Love Youself, it's Okay

 

Today I was talking to some friends and we had gotten on the topic of make-up. We had talked about how most of the time it's just us being critical of ourselves more than others being critical of us. You see? We see all these flaws, every out of place hair, our freckles or our stretch marks everyday. Soon, we start to hate what we see, so we cover it. We notice that one pimple that most people would look past. We notice our "bad hair day" when it seems that no one else does. We are our biggest critic. We try so hard to meet our own expectations that we have convinced ourselves that it's everyone else's expectation, too. Little do we know that we are completely and utterly beautiful! Every freckle, every dimple, every stretch mark is beautiful. "For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; marvelous are Your works, and that my soul knows very well. My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth" Psalm 139:13-15. Though we may not see our own beauty, Our King does. He made us beautiful. Once we learn to love ourselves we then learn to love others. "For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" Galatians 5:14. How are we going to love our neighbors as ourselves if we don't love ourselves at all? We live in a time where it is "conceded" if we love ourselves, when we SHOULD love ourselves. I once saw a video where a boy said "if I asked you to list off things that you loved you could rattle off tons. Your family, your friends, your job and so on. But how long would it be before you said you loved yourself?" To me, that hit me, because it's so true. Where would 'myself' fall on that list? Or would we even say 'myself'? And if we did, would other people think we were self-centered? I'm not saying be arrogant about loving ourselves, like making our friend delete that one picture that we looked bad in. I'm saying, that we need to value ourselves as human being's with flaws and mistakes, battle wounds and wrinkles and everything in between. We need to see ourselves through His eyes. "Then God said, 'Let us make man in Our image, in Our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.' So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." Genesis 1:26-27. Since He made us in His image, that proves that we are altogether beautiful, inside and out. And we don't have to try so hard to be beautiful, because we are already there.

Colbie Caillat - Try
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXoZLPSw8U8

Proverbs 31:30
"Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised"