"Put Together"

photo: Kensington Way 

There was a time this Spring and most of the Summer where I had this constant drive to look put together all the time.  I obsessively bought new clothes and lipstick and painted my nails a lot.  It sounds silly to admit now, but I really thought if I looked put together enough on the outside, I could somehow mask the chaos going on inside of me.  I kept telling myself my inside would feel better if I could arrange the outside just right.  I think a lot of it had to do with control too.  I felt out of control in a lot of situations, but I could control what I wore and how I looked, so I clung to that with everything in me.  It wasn't even that I wanted to impress people, I just wanted to create the illusion of being okay.  I was overly critical of myself.  I would obsess in my mind about what clothes to wear.  But I didn't feel okay in any of it.

My friends and family started to notice and tried saying something to me, but I shrugged it off and told them I was fine.  And then probably added more lipstick.
Some of my friends starting making comments, "Kenz.  You always look so put together…" They weren't being caddy, they were simply pointing out to me that they noticed.
My family, "Kenz.  Why do you look so cute?  We're just eating pizza?…"

I didn't confess that I was a complete mess on the inside.  I mostly just laughed it off and internally sighed with relief.  Good, at least I'm fooling someone even if I can't seem to fool myself.  I still feel horrible on the inside, but at least my lipstick looks good...  

I knew the whole time that my efforts were feeble and ultimately futile.  I was right.  It all got really exhausting after awhile (and I should add: expensive).

I feel like this is a good time to stop and acknowledge a few things: I don't think liking clothes or wearing stylish things is bad.  I don't think taking pride in how you look is bad.  I do, however, think when that becomes your point, when that consumes your heart and mind and drives you to fill an emptiness…it's wrong.  And that's what I was doing.  But I also still like cute clothes and wear lipstick.  I just stopped trying to use them as means for things they aren't meant for.  I've started letting them just be clothes instead of gods.  They work much better that way.      

I finally had this moment with the whole clothes thing. I feel like I should paint this picture for you, because it's important.  I was leaning against the doorframe into my bedroom, staring at the clothes piled on my bed.  They're just clothes.  I stood there looking at these things I had spent so much money on, and I was embarrassed and disappointed in myself and defeated.  They're just clothes.  I've spent so much money on something so fleeting.  I haven't done one thing lately with my money that served anyone but myself.  I waved my internal white flag and surrendered the part of my heart I was trying so hard to fill with the freaking clothes.

Sometimes I have conversations with God in my head.  In black and white that looks a little crazy, but I'm fine with it.  So we had a quick little convo while I was leaning against the doorframe.

"Can we be done with this?"  
Yes.  I'm tired.
"Me, too."
I know, I know.  If I deal with the stuff on the inside, it doesn't matter what my outside looks like.
"Right.  I see your heart."  

Fast forward a couple of months to now.  I've been feeling really good about making progress with the whole clothes and lipstick thing and letting them be what they're intended for and nothing more.  I've been really stressed out lately.  I've had some difficult conversations that my 24 year old self would rather not have and just be overwhelmed with the usual adult stress: work and rent and all that.  BUT I can honestly say I haven't impulsively been buying clothes to cover up my stressed out inside.

…I've bought a lot of stuff for my apartment the last two weeks.  Really.  An embarrassing amount of Target trips have been made.  I kept telling myself I just need to settle here, in this apartment.  When I first moved in, I didn't think I'd be here long.  I thought I'd get married and move out within a couple of years.  But those couple of years have come and gone and I'm still here.  I've been here 2.5 years and don't really have anything hung on the walls.  At 6 months in I threw some things on the wall in the living room, but they weren't really what I wanted and I did it more to convince myself I would put more things up later.  Then I didn't.  So a year and a half later I've decided I should just settle here.  I figured if I bought some decorations it would be a tangible act of me showing that I was going to finally do it: settle in this place.  I should decorate it and then I would feel more at home in this 600 square feet, even if this isn't where I pictured myself now.  You know, if I make my apartment put together (there's that little phrase again that drives me), I'd feel better about it.

I think I will learn a million times over that the illusion of "put together" doesn't actually equal put together.

Tonight I sat on the floor in my living room, looking at the things on the wall and the TV and the new table it sits on.  I love the things and I'm proud of this little apartment.  It's mine.  My safe place.  And I think it feels a little more homey now.  I like it.  But all these new things, and I still sat on the floor with this empty feeling that I couldn't shake.  God and I talked again.

"Well, here we are again."
Yeah...I won't really feel settled here, or anywhere, until I settle it in my heart.  Until I settle it with You.  It doesn't matter what decorations are on the wall, if my heart isn't here and if my heart isn't settled in You and what You intend for me, then no decorations will make me feel any better.
"Something like that.  Do you think you could trust that this isn't all I have for you, while being okay with having this right now?"
Yes.  Do you think maybe I'll learn a lesson sometime before I spend a lot of money?
"Maybe some day." 
I am ridiculous.

You guys, here's what I know:  if I have all the cutest clothes in the world, if I have every trendy decoration and spend hours making a house a home…if I have all of those things, but I don't have my heart grounded in Jesus, I have nothing at all.  Anything good loses its goodness if you try to make it a god.

What I've learned in my materialistic and feeble searching for things to make me fulfilled: I could lose it all, but if I have Jesus, I have everything.  Things are just things.  I could live in a cardboard box and wear sack clothes, and He's still the same yesterday and today and tomorrow.  And I am so thankful He isn't confined to the things we hold so closely and try so hard to fill us up.

Jesus is enough.  That saying used to make me cringe and roll my eyes because I probably saw it on too many Christian t-shirts, but I believe it with everything in me now.  The older I get and the more money I spend, the more I am convinced He is all that I need.  I hope I never stop learning to let things be things and stop trying to make them gods. I hope I never stop letting my heart be broken and mended over and over, as many times as it takes to learn that life is rooted in Jesus and nothing else.

"Who have I in Heaven but you? And Earth has nothing I desire besides you." 

       Psalm 73:25

"Even more than that, I think of everything as worth nothing.  It is so much better to know Christ…and I think of these things as nothing so that I can have Christ."

Philippians 3:8