I do to try to prove to people that I am not all those things.
Days before I married the love of my life, I was scrubbing our house from top to bottom in an attempt to prove to his family and friends that I was an amazing housekeeper and would be an amazing wife. I have taken voice lessons for years and tried almost every diet on the market, to only fail time and time again. I live my life with a constant anxiety that people will find out that I'm not as competent or as wonderful as I try to make everyone believe.
So here is the mystery that I have found today. How does one find joy in life, when they are so busy trying to prove something to the world? I'm giving up. I'm going to start living my life in a way that glorifies God and brings my joy, instead of trying to prove something to all of my family and friends. Here is my confession to everyone that I have ever known: I am not always a great listener, I struggle to with my body and I am not super smart, I just happen to be good at taking tests. I don't rock the plus size life style, in fact, I hate it. I don't think I'm very good at my job, but I'm trying the best way I know how. My life is not my own, but its not your's either.
Today, I am free. I am free from trying to make everyone believe that I am an amazing cook. That I am a disgustingly talented person. That I am in love with who I am. That I am loving life and rockin' it. I'm not doing any of that. But do you know what, I'm going to work on it. I'm going to take it one step at a time and find true joy in learning how to cook. In taking care of my body. In loving the Lord with all of my being and following him like I never have before.
"I say mean things about wonderful people and I don't like Glee." That made me laugh out loud. For what it's worth, I don't like Glee either.
ReplyDeleteAmerican society is particularly bad at giving people value. If you aren't able to do something extraordinary, then you don't matter at all. We forget that people have value simply by virtue of, well, being people. If God sees fit to love them as they are, why can't we? But, no, we insist for others and for ourselves this idea of perfection, of having some sort of exceptional talent, of being a "contributing member of society" (read: willingness to work your ass off forty hours a week at something you hate so you can maybe have money for fun on the weekends, and pay all your bills) in order to have any sort of value. We place value in what we do, not who we are or who we love.
That's backwards. That's messed up. We should start with value as human beings and end there. We should start with love, and end there.
This post made me really glad. Freeing oneself from seeing one's value in 1. What one *does*, and 2. How others perceive what one does, is one of the best feelings ever. Awesome.
Oh, sweet Brittany! You have no idea how much you just expressed the sentiments of just about every other person on the planet...except for the total douche-bags. Can I write douche-bags on your blog? :)
ReplyDeleteYou are so right! The struggle to reach society's idea of perfection will just leave you sitting in a puddle of tears staring your many "inadequacies" straight in the face. I applaud you for your willingness to stand against the overwhelming tide of status quo-ness.
The best part is that in accepting that you will not be everything that you think you want to be, you are becoming what you really want to be: you are real, genuine! I would much rather be friends with someone like you than a fake Martha Stewart clone. I wish I could give you a big hug right now and tell you how wonderful, talented, beautiful and funny you are, but this comment will have to be enough...unless you feel like driving to Texas. :)
Brittany, can I just say I love that you listed not liking Glee as one of your imperfections? I never got into that show either, and when you tell someone that they look at you like you're crazy.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm totally with you on the rest of it too. It's hard to pretend to fit the mold society creates for us. Kudos for being brave enough to be yourself, just your wonderful, talented self. :)
So... I woke up really early today, Jason was still asleep, and I decided I wanted waffles. We were out of mix so I thought I would attempt to make homemade waffles. I googled waffles, found one that looked rather easy, and thought I would try it. I had these big elaborate plans of amazing waffles and making breakfast in bed for Jason - yeah. That failed majorly. I put the batter in, and it immediately started running out the side, steaming, and hissing like an angry cat. I ended up scraping the remains out of the iron and throwing it in the trash, and dumping the remaining mix right down the drain. I'm about to go wake Jason up and tell him he's taking me out for breakfast... I think we should stick with boxed waffle mix from now on, what do you think?
ReplyDeleteI love this post! Box waffle mix is totally the way to go. :) And I have one dinner flop per week it seems like anymore, so you are in good company.
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