Comfortable in My Own Skin
I guess I’m in a post-y kind of mood all of a sudden. It’s unfortunate that school is about to start and I will have very little time for it.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how hard it is for me to be comfortable in my own skin. I started praying that I would see myself the way God sees me…the good stuff you know, not all my flaws. I’m certainly not ready for that just yet.
I grew up with great parents; not perfect, but great. Normal childhood. My parents are still married. And BAM! Low self-esteem. Why does that happen, and what precentage of women/young adults/teenagers do you think struggle with it?
So, it’s something I deal with. Some days I try not to deal with it. A lot of days I catch myself discussing my weight (and how to lose it) or my body (and how I wish I could change it) in front of my girls. It’s bad people. I don’t want them to be like this.
I want them to be confident. Not just in themselves, but the God who wonderfully and fearfully made every hair on their head.
So, I’d like to know where you stand. Is this something you deal with, and HOW do you deal with it? Do you feel like you are comfortable in your own skin?
“You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are-no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.” –The Message, Matthew 5
Every single solitary day of my life I deal with this. Maybe it’s because I no longer resemble the girl I was fifteen years ago. Funny thing about that is that I thought I needed to lose weight then, too.
Is this my thorn? Or is my wacked mindset my own thorn?
I think any woman who says they don’t deal with, are for sure not comfortable in their own skin.
I think those that can admit are a lot more comfortable than they give themselved credit for. Ahem! 
I think for me I have my good days and my bad days. Some days I feel cute but most days I think, “oh my gosh look at my gigantic pores and my ugly skin!”
Every woman has struggles and while one deals with a constant state of how to be comfotable in their own skin, others deal with how to have a better marraige or how to maintain relationships.
We ALL have our junk, don’t we?!
love you RObin!
I think it is something that the world wants us to believe, that we will never be good enough, never perfect. But thankfully we don’t have to! I find myself doing the exact same thing. I am very worried about spreading that to my daughter as well. I want her to be totally confident not in who she is, but who she is in God, that is my goal!
Robin,
I’ve dealt with self-confidence issues all my life too. Like you, I came from a great family with tons of love and support. It wasn’t until several years ago when I read the Eldridge’s book “Captivating” that I truly understood why women like me battle with this. I don’t know if you’ve read the book - it’s one of those that people either love or hate. For me it was very healing.
I think we all have ways that Satan likes to attack us and for me that is my “easy” button that he always seems to push.
Hang in there!
I have issues for sure in this area. I think I could legitimately claim that my parents helped me to become this way, but this is not to say that the problem doesn’t belong to me.
For me, it isn’t always about body image. Sometimes I struggle with that, but that isn’t my big thing. And I can give my mom credit for that. She was who she was, and she always seemed fine with that. But, in general, I think the body image thing has more to do with the messages we DON’T realize we are getting from the places we DON’T think they are coming from. Amanda mentioned big pores. The only reason we think that things like big pores and flabby thighs are ugly is because we are surrounded by a culture that puts that out there, not only as a reality, but also as the *standard* of beauty. We “know” that neither is true. But we don’t really believe it in our hearts.
God made big pores and flabby thighs. This is not to say we shouldn’t take care of ourselves. But I think there is a fine line between taking care of our bodies and worshiping our bodies… which is exactly what we do when we are obsessing over them all the time, trying to get them to fit into a nonexistent standard. It is a VERY VERY fine line. We have to develop a real ear for God’s direction through intimate fellowship with Him if we are to know when we have crossed that line.
Mostly my self esteem issues have to do with not feeling good enough. I want to impress people too much. Whenever I don’t get the kind of response that I *think* I should get from someone, I wonder, “what’s wrong with me?” Or when I don’t do something the way someone else did, I automatically think that I must have done it wrong, and they did it right.
It’s just another form of misguided worship. What I have (slowly) come to realize is that when I see God for the Glorious One that he is, and when I am enthralled by HIM, then I am less concerned about what other people think of ME and more concerned about what people think of HIM. More concerned about pleasing him and not other. Of course keeping this mindset isn’t always easy, but I am working on it. (Well, HE is working on it, actually.)