Self Critic vs Grace
Recently, in many conversations with those around me, I have run into the topic of being a bonafide self-critic. The conversation starts a little something like this:
“I tend to really beat myself up about even the littlest of things.”
“You don’t even know, I am my own worst critic.”
“Me too. If you were inside my head, it’d be scary what you hear.”
I do not know how many of you can relate to a conversation like this, or you might have just realized you are self-critical in your own thoughts without ever sharing it (because you are already self-critical about being a self-critic so why would you say it out loud right?).
Personally, this is something I did not even realize was a huge struggle of mine till I had a mentor point it out to me in the most blunt way possible, and I quote, “You have spent so much of your life living out what God told you to in telling women how beautiful they are, but when you look at yourself in the mirror, you would never even use the word pretty.” Sitting there the Batman comic book ‘POW’ graphic flashed before my eyes after taking that hit. My self critical nature is not just about my physical nature, that is never where it starts, it starts much deeper than that – my heart and my soul – it consumes my mind.
Being a self-critic is an every second of every day job. It requires constant attention and focus. When an action or thought is made, an appropriate judgment has to be thought about, rated, and then made based on our own system of standards. We may not hold others to our standards, but we hold ourselves to our own in the strictest way. If we had a battle cry it would be, “NO MERCY!” as we look at our own life. When we criticize ourselves, it is done in the privacy of our own mind. We look at our life, hold it up to what we believe is the best way to measure whatever it is (i.e. success, fulfillment, goodness, righteousness, etc.) and then we see if we have met the standard, and more likely than succeeding them, we fall short. Every. Single. Time.
This is not the way we were meant to live.
This way of life starts from somewhere within our heart or soul, a wound from somewhere long ago where we started to believe the lie that we are not enough of something, that we will forever fall short and are undeserving of other things because of it. From there the lie infiltrated our minds and through many thoughts, choices, and actions we started living the life of a self-critic.
When we get down to the nitty-gritty, a self-critical nature seems to rely heavily on self-condemnation. Even though these verses are widely known, I do not believe they are wholly believed in faith: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:1-2). Our form of measurement or standards is our own created law and the problem with that is if we identify ourselves with Christ and recognize the Holy Spirit living inside of us, we now live in His freedom from the law. God’s grace is now the ruler over our minds, hearts, souls, and bodies. We now have the ability to COME BOLDY before the throne of GRACE (Hebrews 4:16). There should be no shame or condemnation weighing heavy around our necks when we fall short. If there is, we need to realize those are from the enemy and that kind of warfare needs to be combated with God’s truth the very second it springs up in our mind. God pleads with us to drawn near to Him in those very instances where we fall short, because He alone can cover us by the blood of Christ and through His love help us turn from our sin.
For a very long time I lived in a place of believing everyone else is deserving of God’s overarching grace, just not me. Although I would never actually say this out loud, my thought life and actions reflect this statement: I have messed up too much for His grace to extend to me. When we as Christians live with a self-critical nature, constantly rating our actions and thoughts as ‘not good enough’ we are telling God, “Your grace is not large enough to cover my mistakes.”
When that hit me, I was taken back for a moment because I realized I was telling the Creator of the whole universe that He was not powerful enough to cover me with His everlasting grace. Which made me realize even deeper that it is only when I am living in the fullness God’s grace that I am wholly able understand the depth of God’s love for me, because I only try to live outside of God’s grace when I am not keeping in mind His deep personal love.
When you pit a self-critic against God’s grace, there is a champion beyond even the fifth ‘Rocky’ movie – Christ himself. He conquered death, He cleansed all sins (past, present, and future), He made a way into eternity with Him through His love, and He freed us from every form of bondage through His sacrifice. The greatness and victory of our God goes farther back and farther forward than our earthly minds could ever begin to imagine. And guess what? God’s grace wins.
I challenge you my friend, to shed your self-critical skin and let His love pull you deeper as you embrace wholeness through His unfathomable grace.
xx Liv