Loving the Imperfections

As adults, we are rarely asked what it is we like about ourselves.  Maybe in an interview or something, you are asked about your strengths or most significant accomplishment, or something like that, but that’s not necessarily what you like about yourself.  When, since maybe an essay in 5^th grade, have you had to think about this? 

I’ve been thinking about it for like the past week or so.  But not just what I like about myself, but love about myself.  That seems like it should be an easy answer.  It’s not.

I signed up for a “Secret Subject Swap” with 17 other bloggers – we sent in writing prompts which were then distributed to all participants by some mechanism known only to the host/organizer, Karen, at Baking in a Tornado.  Today is the day we all reveal our topics and posts.  Nothing like a deadline to get me putting on another pot of coffee.

My “secret subject” was submitted by the Mommy Ref, a blogger who has no qualms about beating her kids in a good game of CandyLand. (Come on, it’s good for them!)

What I love about myself is… and it isn’t because…

I’m athletic.  I’m smart.  I’m active.  I’m talented – I can sing and act.

Okay, those aren’t my answers.  I borrowed them from my kids.  I told you, I couldn’t come up with anything so I asked the folks who inspire and spark a lot of my ideas, whether it be a hat that looks like a panda bear, the notion to deep fry cake (yumm, delicious!) or the intent to be a calmer, more positive self.  After I’ve been walking around for the past week trying to think of something I love about myself, they each answered in less than 30 seconds flat.  I asked them to come up with an answer for me.  They mentioned something about having curly hair and a loud voice, then went outside to see who could jump on the pogo stick the longest.

I think a normal answer would highlight some attribute about yourself that you appreciate but not for the most obvious reason.  (My body, although its far from being a shining example of physical fitness.)  But at some level, isn’t it about appreciating your own imperfections?  We are inclined to look for the most perfect thing and hold that up as what we love about ourselves.  But this prompt suggests, at least the way I read it, that we are allowed to love that factor, that personality trait that is still rough around the edges.  It gives us the freedom to say, yeah, I know I’m loud and impatient, but I love being a mom anyway.  I know that my house is a mess most of the time and you trip over shoes whenever you enter, but I love the home that it is anyway.  I know my kids are rambunctious and sometimes hard-headed, but they are also sweet and caring and funny and smart and I really do love them anyway. 

So my answer?

What I love about myself is that I am myself and it isn’t because I’m exactly who I want to be or exactly how I wish I was, but because I’m a work in progress.  

I often want to be somehow different, somehow better, somehow more than I am.  But I am who God intended me to be, at this moment, at this time, for His reasons.  I have to trust that although I may sometimes wish I was something else, in His divine wisdom, I am my own unique self for some reason.  And for that, I love myself.

* Visit www.bakinginatornado.com for the other Secret Subject posts (and recipes for cookies with lots of chocolate and sugar) *