As a a young Christian, I struggled with the fear of man and feeling like a doormat. I was nice naturally, but many times I went out of my way to be nice out of a fear of abandonment. Eventually I came to realize that this brought unwanted attention in the form of being taken advantage of and I had to learn how to set boundaries.
You Get What You Tolerate. Henry Cloud
If you don’t know by now, I’m a survivor – actually overcomer of Verbal Abuse (the nonfatal intimate battery type.) In other words, my husband was bossy.
As a Christian I was taught to submit. If I didn’t, then I deserved what I got basically.
Now, when I got fed up of my life not looking and feeling like what I had wanted it to I began to take notice of a few things.
One of them was the difference in how “worldly women” and christian women were treated in their marriages. I saw that “worldly women” had more satisfying marital relationships. (worldly means – that they didn’t subscribe to Christian beliefs).
Their husbands were respectful and thoughtful. The women said “no” and refused to go along with everything their husbands thought or did without penalty.
They asserted their interest and boldly acted on their self interests, again without penalty.
There was not that fall out I had come to fear: A curse did not come to their house. Their children weren’t in just great in school, the family was thriving financially and most importantly the wife didn’t seem depressed or anxious.
Hmmm I began to wonder. So why am I falling for this Submission rule.
And not just at home mind you, but this behavior seemed to be creeping up in other areas of my life, the lack of setting boundaries.
As my normal habit, I started doing some digging and and discovered that this rule that Christians are to be doormats is a subsconscious program filled with disaster.
Where at any time is it fruitful to compromise yourself when you choose not to do something. I say choose because many times we do know that we “don’t” want to, and we do it anyway. Let’s be honest.
Am I preaching to the choir? Let’s talk… give me your best email and name so we can get to know each other.
Ok, let’s wrap this up.
It isn’t picking up your cross or bearing one another’s burdens to “not have” boundaries because if you were really being “spiritual” you would feel peace afterwards instead of anger, defilement, shame, guilt and condemnation.
Those emotions aren’t liars.
Nor are they fleshly, worldly, sinful aspects of yourself that you ignore.
They are internal communications telling us that we just did something that is out of alignment with our values, our human beingness.
We were put here for life not bondage and enslavement.
You have a right to do what feels good to you and to avoid what doesn’t.
If you are having a response to an interaction or offer or invitation etc it isn’t necessarily your selfish unsaved part that is responding, it is the real you.
If it feels wrong it is wrong.
SELF RECOVERY STEPS TO TAKE
Who do you know that dares to live this way?
- Over the next month observe them closely. Take note of how they protect themselves by saying no or telling someone to stop.
- Did any harm come to them?
- Ask yourself: Is it true that I have to do what you don’t want to do?
That it, Just those simple 3 things. Realizing that you have options and having a tangible example in your life to confirm this is empowering.
Ok so in all honesty,
Of course you are going to do things that you don’t want to. Maybe it’s not convenient, or fun, but those times are rare. And they are a choice when you do it not a sting. You don’t lose yourself.
And know that you are going to endure the wrath when you begin asserting yourself. It better that you prepare for that now instead of fooling yourself into believing that the promise of procrastination – “I’ll do it next time,” is going to work.
People are going to think the way that they think. I know. I spent years …years mentally trying to figure out the right approach to confront someone.
People were mad at me. They used manipulation and fear tactics to try to keep me in their grips but I stayed true to myself and restored my Autonomy.
I didn’t realize it at the time but I used what I call now 12 Keys of Resiliency to maintain my strength as I recovered myself. In this blog I talk about self recovery and these keys will be further explored.
Resiliency is measured by how fast one can rebound and get back on track striving towards their goals after a setback.
I designed a series of quizzes to specifically address how you give ourselves away . They are created on a 3 pain point focus with each highlighting hidden areas that are know thieves of Self Worth. You may take it by clicking the button right below.
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