last night I am at church talking with 2 other women just about kids and regular things. a woman I don't know comes past and is feeling very confident and pretty.. then she looks at me and her fast is downcast.. and I say.. she thought she looked great until she saw me.. and another of the women said she had seen it too.. 

I have thought about this since it happened.. 

why do we compare our beauty to someone else's? why can't we just be beautiful without thinking about what someone else looks like?

we will never look like another person.. feeling badly about how we look is useless.. it doesn't mean you are not beautiful just because I look like me.. 

there will be people that are attracted to you over me.. don't allow my looks.. or anyone else's to make you feel like you are less than.. 

God created each of us intentionally.. we look like we look becaue He wanted us to look like this.. He created us in love.. each of us look unique and special and we should be confident in this.. 

I have alot of things I could be insecure about.. I am 54years old.. I do not get attention from men regardless of my looks... I have a belly I am trying daily to get rid of.. I have cellulite on the outside of my thighs... 

I choose to realize that God created me intentionally and be thankful for what He created... I have the use of all of my limbs.. my mind is sharp.. my heart is good.. my health is good... 

accept your beautiful and be confident in it... 

you are loved... 

sometimes there are things you just don't talk about... 

sometimes they are too hard.. too personal... too much in general.. 

someone told me this is still part of a testimony of all God has brought us through.. 

my ex husband was abusive.. in every form of the word... I am a very confident person.. I am secure about me.. I was raised this way... he took every piece of confidence I had and smashed it.. but it was worse than that.. with abuse sometimes there are parts of you that just can't handle that.. this is a man that was supposed to protect me.. here he is being what I needed protected from.. so this hard shell of me emerged... to protect the soft inner one... 

a doctor would call this a disassociative personality.. you are not split.. you are still one person.. but parts of you can't deal with certain things.. so a stronger part of you takes over and the soft one hides... you remember all of it.. just without any emotions.. 

this is really what I dealt with in my abuse... becoming completely emotionless.. which is safe.. but very sad... 

God brought me out.. He opened my emotions.. He wants me to trust people and love them again.. I haven't quite been able to let anyone close to me since letting go of the harder side.. but God is working on me with this area... 

Matthew 6: 19-21 “Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.

reading this today... I am thinking of the desires of my heart.. what is it that we are constantly striving for? what is the thing you want so desperately but don't have? 

isn't that what we tend to consider the desires of our hear? I would think so because our mind is focused on it much of the time whatever it might be.... and whatever it is.. it is likely something of this earth.. now it doesn't have to be a bad thing.. it can be something God is calling us to.. like his purpose for us.. but when that thing takes over our peace and our contentment in God.. then it stops being about him and has become about us.. 

what if you desire to be married or have children.. this is a good thing.. it is in the bible that it is not good for us to be alone and children are blessings from God.. but when that desire consumes you it becomes about this world I am thinking.. 

but if we could learn to live day by day.. trusting that what God leads us to is good for us.. then we are content and at peace and storing treasures in heaven rather than on this earth.. 

somehow.. all that we do or don't do needs to be about God's desires for us.. not our own desires.. but that is a hard thing to overcome.. the selfish and human nature of us... 

anxiety is the most amazing thing.. 

I am not a worrier.. or at least I never have been.. I am a ahhhh.. Jesus will work it out somehow .. type of person... 

yet now... the dumbest stuff stresses me out.. and it is stuff I know that I really don't care about and is not a big deal.. yet I am panicking about it... 

I hate anxiety... 

ok... so I am thinking alot this week... 

I am thinking about the role of a woman... 

I think much of her role is to show unconditional love.. look at all of us.. it seems God gives every woman someone to love unconditionally regardless of how they treat us.. 

this world keeps telling us about all we deserve and what we should put up with or not put up with.. is this anywhere in the bible as a way to act? do you see Jesus ever living with the mind of self preservation? I don't think so... 

we learn to love by being broken by love I believe.. we have a choice to become bitter in the breaking or become better in the learning and giving of ourselves. I choose to be better. 

the bible tells us that God does not look at the outward appearance of a person but looks at the heart... what does your heart look like really?

I have to be honest with myself and state that my heart is not looking too good right now and I am not sure God would choose me... I have been dealing with someone that is rude and disrespectful and I have come to not want anything to do with this person... more than that.. I see myself almost wishing harm on this person.. I don't think I would feel badly if something happened to them.. I can almost hear myself thinking that this was their just reward... 

well what if God gave me my just reward? would I still be alive to learn this lesson today? likely not... 

what is it that makes us think life should go great for us.. and some others too.. as long as they are not an issue to us.. but when they cause us havoc.. then we don't wish them well anymore.. well I think all of this is a natural response to being treated badly.. does that make it right? no... 

the true test of having the love of God for other people is to be able to pray blessings upon our enemies and wishing them well in spite of what they have done or how they are treating us... 

clearly I am still a work in progress.. thank you Lord for not giving up on me.. 

the bible says that women need to be loved and a man needs to be respected.. yet somehow we both sabotage our abilty to get that many times.. 

women sleep with men in the hopes that he will love her.. that he will love her and protect her for the rest of her life... 

men sleep with women in the hopes that he will never have to be attached to her.. so he treats her disrespectfully often times and then doesn't understand why she doesn't show him respect.. not only her.. but any woman that knows how he treats women in general... how do we respect a man that doesn't treat women with respect?

a man looks at a woman as easy because she sleeps with him looking for love.. so he doesn't respect her nor love her either one... 

for myself.. I have hurt men in the past because I was not allowing myself to get attached.. so I was just sleeping with them the way they sleep with women.. only I stayed with the same one... till they got retarded then I found someone else.. 

now.. I don't seem to be able to trust any man.. in any form.. 

I believe at the end of it all.. the only relationships that work out are the ones God put together.. so that is what it will need to be for me..