This is going to shock you, so you may need to sit down… but I was not popular in elementary school. Or high school. Shoot, I’ve never crossed the thresh hold of popularity even in adulthood. But oh what I wouldn’t have given to be invited to sit with the cool kids at lunch time, or to be invited to the social gatherings that became the talk of the week. I was quiet by nature; a wallflower really. I did everything in my power to not be the centre of attention, the source of conflict, the known person in the room. In fact, if invisibility was an option, I most definitely would have opted in and been happy about it. I never wanted to truly reveal who I was to anyone, because, truth be told, I didn’t feel like I was worth knowing. It wasn’t a self-esteem thing because I felt pretty good about who I was, but I never felt like I was worth knowing. Not being able to recognize it until years (and I mean YEARS) later, I had bought into the narrative that I just wasn’t good enough.
I had a normal childhood. Well… pretty normal, whatever that is. No trauma, no family crisis, I did okay in school and was fairly content. Keep in mind, this is all well before we had the influence of the internet and social media… things are certainly different now, because all I had to compare myself to were my friends and my peers I went to school with… and the odd Pepsi commercial I saw on the limited amount of TV I watched (because there once was a time when we ran the roads until the street lights came on, so who had time for TV?) But I was sold on the fact that I didn’t have much to offer anyone so it would be best to just keep to myself so no one would notice. I mean… I was an average looking kid, I didn’t have any striking talents (unless you counted skipping rope… when I learned how to double-dutch, I seriously thought I’d ‘arrived’), I certainly wasn’t a fashionista and never really knew what was going on in pop culture so I couldn’t contribute to much conversation in that arena. So I found contentment in withdrawl mode because it seemed like a safe place.
Time moved on and so did I. But it’s funny how things follow you into adulthood. I recently saw a commercial on tv for a medication to treat depression. A lady was seeking help from her doctor and as she talked, there was an elephant sitting on her lap. It wasn’t doing anything, but just sat there. It was obvious to her and her doctor that this elephant was a problem (in case you haven’t seen it, the elephant represented her depression, weighing her down, was always present and got too big to handle alone. Stick with me here… ) So the lady gets some help and starts taking some medication and in the next part of the commercial she is seen having a social time with her friends and looks to be doing better. But as the camera pans out, the elephant is smaller but still in the room, still present but not controlling. The visual the company was trying to convey is that the lady still has depression, but it’s now controlled and is being managed. I often think of that commercial as a visual to all the stuff from our past that is hidden, smaller, controlled… but still present in our room. Some of us are hosting a whole herd of elephants from a tragic past, some of us have made up our own elephants from our negative thought processes and some of us have our elephants in cages, but every now and then they break loose and we work fervently to get them back in the cage. But what if I told you that I no longer have an elephant in my room because I set it free… and you can too?
Here’s something that I came to realize that caused a serious shift in me. I spent far too long thinking I wasn’t good enough… I had nothing to offer… everyone else had their crap together and I was doing everything in my power to not let anyone see mine. I feared judgement, chastisement, ridicule and abandonment. Here’s when it changed:
This was just a few years ago. Through a series of bizarre events, I reunited with a friend I hadn’t seen in probably 25 years. Even though I hadn’t seen her in over two decades, our first meeting together stitched all those years together like we hadn’t missed a beat. In one of our first conversations, she revealed that she was hesitant to contact me because she thought (brace yourself, because I had to) that I was so put together, had everything all worked out, had such self-confidence that I intimidated her. What??!?! I didn’t recognize who she was talking about, but as she explained, I did realize that I had done a bang-up job of hiding who I really was for a very long time. However, I did recognize the look on her face as she talked… because she looked how I felt… nervous about being judged, unworthy, like she didn’t measure up. That’s when everything changed for me. For the first time, I came clean about being a hot mess, revealed all my insecurities and years of feeling not ‘up to par’ with everyone else. I heard the cage rattle because the elephants were released and marched from my room. And she changed right in front of me. It was at that point that we both realized what was true. Everyone feels the same way… maybe not all the time, but everyone has been there. How freeing is it to realize that every person you know, every person you meet has their own mess they’re carrying. Some are just better at hiding it than others. But until you release your own elephant, you’ll never be free yourself, because you were made for more.
It’s not a cliche or a cool tshirt slogan. You. Were. Made. For. More. Every one of us was created with a uniqueness that is unique to only you. Anyone who knows me knows I’m a person who has built a life on a deep faith in God, so my belief is that every person is exactly who they are meant to be and has a purpose that has been uniquely appointed to you and only YOU can fulfill that purpose. Whether you’re a person of faith or not, you can’t deny that each person comes with their own personality that is like no other; each person has a natural giftedness (or several giftednesses!) and that gift should be used for the purpose for which it’s given… because only you can use your own gift! I often talk to people about using their gifts and talents for others and it’s surprising how many people can’t identify what their gifts and talents are. No need to take a quiz (although I’m sure the Google can find one for you) because you just need to identify your passion. Your gifts lie within your passion. So identify your passion and you’ll identify your gift, and then you need to use that to make an impact on those around you, in your community and in our world. See, you weren’t made to keep it all to yourself… you were made to use what’s been given to you to make other people’s lives better. I won’t shy away from the fact that loving God is woven into the fabric of my being, so I’ll conclude with this: You are the person you were created to be. Don’t compare yourself to others because they’re comparing themselves to others too and are working hard to keep their elephants in their own darn cages. You are enough and designed with a purpose. You were made for more.
One last note. Every now and then I still have an elephant pop it’s head into my room as a not-so-friendly reminder that he wants to come back in and mess with me. But I’ve learned to acknowledge that he used to live here, but was evicted long ago because living a transparent life where it’s okay to admit I don’t know what I’m doing is much more freeing for me and refreshing for others because it allows them to admit the same, and I’d much rather walk through life where we’re trying to figure it out together rather than work hard to pretend we already have.