As women living in today’s society, it so hard to identify ourselves. I can personally say that I have been through this. Often times, life wants and tries to identify me by what I’m currently doing, how many children I have, my work status, and even my husband. While all of these are apart of who I am, they are not my identity.
If this is true, why do we struggle with it and how can we overcome it?
Studies have shown, that women are relational by nature. We want to connect, deeply, with others. Yet, we generally fear that we are too much for those around us and once those in relationship with us realize it, they will run away in fear, leaving us relation-less.
Due to this relational nature and our desire, we tend to dive completely, heart first, in to our relationships and endeavors. By doing this, we find that we care deeply for the people that we care for. We find that we want to nurture and help them to be the best that is humanly possible. We take the opportunity, while in relationships with others, to cultivate our love and compassion for them throughout our relationship. We want them to know how important they are. In essence, when women love, we love hard.
These loving relationships, if we are not careful, can begin to completely consume us. And this total immersion into the who and what, that we are into, begins to become how we identify ourselves. We become proud of our connections and work.
Remember, when we love we love hard. Do you know anyone that, when they truly love a person or thing, hides it. No, you don’t because it doesn’t happen that way. Love proclaims, I love _____.
So what is the problem with this?
Well the problem is that things and people change. They were never meant to be the indenting factors in our lives. We were never intended to mimic or display the characteristics of a person or a thing. Not our husbands or our children. Not our jobs or our passions. No matter how great they are.
When I was first married, I had completely lost my identity. I, like many other women, love my husband passionately and this caused me to immerse myself in who he is. However, this total consumption of him, continually, caused me to forget who I was. While as a wife, I was called to take on my husband’s name and cling to him, I was never called to become him. Together we become one, but this is through a process of continually becoming the unified couple that God has joined together in Him.
Not becoming him.
Identifying myself by my husband, left me lost, hurting, and confused. It also brought problems into our relationship. I had to begin to learn who I was again and what it meant to be me. Thankfully I had help with this.
Yet, my help was not one that many would think of. It came from God.
Because of how lost, broken, and confused I was, I began to cry out to God for help and He led me to His Word. Through it, I began to see that I could be passionately in love with my husband and still be me. The me that God created me to be, not the me that I was trying to be for my husband.
I began to learn that God had created me a certain way and this complimented my husband, children, relationships, career, and so much more. I began to understand that my identity in Him was more important than any other identity that I would ever attempt to take on.
Today, my husband says that one of the reasons why our marriage works is because he is he and I am me. 🙂 However, the struggle to get here was…well hard.
Now how did I get from point A to where I am now?
It was not easy. I had to begin to let the Word of God consume me. Some people thought that I was changing, but if I am to be completely honest, I was. I was changing from the rejected, fearful, and confused little girl who the world and situations had created, into a confident, loved, and courageous woman who God has always known that I was.
I did this one day at a time…one page at a time…one prayer at time.
It’s like the Bible says in Isaiah 28:10 ,
…precept upon precept,
line upon line,
here a little there a little
Yet, at that time, I was in such a hurry. I thought that if I did not hurry up, I would never become…me.
The truth is that God loves me so much that He was going to make sure that I was completely identified by Him. His plan was never to leave me the way that I was, so I had to learn to trust Him. The process has been difficult and I continually find that life attempts to define me, but I trust in Him.
The situation for you is that same. He loves you too.
If you have read my blog for some time, you know that I have a few favorite scriptures. One of them is 1 Peter 5:7
casting all your care upon Him, because He cares for you.
This has always reminded me that no matter how unloved I feel, I am loved. No matter how much I want to hold on to the situation and take care of it myself, there is a Great and Mighty God that wants to do it more and He does it a lot better than I ever could.
Today I want to encourage you to take that first step in solving the issue of displaced identity. Read Psalm 139 and see what the Lord says about you. Think about how it makes you feel when you realize how much He loves you. Do you see how He sees you? How can it change how you see yourself? Take a moment, a piece of paper, and pen. Write out your thoughts. This is how your process with begin. With looking at God and becoming aware of your own feelings & emotions.
I look forward to hearing from you. Leave me a comment below and share your thoughts with me on this topic. If you don’t want to share below, just send me an email at info@beingmrsmom.com
Remember, you are loved.
(watch this)
