Beautiful and Confident

So this class on Mondays at Celebration is messing me up.  In a good way, but messy nonetheless.  The problem I have is that I've always known that God made me beautiful but how do I see myself that way?  I feel scared to start stripping away my defensive jabs at myself.  What will it feel like to not put myself down daily?  Hourly?  Minute by minute?  What will I be like then?  

I don't know.

It's not just about physical beauty but how you tear yourSELF down, too.  Depending on what you've done in your past, what you're doing in your present and how to let that go.  How to look in the mirror and see the YOU that God made, not the you that you have made.   And let me be clear, I would make a terrible God.  I can't make beauty like He can.  NO ONE can.


We talked about confidence and hope yesterday and were challenged to do one thing this week in an area of our lives where we aren't confident.  I already did mine!  At the end of class, I shared my fears about stripping all the negativity away and beginning from there.  I'm so scared to talk to a group of people and just feel either a) stupid or b) that people will think I'm trying to get attention by speaking up.  It's exhausting, but I've got to beat it.  And that's the thing.  Why do we do this to ourselves when it's so exhausting.  It would be easier to just accept who we are in Him and move on.  We are holding on so tightly to things that make us unhappy and it just doesn't make any sense.  


I've tried for years to just convince myself and accept the fact that I'm not pretty or the right size or smart or confident or that people don't like me because then it would be easier.  I just tried to accept it and live that way.  But God wouldn't let me and that's why it always pops back up, I guess.  He knew I would be in this class now and let me just say THANK GOD FOR THIS CLASS.  


There is hope for a future where we as women can be confident.  I'm hopeful.  I'm scared, but I'm doing it anyway.