I had a wonderful mentor many years ago explain to me what it meant to be an INFJ. I was so intrigued back then because it finally put somethings in my life in perspective and it helped me make sense of things I had struggled with because I didn't know how to explain it. As a teen I was so insecure and shy and always preferred to be outside with the animals or sitting in a deep conversation with someone rather than the "normal" teen stuff.
But as I have grown I have learned that this is just how God made me. I have grown to love those parts of myself that can make me seem weird to people :) God creates us each so wonderfully and with such precision. It always astounds me. Each of us have been given a mighty and magnificent purpose and some of us may live ours out in a quiet and gentle way....and that's ok.
Today while out riding horses with my daughter, I loved the conversation we had about how kindness really is a super power and that being kind and gentle in a hard and ugly world requires a strength that not everyone has naturally but when we surrender our lives to the Holy Spirit, He is able to do supernatural work and empower us to walk really hard situations out with grace.
My heart is happy that I am no longer embarrassed or afraid of who I am. It only took 41 years....but hey.....I'm a work in progress! I'm grateful that I can walk confidently in Christ and know who I am in Him. It completely changes everything. No longer do we look for acceptance from others or things. We simply live out brave by His power. For me to learn this, there had to be a stripping of myself. A stripping away of all that I had wrapped up my identity in. Personally that was incredibly painful and something I resisted even as I knew I would grow from it. For all of my adult life had been wrapped up in being a mom and a wife and in the stripping of those things I was left with a burning question deep within me....WHO AM I? What is my value?
I clung to the Word of God as a lifeline that would either see me through or take me home because the process was so painful. Long before the shattering happened though, God was equipping me as an INFJ and He had already put inside of me a deep desire to stand firm on His Word.
Now I am loving my simple and beautiful life. I am confident in who I am in Christ and in His power in me. I'm confident that God put me together just as He wanted me to be. I'm confident that although I still have much to learn, that in and of itself is a beautiful adventure!
Simple. Raw. Real. Authentic.
It really is a beautiful place to be.
