Don’t Be Afraid to Be Yourself

I shy away from truly expressing my feelings. Which people who know me would question, because I don’t think anyone would call me “emotionally reserved.” I cry most days—good cries, happy cries, grateful cries, excited cries, and of course, sad cries, too. But despite how many feelings I show on the outside—I have a zillion and ten more that I stuff down and keep inside.

Because I don’t want to come across as too much.
Too emotional.
Too weepy.
Too easily excited.
Too…
Are you ever afraid of coming off as too something or other?

Most of us are, but it’s silly. Because when God created me, when He knit me together in my mother’s womb, He put heaping portions of emotions in me. And when He created you, He crafted you in a beautiful unique, way, too. For. A. Reason. God is intentional and strategic and apparently wanted me to be extremely empathetic and to feel things in technicolor. He specifically wanted you to feel things like you do. And yet, sometimes I’m afraid to express my feelings. You?

We live in a broken world where we’ve probably all shared our feelings and gotten hurt. Where sometimes we love and aren’t loved back. We’ve most likely confided in people who have turned around and spilled our secrets. We’ve explained how we feel, only to be told to get over it. And after having this happen enough times, we hold back parts of ourselves, put up walls, create defense mechanisms. Because we fear we’ll get hurt again.

These fears make sense. Because we learn from our experiences. And when we experience pain, our instinct is to avoid it next time around. But there’s a difference between not touching a hot stove, because it burned us the last time we did and stifling the unique personality God gave us. The first is being smart. The other is living scared. God tells us over and over in the Bible, “Fear not.” 2 Timothy 1:7 tells us, For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline (NLT, emphasis mine). Which frees me to not be timid about my me-ness. And frees you to not suppress your you-ness. We have God’s power in us. So if we feel we need to stand up for what’s right, we can without fearing what others will think, because God is with us. And if a tear sneaks down our cheek we don’t have to hide it. Jesus wept, too. If we tend to be playful, we’re allowed to tell a joke or be silly or spontaneous when appropriate. In fact, it will probably be a welcome relief and joy to those around us.

When we regularly spend time in the Bible, we can learn how Jesus loved and offered grace and interacted with others. Through prayer we can ask Jesus to help us use the ways He’s created us to be more like Him. For me that means empathizing strongly and hugging often. Jesus felt compassion for people all the time. For you that might mean analyzing situations and calculating probabilities–coming up with smart solutions. Jesus was crazy smart–sometimes answering a question with a question, sometimes not answering at all, and other times explaining something through stories. Or maybe you’re gifted at making people smile or laugh even in the midst of challenges and hardships. Jesus turned water into wine as His first miracle, flipping a socially awkward and tense situation into one of celebration. We can remember and hold onto the fact that God created us, gave us each different ways of dealing with things, and that’s okay. Actually it’s great. Because together our individual personalities better reflect different facets of God.

This doesn’t mean we’ll always get things right, that our feelings will never get hurt, that everyone will always understand us, or that people won’t judge us. But it does mean that we can rest in God’s great love. That He will love us no matter what he or she thinks or says. That the God of the Universe understands that my heart breaks over the pain and shame of others. He’s with you as you internally process things and with your best friend as she externally processes and the words tumble out of her mouth. It means God loves that your sister expresses love for others not through words at all but with her hands by baking pies. Turns out, it’s okay to share my emotions–to tell someone they make my heart sing, that I’m so proud of them, that my heart is hurting for them, that I’m angry at the way they were mistreated, that I’m so excited they called. In fact, when I do, I might just remind someone how loved and seen they are–that they matter.

Is there something about yourself that is part of your fabric, how you were woven together that you try to stifle or dilute?

Do you ask a lot of questions? Get easily excited? Have a tendency to be quiet and observe a situation before commenting? Do you naturally take charge, take notes, or take chances? I’m guessing God put these things in you. Are you using them? Or are you worried others will think you don’t operate the way they wished you would?

Here’s the thing. We’re not here to impress the world. We’re here to love God and love our neighbors, because Jesus told us those were the most important things we could do (Matthew 22:37-41). We’re supposed to tend and cultivate this earth and the people in it as God instructed human beings on Day One in the garden (Genesis 2:15).

And so we need to rock what we’ve got, embrace the personality traits God knit into our being, make the world a better place by shining Christ’s light, sprinkling our special sauce on the world not worried about if someone else does or doesn’t approve. God’s opinion is the one that matters most. I’m not saying we shouldn’t care how our actions affect others. Absolutely we should care. We should try to make it our aim to make God’s love and glory known by others. What we shouldn’t worry about is what others will think of us as we emote the specific way Jesus designed us to feel.

You can be the awesome you God always intended you to be. You don’t have to worry about snide comments or eye rolls or people talking badly about you or forming bad opinions. Those things might happen, but God sees your heart, understands your motives, and loves you always. We can trust God. Be ourselves around Him. Hold our heads up and be grateful for how He designed us, owning the fact that how we shine His light illuminates yet another angle of His awesomeness. And we can praise Him. For we are fearfully and wonderfully made, one of God’s wonderful works.

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful.
—Psalm 139:13-14

–Written by Laura L. Smith. Used by permission from the author.