“I just don’t feel like myself.”

That’s what I heard myself saying to a room full of women, half of which I’d just met. As hard as I tried to keep it all locked inside, the tears began to fall, like I was mourning a someone gone missing.

She felt long gone, the real me. Days spent walking around in a shell, the heart of me nowhere to be found.

And honestly, I didn’t like the me I’d become. Getting caught up in stressful days. Not making time for me or God or anything I loved. So bound up my shame, so wound up with discontent that I felt like I had to hustle my way out of it. And in doing that, I just perpetuated the madness.

It’s hard to love yourself when all you feel is shame. Shame for not being able to live the creative life that all of my friends have. Shame for just coasting, for not trying harder to make that life of creative freedom and independency work. Shame that I’m an artist and a writer and a dreamer and that my days look like sitting behind a desk and then being too worn out to do things that actually mean something to me.

Shame that I kept trying to inch ahead in this game and kept coming up short, behind, empty.

When that’s all you’re measuring life by, it’s hard to love yourself. Or maybe it’s just easier to not even try.

I used to love getting up early to spend time in the word, to pray and journal. And suddenly, I was laying in bed until the last possible second, dreading the hours to come.

Why? Because I didn’t want to open my bible, open my heart to Him, and be faced with all of my disappointments. All of my failings. Drawing near to Him means being vulnerable, and I didn’t want to feel the weight of my current reality, my current spiritual state, any more than I already did.

I was unknowingly rejecting His love because I didn’t feel like He could love the mess I’d made.

And without even realizing it, I’d projected my feelings towards myself onto how I thought God felt about me.

I didn’t love myself, so how could He? I was constantly ashamed of myself, so surely He was, too. I was annoyed by the lack of progress made, so He had to be disappointed that I wasn’t moving forward, that I had nothing new to show the time He’d so graciously given.

Oftentimes, when I’m feeling far from God, I open up my bible app and start a new reading plan. I look for a new Bible study to start. I pick out a spiritual book to read. I tell myself that I’m going to wake up early each day of the week and make sure I get my quiet time in. I set all the goals I can think of.

And there is nothing wrong with any of that. But lately I’ve been hearing God say, I just want you. Come sit with me. And don’t do anything. Just sit. With Me. Don’t try to impress me with your bible study and reading plans. The most impressive thing about you is that you belong to me.

Guess what? His measuring stick doesn’t look like mine.

Because God doesn’t care if I followed the 3 Steps to Success or if I blogged 5 times last week, if my Instagram is perfectly branded or if I posted consistently on social media, if I’m working for myself or someone else. He doesn’t care if finish my bible study every day or if write the best notes in the margins.

God cares that My heart belongs to Him.

And this is what I realized in the midst of this cycle:

I use those good deeds to try to qualify myself. 

Just like I try to make my life something meaningful, something that I think will be worth something. Just like I try to build empires and tribes and businesses, the cycle with God follows the exact same pattern. I tell myself if I do all of these things and works, then I can enter that Secret Place and not feel shame. I can meet with Him face to face and feel worthy of His time, His presence, His love.

If I can only stay on the right track for a week, for a month. If I can only read through the entire Bible. If I can only finish that study on time. If I can only…

Friends, that is not the way God intended it to be.

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. -Hebrews 4:16

We need no fancy qualifiers to enter into His presence and and His grace. All He requires is that we say Yes. The only thing He wants is a heart surrendered to Him.

So lately I’m trying to come to Him without a plan. No eloquent prayers needed. No check boxes on reading plans required. No study books or perfect space necessary. Just open pages, open hands, open heart. And simple, honest connection.

Because I’m tired of trying to hustle my way into significance.

In doing that, I inadvertently believe that I’m not all the things God already says I am.

The reason I didn’t feel like myself in that room full of women? Because I was trying to find myself, build myself, when His word has already declared who I am.

Girl, even when no one knows your name, you’re His. Even when you feel like a mess, you’re His. When you feel ashamed of where you’re at and what you have, you’re His. On days when you don’t love yourself, you’re His. When the guilt creeps in because your Bible has gone untouched, you are still His.

When you stop trying to prove yourself and stop trying to create yourself, you can rest in the identity of the One who already created you and the One who already proved His love on the cross.

If you feel like you have to build a tower of good deeds to feel worthy of His love, don’t. If you feel like you need to do more and be more to live up to an unfounded standard, stop. 

Sister, if you feel like you have to hustle to make a name for yourself, I pray you stop right here, right now, because you already have a name, and it is HIS.

Know that the LORD, He is God! It is He who made us and we are His. – Psalm 100:3