a NEW year..

God once told me that it wasn’t my fault – my guilt, my isolation, the other ways I turned out. He said I’ve done what I could with what I had.

When I was a kid, I didn’t do anything special. I wasn’t doing brilliantly at school or making a special effort to make friends, or going to therapy to deal with the negativity in my life. I was just me. I didn’t think perfectly, deflecting all negative thoughts, so the darkness wouldn’t get to me. In fact, the darkness did get to me. Severely. I just lived, barely got by, and coped badly. It was a mess. It was all a dark, horrible mess, and I was incredibly scarred.

I have a lot of problems, as an adult. I constantly feel I’m a bad person. I can become quite isolated, and withdraw from life. I’ve struggled with depression for many years, and carry a huge layer of guilt with me at all times.

But God said it wasn’t my fault. How I turned out. He said I did what I could with what I had. He didn’t look over my past and say I should have worked harder to get rid of my negative thoughts, and should have made more friends. He didn’t blame me at all, for how I turned out.

In my life now, I feel I need to think and act perfectly. I’m not allowed to be sad – I need to manage my negative thinking, so I don’t get depressed. I’m not allowed to be alone – I need to have people around me so I can think correctly and more positively, and not be in my own world. I have to work hard, doing everything correctly, and meeting the right standards. I can’t let myself down in any way, or the negative consequences are my fault.

But God doesn’t think this way. Imagine if he’d thought that way about how I grew up. God looks at me and says, however I’m coping, however I’m feeling, however I’m doing, it’s ok. It’s not my fault. The same rules apply now as when I was a kid, when I wasn’t coping and it all fell down around me. I did what I could with what I had. Right now, I’m doing what I can. If I’m upset, lonely, overwhelmed, feeling negative, or even getting depressed, I’m doing what I can. I’m doing what I can, because however I’m doing is ok. I’m ok, no matter how I’m doing, because I’m ok as I am.

It’s not about meeting a standard. It’s about being ourselves. We’re ok if we have no friends and are confused and scared and doing the wrong thing; if our lives are falling apart and we’re depressed. We’re ok, as we are. God doesn’t frown upon us and say we’re only doing ok if we’re coping well. He loves and accepts us as we are, and will never leave us. We don’t need to think and act perfectly. We don’t need to be coping. We don’t need to be happy. We just need to be ourselves. We’re doing what we can. God doesn’t ask any more of us. He loves us, as we are.