Settle In to the Good.

For as long as I can remember, I have been working on myself. I have been trying to get it together. Trying to turn myself into the “best version of me.” I have been trying to get my act together. Put on my big girl panties and deal with it. Fix the broken pieces of me so that I can get on with my life.

And to tell you the truth, I don’t think I’ve gotten very far. I mean, yes, of course I have grown as a person or whatever. I have learned a lot of lessons and seen tremendous growth in my spiritual life, my life as a business owner, in my home life as wife and mother. But how much of that is really due to my hard work at reinvention and improvement, my renovation of the soul? And how much of it is just growing up? How much of it has to do with me and my efforts and time and money, and how much of it is just walking with God a little longer than before?

In the past few months, I have given up.

I mean this beautifully and with so much of God’s grace and mercy soaked into it that it can only be a good thing.

I don’t try so hard at the self-improvement thing. I read books I want to read and not to learn the secrets of life but to enjoy a good story. I tweeze my eyebrows less often and they pretty much look the same. When I don’t make time for exercise I don’t beat myself up for it anymore because really, I don’t work out unless I’m going to run a half marathon with my mom and then the only driving force is that I can’t be slower than my mom so who am I trying to kid with this working out thing anyway. When I go to bed with a messy kitchen because my body has just had it, I don’t have to have a melt down about it first. And it gets clean first thing in the morning. And that’s seriously fine with me for now.

It’s not that I don’t believe in hard work and pushing yourself and being your best. Because I do. But I keep seeing all of this stuff on social media and pinterest and amazon and everywhere. Stuff that will make you better at your own life. Tips and tricks to fix the way you’re doing life as if the way you are going about it now is insufficient.

But what if it’s not? What if constantly trying to be your best, whatever that means, is actually wearing you down to the nub? Realistically, if you sharpen a yellow No. 2 pencil to be perfectly sharp at all times, you get a tiny round piece of metal with a pink eraser, not a perfect pencil.

So what if instead of constantly trying to become a better version of you, you just settled into who you are today? Settle in to where you are in life today, right now, for now because constant self-improvement, constant self-care, affirmation writing, gratitude journaling, bible study attending, devotional reading, healthy organic fair trade non-gmo local eating, non-toxic exclusive product buying, weed free garden and oat milk in your latte is too much work to maintain all day every day.

I’m eating cracker and drinking a peach tea for lunch while I write this. But I fit my meditation in this morning and it felt soul good. My skin has yet to grow out of the cystic acne phase. But I’m having a killer hair day. My daughter is having a really hard time with naps and bedtime the last few weeks, but last night we laughed until I cried and bubbles of spit came out of her mouth.