Gallons And Pints

First . . . I want to thank everyone who responded to last week’s blog post. It was emotional for me (I cried when I wrote it) and it was a tad difficult to share. But, it really touched a lot of you. I appreciate the kindness and support that everyone who took time to respond showed; through private message, email, text, facebook or on the blog’s wordpress site. I love you all and thank you for reading each week and letting me know I am definitely not alone in any of this. 

I saw something, once again on facebook, that sparked something for me a couple days ago. First, let me go back a couple weeks. A couple of weeks ago, I was told outright that I was an intimidating woman. I am not going to lie to you . . . that made me cry. I have never considered myself “intimidating” or any other version of that word. In fact, in a lot of situations and circumstances I have been just the opposite. A doormat, if you will. I have struggled most of my life with speaking up for myself. I am the kind of person who wants all of us to co-exist with peace, mutual respect and love and I am GENUINELY shocked that everyone else doesn’t want those same things and I am so sad when I see meanness and evil in people. Yes, evil. It exists. My whole life I have struggled with allowing others to manipulate me. This is hard to admit and even harder to explain but I am going to try. I have a REALLY good sense for reading people. Most of the time, from the moment I meet them, I can see what their true motives are. I have been guilty of allowing people to use me and my compliant nature manipulate me for their purposes and all because I didn’t feel I had the right to stand up and say no . . . in part because I was afraid of hurting them, or losing their approval, or WHATEVER the reason was, but those reasons were the top two, usually. The hardest part of being “used” in that way was that I KNEW the intentions of the person using me and still allowed it. Now, that hasn’t happened in a long time. But it took some real soul-searching and some real hard talks with myself to get where I am now. Now, what did I see on facebook? A post that read, “Dear strong woman, You are not intimidating. They are intimidated. There is a difference.” That post hit home, made complete sense and maybe helped me understand this in a different way than I had ever considered before.

I started this blog as a way to share myself . . . the person who I am finding as the layers of fat fall away . . . with all of you. I knew it was going to be a wild ride when I first started losing weight. But I didn’t know how much of a rollercoaster it would be. I have gained so much back that I had truly lost or forgotten about. I have written about some of them . . . dignity, self-respect, my will to fight and endure, strength, a renewed sense of purpose, and my voice. And I think that last one relates best to what I am sharing this week. I have found my voice. And people who knew Lacy three years ago will tell you that Lacy of today looks and sounds a little different than she did then. I don’t think that’s a bad thing. I feel like in the last couple years, I am no longer afraid (to the same extent) of what people think of me. I still have twinges and hints of that, but again, not to the same extent. I feel I am stronger in EVERY way from what I was 2 years ago. Physically, emotionally, spiritually and even mentally. I have a renewed sense of purpose in my life and I am not afraid to share that with anyone. Boldly, even. And I have dealt seriously with people who have mistreated me or talked down to me in the last two years. I have found my voice and I am proud of that. And I feel strong enough to use it and I am proud of that, too. 

Am I about to force my opinions and my truths onto other people? No. Now, I WILL share those things with anyone who will listen. But I will never say that they aren’t entitled to their own opinions. Never. Those differences are what sharpen us, and make us better. Differing opinions exist to make us walk around a whole issue instead of staring at if from the side we are standing on. The Bible says that iron sharpens iron. When I think of that passage, I think about how hard iron is, and how unbending and strong it can be. I believe it’s a great picture of when we are relating to others. We can all talk about things we are passionate about until we are blue in the face. And most of us aren’t going to change our opinions on the matters discussed. But if done correctly, those conversations leave us better than we were when we entered them. Sharper. To hold the opinions we have, I believe we need to know the other side of that opinion. We have to walk around the whole issue and make up our minds about what we are going to believe and what we see in it. Dealing with people in kindness and love should reinforce who we are to them. That’s my hope anyway. Just because I am a strong person and I have and use my voice doesn’t mean I am not kind and loving and able to feel empathy and compassion. Because I definitely can! 

Many, many years ago, Bishop T.D. Jakes was talking on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. He talked about how some of us are “ten gallon people” who are disappointed because some of the people they love most in the world are only “pint sized people” capable of loving in “pints” and not “gallons”. Well, I am here to tell you I am a “ten gallon person” and I am not about to apologize for that. I can honestly tell you, though, that I truly just realized my capacity in the last few years. I had never thought about my being strong, or capable, or measured in gallons instead of pints. I am not responsible for making pint sized people comfortable around me because they can’t fill me up. I am not going to downsize my personality, my hope, my dreams, and who I am to make other people comfortable. And the older I get and the more I learn, the more I have realized I can’t rely on people of ANY size to fill me. That’s completely up to God and my acceptance of His work in my life. T.D. Jakes opined that day on Oprah that we have to accept what people CAN give us and love them for that and forgive them for what they are not capable of giving us. I believe that extends to forgiving people who tell us we are intimidating, or overpowering, or too bold; who tell us we make them feel bad because they don’t understand we are larger capacity vessels than they are. Guys, we ARE who we ARE. There’s really no changing that. Nor should we be expected to. I will never forget a time when the boys were younger and I was bathing them. They were maybe two and five or something like that. Franklin was in the tub already and Ben got in and created a wave-like effect that knocked Franklin over in the water. His body displaced his brothers for a moment. I think that’s a good picture of some of us “ten gallon” vessel people. If we get into a conversation with others who are not ready for our large personalities, hopes, dreams and discussions, we run the risk of rocking them a little bit; of displacing them for a second. But is that truly on US? I don’t know that anyone’s to blame for it. The other person can adjust to the raising water and level themselves out. 

Because I am apologetic, I am tempted to apologize to anyone and everyone for things I may or may not have even done to them. I over apologize. Truly. And then I find myself apologizing for apologizing. I am working on that. Because of my overly apologetic nature I am even tempted to throw out an apology here to anyone I have ever been “too big” for. But I am not about to do that. I don’t feel I need to ever apologize for God making me who I am. And the same goes for you. I don’t feel that any of us need to apologize for God making us who we are. We all bring something to the table that others don’t. We are all capable of contributing to a greater good. We are all looking to live the most abundant and joy-filled lives we can. And to do that, we have to fill up when we can, however we can, and then give out of our abundance to help others around us. We are ALL worth that. 

#loveyourjourney #youreworthit #bettermewithNewYouCBD #Endo30 #itsuptoyou