…And all of a sudden, two months have gone by without a blog post.
I think about blogging. Sometimes I even sit down and try to post something. And lately I’ve been trying to figure out why it seems so hard. I mean, I journal all the time and that is basically the same thing. Blogs to me are just journaling for the world to see – which is alarming and definitely makes me reconsider posting ever again!
But I realized something, as I was reading Grace for the Good Girl this past week. I have this expectation of myself that things have to be perfect before they can be seen. This means that for a blog post of mine to actually be posted and read by the world (or just 3 of my lovely best friends, more likely), it has to be perfectly written, meaningful, lifechanging…etc. I know deep down this isn’t true, a blog is just thoughts on a page that may or may not mean anything to anyone else. But I put this pressure on myself to write things that will keep the world spinning, as if that’s my job.
Blogging isn’t the only place where I feel this pressure for perfection. It is life in general. That is the whole idea of Grace for the Good Girl. We hide behind these masks, they may be different for everyone, but mine is definitely being “fine.” So when I show anyone any part of my life, it needs to be tidy and pretty and perfect.
I was frustrated the other day when I was on the phone with someone and they wrapped up the conversation by saying, “Well, it sounds like everything is going great with you!” And I thought, “How could it possibly sound like that?” I thought that I had communicated my frustrations with my job and with my online classes and other issues in life…but it turns out that I am such a master at this mask of perfection and “being fine” that I can almost unconsciously disguise my messy and mixed up life. I have noticed that a majority of my conversations end with some sort of conclusion of that nature and that frustrates me.
I want to be real; to talk openly about the frustrations and hard parts of life. Have you ever noticed that it sometimes takes a lot of energy to do that though? Sometimes when I’m talking to someone it just feels too exhausting to explain that the kids I nanny may drive me crazy and I question what I’m doing here and all I want some days is to be back in Oregon. (…and part of me cringes just writing that – why is this mask so strongly glued?) Sometimes It is just so much easier to be “fine”. A one word answer instead of word vomiting all over someone about all the problems in my life.
So I’m a struggling “good girl”. And I’m putting that out there for whoever happens to read this, which is terrifying, but a step in the right direction. Anyone relate?
this life's blessings 