Unhealthy Relationships.

Recently, I realized I was in an unhealthy relationship, but not the kind that you're thinking. My friends are life-giving, encouraging, and reflect Jesus well. I have a wonderful man who treats me with respect and leads me gently with kindness. My family gives me the space to be an adult and loves me unconditionally. The people I'm surrounded with are truly amazing, and I have no issue with any of them.Me. My unhealthy relationship is with myself.You see, as women, we are taught from a young age how we should expect to be treated. We are taught that we should respect ourselves enough to never succumb to abuse, bend knee to bullying, or befriend those who don't value who we are. I know there are exceptions to this statement, but I truly believe that most of us get it. We know that we are worth good relationships with the people in our lives. Even if we tolerate unhealthy circumstances with people for a period of time, I've noticed that most women choose to sever those ties and move on.Why don't we do hold the same standards for our relationship with ourselves?I've observed a pattern, and it hits close to home. For some reason, likely related to culture and the natural tendencies of our gender, we refuse to value ourselves fully until we've reached the unrealistic goals of the modern age. As women, we naturally desire to be perceived as beautiful, have attractive personalities, and be well-received. Men too, but I've found that women tend to feel these desires more deeply and consistently. We simply won't settle until that boy likes us, the scale reads a specific number, those baby stretch marks fade, our skin tans, our laugh is less embarrassing. Even the most confident weighs herself in her mind against who she could be, though she may dismiss it.How can we change the culture of self-hate into self-love?The past few days, I've been really thinking about good news versus bad news. The world is full of bad news, and it has the ability to paralyze people. In reality, most bad news is just exaggerated or flat out false information. For example, my family read an article about Christians being imprisoned in Nepal, right after I returned from a 3-month stay doing missions work there. The fear surrounding it was enough to make them never want to visit. The reality? It wasn't really happening – at least not to the scale that they read. Sure, it happens sometimes – but it's not enough to silence my missionary friends there from preaching the Gospel to everyone they see. A year later, and they're not imprisoned. We've all heard it - “false evidence appearing real.” But goodness, it's true.The same goes for the lies that we tell ourselves. They have the potential to paralyze us in our tracks and keep us from ever truly loving ourselves. Or we can paralyze them in their tracks and put them to shame with the truth so we can live in freedom.In order to rewrite the narrative of our lives, we must surround ourselves with different narratives. It's a simple principle – we will begin to believe what we surround ourselves with. If all we see makes us believe bad news about ourselves (I'm looking at you, social media), we must realize that we are surrounded by news contrary to the Good News of the Gospel. Jesus came to set us free from all bondage, including the chains of insecurity and the unhealthy, internally abusive relationships we have with ourselves. This is His intention and His desire. We just have to let Him, and choose to walk it out.It's time to unwed our insecurities. To start speaking kindly and gently with ourselves. To smile when we look in the mirror and tell ourselves we're beautiful, regardless of the scale, the size we wear, or our crooked teeth. To affirm our intelligence and personality and tell ourselves that we are good enough. To end the cycle of abuse so we don't pass it on to our children and our children's children. It's time to shift a culture and pass on a generational blessing of confidence, security, and comfort with who we are. How will you begin to rewrite your narrative today?words by Olivia Douglas and photo by Jenny Lawrence