Flashback Friday: Worth
FLASHBACK FRIDAY
The boys recently asked my about my teaching past. They wanted to know what grades I taught and what I thought of the kids. They asked if it was hard and if I liked to teach. Jack asked me if I wanted to teach again and I told him I wasn’t sure. I let him know I was still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. He thought that was funny since I am already grown…obviously.
The next day I felt blah. Nothing happened to dampen my mood. I just was. I was feeling lonely, inadequate, and useless. No one said anything to make me feel this way. It was just one of those moments. I am merely a stay-at-home mom who folds laundry and packs lunches. Am I really contributing to this world? I know raising my boys is the most important thing I will ever do, but I wondered if there is more for me. Is there something waiting for me that I am missing? Am I valuable?
I realized that I find value in doing. My value, in my mind, is linked to what I do. As much as I don’t want to admit it, I find my worth in the things I do or accomplish. I know this is backwards and not right. I know it in my mind. I just have to get that knowledge to my heart. For so long my worth and value came from my degrees, my career, and then my kids. Now, I stay home making dinner and playing chauffeur. Is that enough? Am I doing enough?
I am not more valuable in the busy. A career doesn’t give me value. Popularity or the amount of friends I have doesn’t give me value. My worth doesn’t come in the form of perfectly folded laundry and freshly made meals on the dinner table. Nor, in a paycheck. My value comes from God. And it’s about time I start believing what I know to be true.
“Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.” Luke 12:6-7
If God knows all the hairs on my head, I most certainly must be of value in His sight. Last year my motto was, “present over perfect.” This year I am holding to “confidence in Christ.” I am challenging myself to believe the truth and power in this statement. My value doesn’t come from the things this world values. It comes from Him.
We ALL need a reminder that we add value to this world. We need to be told that we matter. Most of us, including myself, struggle with worth from time-to-time; sometimes all the time. We want to matter. We want to have a positive impact on this world. But, far too often, we instead feel alone, unqualified, and marginalized. We feel like someone else is doing it so no one needs us. We believe the lie that our voice adds nothing. We forget that we are valuable.
You are valuable because you exist. Not because of what you do or what you have done – but simply because you are.
Max Lucado
You are valuable just because you exist; because God created you. He created you for a purpose and out of love. You are enough. I know many times it does not feel like enough, but it is.
You are valuable.
This world needs you. We need you. We need your voice, your stories, the gifts you don’t think you have. We need your love, your hugs, your mistakes, your mess. We need it. All of it. Every single thing that makes you you: WE NEED THAT.
So, when you are feeling worthless, when you are feeling completely alone remember that you are needed. You are valuable just because you exist.
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I have written a few times about value and worth. Apparently, this is an area of weakness for me; a thorn in my side. I struggle with believing that I what I do even matters; that I am enough. I am constantly searching for a measuring rod that I can use so I can measure my value. I didn’t realize how much I placed my worth in accomplishments and the number on the pay scale until I decided to stay home and raise the boys.
Before I had kids, I was a go-getter always striving towards some kind of goal. When you stay home to do the mommy thing, the only thing you are chasing is survival. Will we make it to the next meal before having a poop explosion or toddler meltdown? Will I survive the witching hour? That is what you strive towards. Not a beautifully designed vision board for some lofty goal or the next pay raise.
So, the transition from go-getter to mommy was difficult for me. I compensated by never sitting down always doing something. Because, for me, doing equaled value in my distorted mind. Now that I am chasing one of those dreams on the vision board, my longing to find value is amplified.
I started out doing this for the one. If I can positively impact one person, even if that one person is me, than it is all worth it. Somewhere along the way, however, I lost site of the why and started chasing value. I concocted some weird equation in my head as to what deemed me valuable. When those things didn’t happen, when I didn’t see results that equated to my value, I began feeling anxious and unworthy.
Isn’t it like the enemy to know exactly what to do to make you feel like an utter failure. He’s like that ex-best friend who knows your inmost sensitive parts and twists the knife in the wound. He has my number and is playing his hand well. He knows I need some kind of compensation for what I do when I am striving and when that doesn’t come, it can totally decimate my spirit. What he doesn’t see, is that I am equipped with a God that is on my side and by my side no matter my mood and that will decimate him.
Value doesn’t lie in achievements. Value doesn’t come from a certain number on a paycheck. Value doesn’t come from doing it right or accolades from an audience. Value, I am learning, comes from something much simpler, yet, much more meaningful than anything I can make up in my head.
Value comes from God.
When I get in my little tizzies, my husband always asks me what I will do once I hit that mark. He asks me what that “mark” looks like and pressures me to tell him what I would do if I hit that mark. He always ends with, “And then what?” He knows that even if I hit all those goals and fulfill all the areas where I believe value lies, I will still be empty because he knows those things don’t truly satisfy.
I can hit all my marks. I can publish a book and go on a speaking tour. And then what? Then, I come home and do the laundry and make a meal for the millionth time. Reality hits and that mark of value is gone with the wind. I can no longer rest my value in the things this world tells me are valuable. I will always be empty if I do. The only thing of value, my only place of worth, lies in Jesus. And when I sit back and think that the God of the universe who created those beautiful Texas sunsets that I cannot get enough of also created me, little ole me, I can rest in how valuable I am.
You, my beautiful friend, are valuable just because you are. There’s no striving to attain value. There’s nothing you can do to become more or less valuable. You just are. Because the God who paints the skies also painted you and that has more value than anything this world has to offer.
“She is more precious than jewels,
and nothing you desire can compare with her. Long life is in her right hand;
in her left hand are riches and honor.
Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
and all her paths are peace.
She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her;
those who hold her fast are called blessed.”
Proverbs 3:13-18
Love & Blessings,
Meg