When Do We Stop Worrying About What People Think of Us?

@bethvogt

This is one of my “thinking out loud” moments and you – yes, all of you – get to listen in.

It’s 4:10 a.m. when I’m writing this as I try to figure out something. Sometimes I do that by putting words on paper. This time, I decided to let my scribblings become a blog post.

Last Wednesday I got sick. It wasn’t the most convenient time for me to get sick, since I was heading to Nashville on Thursday for a writers conference – a long-planned-for-and-much-anticipated event.

Despite being sick, I kept packing for my trip. Laying down and sleeping, and then rallying to pack, and repeat, repeat, all through Wednesday. And when 3 a.m. Thursday dawned, I woke up and prepared to head to Denver airport, despite still being sick.

But once I was in the car, with my husband in the driver’s seat, I broke down crying. “I can’t do this. I can’t get on the plane.”

It was as if admitting that allowed me to drop twenty pounds of excess baggage as I dragged my aching body upstairs and crawled into my bed.

But even as I burrowed beneath the covers, I fought the urge to get up and keep trying. I’d paid good money for that conference! And I was letting so many people down. I was supposed to room with my friend, Julie, whom I hadn’t seen in years. And I’d miss spending time with one of my best friends, Edie, who’d encouraged me to come to the conference. Others had been confident the conference would be good for me, too.

What would people think of me?

And that right there was the 20-pound question weighing me down: What would people think of me?

Well, more than likely, they’d think I was too sick to go to Nashville. It’s a simple as that.

I was too sick to get on the plane. People who feel like I felt last Wednesday don’t belong on a plane. Believe me, you wouldn’t have wanted to be seated next to me. I slept for the next three days. Didn’t feel anything close to normal until Saturday. If I’d gone to Nashville, I would have just been holed up in my hotel room, sick.

But back to this question I’m puzzling over: What would people think of me?

Some of you may recall I turned 60 a few months ago. Here’s another question: When do we outgrow worrying about what people think of us? Do you like how I generalized that statement? It was a bit less painful to ask that way.

Here’s the reality: If it had been anyone else but me, I would have been more gracious about them not going to Nashville than I was about me not going to Nashville.

Hmmm.

Why is it that we offer others grace more easily than we offer it to ourselves? And yes, I realize I slipped into the third person again there.

Do we think we are undeserving of grace?

An author friend of mine called grace “the simplest gift of all.” I say yes … and no. Grace, God’s key that He uses to open the door to forgiveness, can seem easy at times, but then there is the hard, beautiful grace that stretches to cover scars and wounds.

And maybe that’s what trips me up at times when I feel less than perfect. Maybe I’m afraid too much of my wounds and scars will show through God’s grace.

But at moments when I’m freaking out and wondering, “What will people think about me?” I’m forgetting He lavishes His grace on us. God knows I’m not perfect – I’m the one who tries to fake it. That’s why He offers us grace. And I suspect most people don’t think I’m perfect, either. And the ones who matter love me anyway.

There is more than enough grace for everyone, isn’t there? And there’s more than enough grace for me.

 

When Do We Stop Worrying About What People Think of Us? http://bit.ly/30F5m7Z #perfectionism #grace
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'God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.' Quote by William Shakespeare http://bit.ly/30F5m7Z #honesty #expectations
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