Biography Books Press Room Amy Wallace Books Life Resources Blog Events

Monday, February 19, 2007

True confessions

My clothes no longer fit.

I loathe exercise.

I want to quit trying to lose weight because it's far more fun to put weight on than take it off.

I hate the way my body looks.

My blood sugars are totally out of whack.

I feel guilty for all of the above.

Okay, now that I've gotten that off my shoulders here's what I'm doing about it. First off I'm doing the tried and true lessening what I eat and exercising more. This has been a huge inner struggle because I haven't eaten like I'd like to in months and yet I've lost nothing. I’ve gained weight in fact.

So God being God and loving me even when I pout brought to the forefront an even bigger problem than my weight issues. The growing attitude of entitlement that's weighing me down far more than the numbers on my scale.

By entitlement I mean the attitude that someone owes me something. Here’s how it looked in my home over the weekend...

The three-year-old version: "All toys are my toys and everybody should let me do whatever I want when I want it."

The six-year-old version: "My opinion deserves to be heard and everyone should listen."

The nine-year-old version: "I can take all the time I want to do whatever I want and no one should tell me otherwise."

The thirty-something-year-old version: "I want to eat and do whatever I want and I shouldn't ever gain weight."

In all these things there was an underlying belief that someone owes us something. There’s a “right” each of us were holding onto that brought us into conflict with each other or ourselves.

And God saw fit to give me this object lesson through my kids and my weight issues so I wouldn’t miss the message.

Again, God being God, He didn’t leave me to stew in my attitude with no hope of release or direction. In giving my girls a “talking to” about the issues of rights and how ultimately God owns all we have and our time, talents, and journeys belong to Him as well, I saw my problem far more clearly than I wanted to.

I felt like God owed it to me to make one issue in my life easier and I’d chosen my weight as the thing He “should” be fixing. After all, I was doing “good stuff” and “trying hard” especially in the area of eating healthy and exercising.

Then this morning I read in 2 Peter 1:3 “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.”

Here’s a true confession of what went through my mind when I read this verse: So if I have everything I need for life and godliness, why is my health as a whole such a wreck??? Why do I feel like I’m failing far more than I’m succeeding in any given area? AND why does it feel like God’s not giving me what I need to even get out of bed let alone live a godly life?

Not only had I been upset with God over not making my weight issue easy to fix, I realized I had fallen back on demanding God be my genie in a bottle.

I ask. He answers, “As you wish.” Life is good.

Ouch.

So I went back to this verse and in repentance prayed, “Lord help me see that You are what I need and it’s in knowing You and allowing You to permeate every area of my life that true Christlikeness shines through. Godliness and life are about being in relationship with You. Change me to seek You simply for You.”

As I’ve pondered all this today I’ve come to realize something else. My “true confession” that matters the most is this…

God is God and I’m His beautiful daughter.

That truth is not dependent on a scale’s smaller numbers or my mirror’s approval. It’s not dependent on whether I feel like it’s true or not.

It is simply the truth.

And the more I confess the truth, the more I learn about God just by hanging out with Him, the more like Him I become.

That’s what truly matters. To know Him and enjoy Him. To let His power and His plan be lived out through us.

Please pray for me! And let me know how I can pray for you. Together let’s remind each other to praise and trust and hang on.

God is good all the time. And all the time He is good.

5 comments:

Rel said...

I am with you my friend, on all fronts :) You are precious to God and to your Aussie internet pal!

Sally Datria said...

I am there with you too!! I battle the weight thing constantly...for me the more stressed I am, the less I eat, then because of the cortisol I GAIN weight even though I'm eating less...it's crazy!! My health is an issue too...not in the same way as yours, mine is my teeth
***sigh***(let us just NOT go there...) but I can somewhat relate!!

Amy Wallace said...

I gotta tell you guys, this post was SO hard to put out there. I hate admitting where I am, but I've found that if I don't nothing changes. Truth is where I have to start from and the truth is I'm still struggling with this issue.

Thank you both for letting me know that what I said resonated with you. It really surprises me that so many women struggle with this issue. I look around and see beautiful, confident women and think what a doud I am. I look at both of you and see inner and outer beauty too. Just so you know.

Rel~ thank you for the reminder I'm precious to God and to you. I don't think of myself that way unless God puts it so clear in my face I can't ignore. Even then, I forget. Thanks for the loving reminder. Your friendship is a gift!

Sally~ I hadn't even considered the effect of cortisol and weight. ARGH! I'm praying for you, my friend, that God would wrap His arms around you and be your comfort. I'm also praying you catch a glimpse of the joy you bring the people who call you friend. You are much loved and God sees you and smiles. Remember that.

Rel said...

Thanks Amy :) My battle is also, as I know yours would be, not to pass on my struggles and insecurities about weight/appearance etc on to my three daughters-ugh! As you say, what we say to them we need to be saying to ourselves too :)

Amy Wallace said...

Rel,

Thanks for the needed reminder about being careful to not pass on my weight struggles to my kiddos too!

One thing I make sure and do when the topic comes up is to remind them that my current struggle is part my fault for not watching what I ate better and part an issue with my health. Both of which we can bring to God. Taking in all back to prayer and praying together is a huge help!

I pray for them to have God's eyes toward themselves and, like you said, I'm trying to remember to pray that for myself and believe it too. :-)

Amy

 
Designed by: MasterDesignsArt by: JaggedSmile