Sometime in the last two (pandemic) years, I found a blog by a man named John Roedel. He dialogues with God, and he gets some great counsel back! I don’t read him often, but when I do, his insights resonate. I’ve been dialoguing with God for many years in journals, and I too receive some wonderful guidance. The God of my journaling speaks with a wisdom, kindness, and love that soothes and redirects me. He encourages me to live a whole, joyful, forgiven, resurrected life—an Easter life.
But I was caught up short recently when I was recounting to a friend a bad decision I’d made and then later reversed. I’d felt guilty about making a fairly significant plan with another person and then backing out, but proud of myself that I’d seen the problem with that decision and corrected it. I thought of the episode as “getting out of the mess I’d made.”
My friend had a different take on it: not that I should have stuck with the original plan regardless, but that maybe something good would come out of it all—which, in fact, was already the case!
The friend reminded me that I sometimes tend to be hard on myself (I’m a recovering perfectionist). Could I see it this way; that I had simply:
- made a decision that seemed right at the time
- acted on it
- then had seen things differently
- made another decision and
- acted on that?
Maybe I could try talking to myself in a kinder voice. I hadn’t seen my comment about making a “mess” as unkind. In fact, I was kind of proud of myself for getting out of it, but I decided to pay attention to the suggestion, because sometimes those close to us see things about us that we can’t see.
Suddenly I realized that in my journal dialogues, the “kind voice” is God or Jesus, and the self-doubting or confused or questioning voice is Carol. To be clear, I don’t think I’m receiving the words of God or Jesus straight from the mouth of the Divine Being, without interference or input from my human consciousness. I believe that, at their best, the words come from the Spirit of God filtered through my human consciousness. They are actually my words—me—inspired by the Spirit of wisdom, counsel, courage, etc. (Isaiah 11:2-3) Can I own that fact more fully and thereby retrain my brain to see “Carol” in a more positive light, the dawning light of Easter?
I decided to do a journal experiment and let Kind Voice Carol (KVC) speak—just as (I hope and pray) it’s the kind voice that speaks in my interactions with other people. Looking back in my journal, I notice that when I’m not upset about or questioning something, that voice does come through, but when I’m feeling anxious or depressed, it’s the self-judging voice I label as “Carol.” Maybe I need to realize that this is, in fact, labeling myself, reinforcing a false image of who I am, not seeing myself in Christ.
Of course, I must recognize that wholeness in Christ is what I’m moving toward but have not yet attained to. But I certainly won’t attain it by self-effort or focusing on the negatives (in myself or in anyone else)! Instead, I want to focus on the fact that “the One who began a good work in [me] will continue to complete it until the day of [manifest wholeness in] Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 1:6)
How do you see yourself? Talk to or about yourself? Could self-doubt and self-criticism be a hindrance to the “you” that God is even now forming in His image, “from glory to glory”? (II Cor3:18) Let us see ourselves in Christ—and He is risen! He is risen indeed!
