freedom!!!!

I again found myself self-reflecting when I stumbled upon a picture of myself on my phone.

                                               

I smiled while looking at it because I realized how far I have come from the insecure girl that I used to be. Starting college, I remember having conversations with my teammate, who is also a good friend, Bea. We would always talk about our insecurities, how we deal with it, how it controls us, how it manifests itself in our lives. This, for the first time, I will share today.

Insecurity has taken hold of many aspects of my life, but for today, I will focus on my insecurity with my looks and my heart. Let’s start with the looks.  I didn’t always watch my weight; in fact, I grew up a really skinny kid. I remember people would always tease me that I was too skinny to carry my tennis racket. When I hit puberty, I wasn’t called skinny anymore; I was sexy.
It didn’t last very long though, because I started gaining weight by the end of my 1^st year in high school. I wasn’t overweight, I wasn’t even considered fat, I was just GETTING fat. Come 2^nd year, I already had a full face, and my limbs started to bulk up, and im not talking about muscles. I don’t really know when I started worrying about my weight but I assume that it was when people started teasing me about my weight. People started saying I got fat or I was fat. I guess it was also the lack of compliments on my face that made me feel that it was my body that made me attractive. I don't remember hearing, “You’re beautiful” very much growing up. I even remember my friend telling me once in my freshman year, “you know they said that (name) only likes you for your body.” I forgot exactly what she said, but basically the message was, the boy who liked me thought I was “hot” and that I had a nice body but I didn’t have a nice face. (Talking about this somehow makes me relive my insecurity a bit haha). My hair became so important to me by then. It was my security blanket. Everyone said I had nice hair (not always but most of the time), curly and mermaid-like, so I kept it as another attractive thing about me. I never cut it because I always wanted to hide my face behind my hair. I always believed that people will see how ugly I was if exposed my face, just my face.

I don’t think that my having a relationship in my early years in high school helped either. I don’t want to talk about the details because I know that some of the people who will read this know about it, but I just want to point out that our too early of a relationship just made me even more insecure (I don’t blame him though. We were both still very immature and childish and selfish). During those times, my weight-based/body-based beauty was reinforced. Eventually when we broke up, I was devastated. In my head I would describe myself as “fat and alone”. I was convinced that if I don’t lose weight, no one would ever like me. And so, the starvation began.

In my 3^rd year in high school I had a specific meal plan. In the morning, I had a piece of bread. During recess, I would eat (I forgot what you call it) one breadstick. At lunch sometimes I would eat taho or maybe another piece of bread, and try to make myself full by drinking diet soda. This continued for a whole year, which made me sick many many times in that year. Not a lot of people knew this, but I would also look at anorexia websites. I would be inspired with how fast these girls lost weight because they starved themselves, and I always tried to do it. I registered myself in those sites so I can get advice and help. I did lose weight during my 3^rd year in high school, but I never felt secure, not once.

I guess many girls can relate to me when I say that I wore fitting and revealing clothes to draw attention to my body, which was the only thing I thought was attractive about myself. Only a few know that sometimes I would just lock myself in my room and cry, look at the mirror and cry. Some people might make fun of me and say I was crazy, but that’s the only thing I could do, starve myself, judge myself, and cry.

When it came to boys, OH BOY! I was never the type to date around or fool around, but I always always ALWAYS desired the attention of boys. I felt that if someone liked me, then I am beautiful. If no one did, I was ugly. I guess I was what people call a flirt and/or a tease. I would entertain boys I didn’t like but eventually reject them. I just had to make them believe that something was going to happen, just to counter my insecurity. It may sound very selfish, but at that time, I didn’t see it that way. I just felt valued when someone liked me. When a boy took interest in me, I felt so special, so beautiful, so loved. Isn’t it sad how my self-worth was based on something so shallow?

A few months after ending things with someone I was sort of dating, I sunk to my lowest point. My insecurity consumed every part of me. I was feeling so good for a while, having someone around, but I didn’t know how hard it would hurt when the person you based your self-worth on, rejects you.

This is where the heart part comes in. because of my physical insecurity, I did things, thought things, I am not happy about. Yes, I considered cutting myself. I even considered self-liposuction (if there is such a thing). I did shameful things just so boys can like me or notice me or find me attractive. I guess I never admitted it to myself then, how awful I thought I was, but I eventually did figure it out.

April 2009, Word for The World announced that they were having a Youth Camp. personally, I didn’t want to go, but when my mom told us that we should go, I had no energy to contest. On that first day of youth camp, we had to surrender our phones, I do believe I was somehow happy to do so, because I didn’t have to watch it and wait for someone to text (cause no one was). That first night it was called Salvation Night. After dinner, everyone went to the Main hall (or whatever we called it), and we had praise and worship. At first I was just singing softly, feeling weird about the other people crying, raising their hands. I don’t remember how it happened, but what I do remember is at one point, the pastor said that those who want to give their lives to God may come to the front and kneel, and a few moments later, I was on my knees crying, asking God to take it all from me. I told Him I didn’t want my life; I wanted Him. I told Him how tired I was, how filthy I was. There was no other moment before that when I just revealed openly who I knew I was, who I thought I was, a dirty sinner with a horrible record. In that moment of complete surrender, I experienced a love I have never felt in my life. No one was hugging me but I felt an embrace. I knew, that was my moment of healing.

That’s where it all started. That’s when I knew that someone could see me, know my past and love me, really love me. Since that day, little by little God took away my insecurity and replaced it with the sureness of His love.

I have felt more and more beautiful each day since April 2009. I started to become content with my body when I had a one on one, serious talk with God. I remember that moment when I said that I love Him and that I am not going to destroy this body he gave me by starving it. I told Him I wanted to love my body, and that I didn’t want my weight controlling me. I said I was gonna treasure this body because he treasures it. I told Him I was going to be healthy, not for appearance’s sake, but because I wanted to honor Him with my body.

It was a hard road. There were days when it was so hard to fight the insecurity, but I would face the mirror and say all the beautiful things about me, I would remember how much God thinks Im beautiful and how my weight does not define who I am and how my weight is not the measure of God’s love for me.

I know I have gotten much thinner than I used to be, and I believe this is a product of not focusing on the body’s appearance. If I did, I would’ve given up a long time ago, because this didn’t happen overnight. 5 years of training to love my body, and 5 years of pursuing a God-glorifying healthy lifestyle. Though I am fit now, I don’t find my worth in my being fit. I see it as a bonus of valuing the body He gave me.

I cut my hair too, as you can see. I was able to do so because I wasn’t hiding anymore. My long beautiful, mermaid-like hair is not my beauty. I really like the picture posted on top because I am reminded of how free I am. I can smile without fear of people thinking im ugly. I can post pictures without anxiety that people won’t like my hair. The point is, I feel beautiful, regardless of how my hair looks. My chopping it off was the symbol of my freedom.

Oh and with boys? I remember during my 1^st year in college, God spoke to me through a book called When God Writes Your Love Story. There he told me just how he loves me, and that I did not need anyone else to convince myself that I am loved; He is enough. His pure love enabled me to stay away from flirting, from dating with no purpose, with leading men on. And in that time of my life, I became so content on my own, and I was able to focus on my relationship with God. It was Christian puberty for me, that time. Of course there were nights when I cried cause I felt lonely, but every single time God reminded me He is enough, and He really is, my friends. I’m smiling just thinking about Him.

Just like how I surrendered my desire for a “skinny-me” and eventually was blessed with a “fit-me”, I surrendered my desire for an “in-a-relationship-me” and eventually was blessed with just that. Nope, I’m not yet under the covenant (LOL), but what I can be thankful for is that I love God more than anyone, and that I am secure in God’s love, which allows me to love my man unselfishly. Unlike my previous relationships/flings where my self-worth is anchored to their attraction to me, now, my self-worth is anchored to God, and any man who comes in my life does not carry the burden of feeding my insecurity, nor do I selfishly look for what I can get from the relationship. It is God’s love that secures me and makes me feel loved that I maybe able to give love.

Lastly, I shared how I have always felt so dirty about myself. During those early years as a Christian I wrestled with that. There would be times I would lie on the floor, crying, thinking that “yes, God loves me for me, but no one else will”. “No one can know about my past and love me. Church people just see the new me, but they won’t like me if they knew the whole me”. Funny how that has changed. Yes I still make mistakes, but I have found that my righteousness, my purity is not based on my own, but on the blood of Jesus. My past is my past and I can talk about it without tearing up anymore because I am free. God’s love abounds so much in me that I don’t see myself through my eyes, but His! Again, yes, there are still times when it is hard, especially when I sin, but His love, time and time again, picks me up and gives me strength to repent and go forward. YOU DON’T GET TO DO THAT WHEN YOU’RE INSECURE!

Hallelujah! I still have insecurities that’s for sure, who doesn’t? but the difference is, it does not own me anymore. It does not control me anymore. God’s love abounds. God’s love secures. God’s love heals. God’s love saved me. And in God’s love I will remain.