By Jill Connelly
”I am not enough.”
These words have echoed in my soul for far too long, and I’m ready to let them go.
As I walk through this surrender, it feels like grief, a death of part of me. My false belief that I am not enough became part of my story at age 5, only to be solidified at every turn. My choices of men and some friendships were mostly based on me choosing someone that couldn’t see my value. I had to prove I was enough.
In the last few weeks, I have been trying to figure out how walking through this will work, what it looks like, feels like, how to explain it to others. The passion I have about this experience is raw and powerful. I even feel somewhat defensive of it, as though people must understand this key component to live free.
I have had so many tears, allowing the grief to come each time I am faced with a circumstance that would have contributed to my false belief (I’m not enough). I cry as I feel that it does not belong to me, that the security I felt was only coping. That proving my value made me so much more to all those around me. I have been thinking of it as ripping that part of me out, as if losing an appendage. Scared and very sad at times that I must let her go.
Today I was gifted a new thought, the Holy Spirit allowed me to see Jesus holding that part of me – my little, not-enough girl. The surrender is having clarity that I am not ripping out the bad. I am gifting what was necessary for survival over to the only ONE who can heal.
It is not casting out or renaming her anymore. It is simply placing her on the lap of Jesus. Seeing her being loved and healed so completely. Knowing now she is safe in His arms. I can see it. He granted me that. It allows my sadness to be turned into joy over having complete understanding that she is resting restored in heaven with our Daddy. I no longer need her, I no longer carry her to protect her or myself. She belongs to Abba.
A little more personal background. I’m 53, and have been married 5 times. I have three children from two different husbands. I am very much the “woman at the well”….without the current man. My parents split at age 5, and my mom went on to adopt 12 children. I am one of 18 at this point. I spent my life not being enough, always looking to prove that I was. There’s so much more …that’s just the basic back story!
I am joyfully single and finally dating Jesus. Such an immensely freeing place to be.
Love is the fire that ignites and kindles faith and transforms hope into certainty.
