Normal: Being Honest About Our Hearts

@JeanneTakenaka

Can I be honest and say I’m missing my “normal?” 

Normal tends to keep us grounded. It offers a sense of rhythm to our days, our lives, our spirits.

When “normal” is stripped away, as it has been recently, we’re forced to deal with the impact of that loss on our hearts. My normal defined my days. I knew what to expect. I gained a sense of achievement by accomplishing my tasks, by being on time to pick up the boys from school and then get them where they needed to be. 

Agree: Can We Be Authentic?

@JeanneTakenaka +Jeanne Takenaka

Our Five Minute Friday prompt this week is—AGREE. This largely unedited “rough draft” form of writing stretches this perfectionist, in the best of ways. We write for five minutes on a given word. If you’re interested in learning more about 5-Minute Fridays, check out the Five Minute Friday website. Or, click on the link at the bottom of this post. As you read my simpler Friday posts, I hope you’ll join in the conversation!

AGREE

God has imprinted the word, Authentic, on my heart. I spent a year focusing on that word, and God taught me much.

More than almost anything, I want to live an authentic life. One that reflects Jesus through words and actions.

A life that is honest and real with those around me. Especially the ones I love the most.

Authentic and Agree do not always co-exist.

For decades I spent so much time trying to be agreeable. To fit in. To be accepted.

I could agree with almost anyone (within reason) and think I was being honest. With myself. With them.

But the truth is: we are not always going to agree with people. Things will be done that bother us. Words will be spoken that hurt. Are unfair. Untrue.

Do we just have to brush over it for the sake of agreement? Of unity? Of being godly?

Sometimes, to agree with someone is to be inauthentic.

It’s easy to agree with others to avoid conflict. But when that’s the main reason for agreement, we lose a piece of ourselves and gain compromise and falseness.

We don’t have to enter into conflict all the time. But we need to accept the fact that there will be times when, to be authentic is the higher calling. To agree with someone or something will strip our “real-ness” and replace it with a phony.

Can we be authentic and disagree with someone? Yes. Can we do it in love? Hopefully.

This is what God calls us to. When we disagree with another, may we do so in a loving way. God doesn’t call us to be right or even authentic above all else. He calls us to love.

This looks different depending on relationships, circumstances. But if we can reflect His love in a situation, authenticity can weave deeper into the fabric of who we are.

What about you? How do you disagree with someone in a loving manner? How do you live out authenticity?

Click to Tweet: Sometimes to agree with someone is to be inauthentic

I’m linking up with Five Minute Friday—Agree

Excuse: Why We Use Excuses

+Jeanne Takenaka @JeanneTakenaka

Our Five Minute Friday prompt this week is—EXCUSE. This largely unedited “rough draft” form of writing stretches this perfectionist, in the best of ways. We write for five minutes on a given word. If you’re interested in learning more about 5-Minute Fridays, check out the Five Minute Friday website. Or, click on the link at the bottom of this post. As you read my simpler Friday posts, I hope you’ll join in the conversation!

EXCUSE

“Mom, I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to get ice-cream without permission.”

“I have to do this thing in my room (translate: goof off for awhile) before I do my homework.”

“I can’t help this behavior, it’s just the way I am.”

“Sorry, I’m having an off day. Normally, I keep all my appointments, and I’m five minutes early.”

Excuses.

We’ve all used them. I find we tend to fall back on them for various reasons. They cover over an aspect or a shortcoming within us that we don’t want exposed.

We may want to avoid trouble. Or avoid doing something unpleasant.

Or perhaps we’re trying to veneer a shortcoming. Or slip on a mask that make us look better to someone else.

As I thought about excuses, I realized that most of the reasons we use them is to cover or hide something that we consider inadequate about ourselves.

We don’t always want to own our mistakes. We’d rather hide them and justify why we did (or didn’t) do something.

Using excuses often reveals our struggle with insecurity. We don’t want people to see the real us. We are afraid people will find us lacking in some way.

Or am I the only one who deals with that?

When we try to justify something we did and make it sound okay?

The “I’m sorry I’m late. I’m usually five minutes early.”

We want to make ourselves look good to someone else.

The thing is? God knows our hearts. He knows the areas in our hearts where we’re afraid we fall short in the eyes of others.

God’s not asking us to wear a facade in front of those around us. He wants us to be authentic.

When we own our mistakes to others, we open the door to vulnerability.

When we admit our desire to get out of something, our real-ness provides a safe place for others to admit when they have felt or done something similar.

And, when we own the fact that we are less than perfect? Wow. That is a powerful testimony to others. Because it’s only when we’re willing to strip away the excuses and let God shine through the cracks in our lives that we can truly reflect Him to those around us.

What about you? How do you choose authenticity over excuses? What’s the funniest excuse you’ve ever heard (or used)?

I’m linking up with Five Minute Friday—Excuse.

Broken: When We Let Jesus In

+Jeanne Takenaka @JeanneTakenaka

She entered the city leader’s home. Quiet, probably unobtrusive, carrying an alabaster vial of something.

As Jesus and His disciples sat at the table of the leader, she broke her vial over His feet. No doubt the aroma permeated the home, filling it with the heady scent of the costly perfume.

I wonder what everyone thought. No one said a word to her, at first. The men talked around her as if she couldn’t hear them. As if she was invisible.

Hidden: When It’s Time To Stop Hiding

Five Minute Friday prompt this week is—HIDDEN. This largely unedited “rough draft” form of writing stretches this perfectionist, in the best of ways. I write for five minutes on a given topic. If you’re interested in learning more about 5-Minute Fridays, check out our hostess, Kate Motaung’s site. Or, click on the link at the bottom of this post. As you read my simpler Friday posts, I hope you’ll join in the conversation!

HIDDEN

I never really understood it until this year.

This crazy desire to keep the essence of who I am hidden behind the image I thought others wanted to see. Anyone who’s read my blog for long knows that I have struggled with finding my identity in Jesus.

The rejection that happens to a child stays with her for a lifetime.

It takes that long for some of us to erase those horrible words and messages and allow God’s truth to be written over the walls of our mind.

This year, as God teaches me about my word AUTHENTIC, He’s showing me I don’t have to stay hidden.

I don’t have to present the “got-it-all-together” face to the women in my life.

I don’t have to show only a fraction of the real me . . . the part I think others will find acceptable.

Do I show all of myself to everyone? No.

There are times when too much information is simply that: Too Much Information.

But, there are times when God is calling me—each of us, really—to reflect the whole of who we are. 

Authenticity begins when we trust Jesus with our inner stories. It begins when we choose to talk with Him about those wounds we all carry.

He’s showing me I need to choose to trust Him when He puts me with others. I need to trust Him enough to share His light—as only I can shine it—with others.

I need to trust Him enough to live as the person He created me to be. We’re each unique. There’s no one else like us in the whole world or its history. God created each of us for a purpose.

When we hide the essence of who we are behind a facade, we aren’t trusting Him, and we’re dimming His light within us.

We need to trust enough to share our stories with others. Because when we share, who knows? Maybe others will be encouraged. 

Maybe they will find glimmers of hope for their own lives.

Maybe they will even want to know Jesus . . . all because we opened ourselves up to trust Him to shine through us. As we are.

What about you? When you’re nervous about being your authentic self, what do you do? What helps you to live authentic? 

Click to tweet: Authenticity begins when we trust Jesus with our inner stories

Linking up with Kate Motaung for Five Minute Friday—Hidden

Authentic: When Rejection Needs a Final Word

+Jeanne Takenaka @JeanneTakenaka

This post is a little longer than most of my posts. I wanted to share some of what God’s showing me about my One Word: Authentic. I hope you’ll read to the end.

*****

I’m living in the limp lane of life right now. My knee is slowly recovering from ACL reconstruction surgery in February, and I don’t get much done from sun up to sun down. I’ve had to accept that some tasks will be completed, and others will wait for another day.

I’m used to being in the “do-er lane.” Moving fast through my to-do list, accomplishing much in a day. I’m up and down and moving around, going to appointments and driving the kids where they need to be.

Change: When Change Finds You

+Jeanne Takenaka @JeanneTakenaka

Sometimes, we know a change is coming. Other times, it makes its presence known through a simple tumble down a mountainside.

Yes, that would be the change I just encountered. We took the boys skiing recently. I was on my first run of the day, hurrying down ahead of hubby and Edmund, because I needed to exchange my boots.

The boots got exchanged all right . . . for a splint and a sprained knee.

Appearances: 4 Thoughts For Finding the Gold in People

By Jeanne Takenaka

As a girl, I found some pyrite while on a family hike. It sparkled like gold in my little-girl mind, and I was beyond excited. I showed my father, and he patiently explained that what I’d found was fool’s gold, or pyrite. Disappointed, I set it back on the ground.