A Chance to Change.

Father,

You have opened my heart, You have gently held me. 

You speak sweetly in my ears and into my heart.

Your tenderheartedness is so clear. 

You are wanting me to see me as You do. To be proud of myself as You are proud. To view myself as beauty and grace, as You have given me Your beauty and grace. I am all things from You and yet I struggle with accepting Your truth. 

I feel like I've been stunted at ages 16-18 when my parents divorced. I didn't receive the affirmation of how beautiful I was from my dad or see how to show my femininity in a healthy way from my mom. (My parents are great and they did far more greater things than negative things in my hindsighted opinion.) I'm thankful for how content I was as a kid, but that contentment became paralyzing for me. I never changed my outlook on myself. My clothes even stayed the same and excuses to stay the same only grew. "No money, I don't like to shop, I don't feel comfortable in the clothes, I look fat, etc." I wonder if  I even would've gone shopping if my mom took me. I'm sure she tried but I just didn't care at a young age and I'm sure she took that as my same stance when I was older. I was given money to buy clothes myself but I chose what was important to me at the time and it wasn't clothing. It was people and accessibility. I used my money for that.

Now, at 25, living with my dad and family again back in my hometown, I'm back to being a kid. My inner "16-18 year old" self is reliving in a new perspective. It's almost like I have a chance to do things differently this time around. I'm starting as a teen and becoming a woman. But a woman of God, a woman with a solid foundation of faith.

Father, create in me a feminine mind and thought, of myself and how You see and have made my femininity. Begin to eclipse my previous mindset with a new one, one that is precious and full of beauty, seeing and experiencing myself as a woman. When I look into the mirror Lord, rid my mind of excuses and settle me in what You say when you see my reflection. You have created me as beautiful, simply as I am. But when I put on make up or choose clothes Lord, I want it to be as I am adorning You with what I choose, not to receive compliments or attention to to make me feel better in the moment, but because I am a Holy Temple and I want to be beautiful for You.