Your Search History

The alarm goes off. You notice the sunshine peeking through the blinds. Your first thought is, “Here goes another day. There is so much to do.” This routine was so present in my life for a length of time I sometimes find it shameful. Wake up, go to work, fake being at peace, go home, go to sleep, and then wake up and live this nightmare all over again and again and again.  

That was the totality of my life's rhythm. For some of you it’s your rhythm right now. If it is not your now, it could always be our tomorrow.

To ask yourself a question is to grant yourself the opportunity to be honest with yourself, for yourself.

For me, I had to ask myself the question, “What are you searching for?”

When I first asked myself this question I didn’t even fully understand how to answer it. “What am I searching for? I don’t know, maybe time, money, community…” What are you believing for? What was it that you want? What do you desire?

I couldn’t articulate or identify the answer I knew to be true. Confusion rested within the forefront of my mind like the dew rest on the grace at the breaking of day. What was I searching for?

With intentional effort, I reached a place where I could articulate the answer of the question that paralyzed thought before. I was searching for me. Throughout the journey of life I thought I had lost something valuable, I was missing out on opportunity. I had missed the opened door of success. But really, I was pining for me.

Life has the agility of progressing away from us. We become inattentive. We develop new fixations that eventually guide us down a path that we will forget how we even got to its destination. We lose our own self. Throughout this process we develop behaviors that are followed by our expressions of those behaviors that then become habits that ultimately demand further distance from who we were created to be. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

And every step further in this direction we often know deep within, "My image is lost."

For such a length of time, I lived astonished at the lack of longevity of my relationships. I began to examine why people didn't last. I lived life so oppressed with worry that eventually I ceased loving myself. I took the absence of intentionality from others and how they treated me as the defining factor of my value. You could even say that I sold my worth to people I don’t even speak with today. I sold my “birthright”.

James 4:1 says, “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?”

That’s just it. I forgot who I was in the process of trying to gain everyone’s acceptance and love. I thought that would “fix” me or my lack of. I went from being created in His (God) image to being influenced by man's approval, or lack thereof. When the pain I had endured reached a depth where I felt as though I could not breathe, it forced me to ask myself, “Who am I? Why am I this?” I had to go back to my image.

For awhile, I blamed everyone else. I blamed people like you.

My healing didn’t happen in the blaming. It happened in the searching.

The moment I stopped blaming everyone else was the beginning of my healing. I had forgotten a key lesson I learned back in the day of Sunday School. I was created in the image of the most high. I was created in the image of the almighty God. I have a choice to accept the invitation of an unhealthy mindset and life rhythm. I have the choice to live life seeking the approval and love of others. I have the choice to love or shame myself. I have the choice to treat others with kindness in love without the expectation of reciprocation.

We all have a choice and we all are searching for something. Today, take time and ask yourself, “What am I searching for?” For me, healing happened in the searching. It happened in the reminder that I am created in His image.

You will never shame yourself enough to love yourself again.

James 4:1 says, “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?”

Your healing is in the searching. You were created in the image of God. You were beautifully made. You may have lost yourself along the way, but God is calling your name. Call on the name of Jesus. Believe for the shift to take place and then act on that belief.