See this little girl? That’s me. I know, weird, I was blond as a little girl, here I was being taught by my brothers they finer art of something 🤷‍♀️. Back then, all my brothers had to do was tell me I couldn’t do one thing because I was a girl. And I was on it with a passion and fury.

Beat you to the house?
Ran so fast I was in front, that cost me a tooth as my brother was right behind me and smacked me into the metal door.
Jump off the deck?
Totally! That got me 30+ stitches in the armpit. Gnarly scar for that one. Another 1/4 inch the chain link fence I landed on would have hit my main artery. So close to a nerve that would have ended mobility in by arm.
Girls can’t ride this hill!
Oh yes I can. I rode so fast I flew down the hill, which was great until I literally flew 30 feet landing on my face. 46 Stitches 4 knocked out teeth, wired jaw, neck issues.
My pretty front teeth fake. I didn’t have my all my front teeth from 9-21 till I bought my teeth. Cuz adults pay for their own stuff.

Which leads me to a thought: Being an adult means you’re not trying to compete with others.

Scratch that, being a confident adult means your not competing with others. Being an adult means you pay all your own bills.

See, that little girl was competing, trying, working at being accepted. I tried sooo hard at it I was missing finding myself. In my first book I tell the how, but simply put when you find you, you find out competing with others is well, a waste of your time. Competition with yourself will refine you, push you, make you better than competing with others. When we compete with others we can justify our actions, our pride, our sin has not as bad as someone else’s. We can also miss the amazingness that is us! We miss the God-given abilities we are meant to refine. We miss the unique gifts we can give the world…all lost in striving to be someone we are not. There is sooooo much work to do on any one human soul we literally have no time to be working on others.

Literally we loose ourselves in pursuing what we think others want, when really all those who really love us want, is for us to see what they already see: that we are worthy of great love. ❤️

Being you doesn’t mean you get to hurt others. Being your true you, means you get that others too are in the process of becoming.

Warning though. When you work on you and stop participating in the game of competition and justification you start to change. I’ve remade me into something that 90% of those that knew me as a kid either:
1) Don’t like me.
2) Are surprised how I’ve turned out.

It’s worth it though because I’ve gone from not liking myself to being amazed and very surprised at what God can make happen in me.

You are worth getting to know, you are worth the self-work. ❤️❤️