At work today I overheard this conversation:

“Have you tried these yet?”
“No!” *Horrified* “Have you seen how many grams of sugar they have??”

Is anyone else tired of this?

I mean, I am all for maintaining a healthy lifestyle – in fact, I encourage it. I’ve devoted a lot of my time to help people achieve and maintain such a lifestyle. So what am I tired of?

I’m tired of never being good enough.

I often hear similar conversations at work. Discussions on why such and such food is so bad for you, or why such and such new exercise routine is the best thing since…I don’t know, since sliced bread probably. It’s sickening to me to listen to people at work lament over eating that piece of candy because it’s “going to make them fat” and now they “definitely can’t skip the gym!” And it doesn’t end with the amount of calories one consumes, or how frequently one works out. I hear the same themes running through conversations about jobs, family, really life in general.

And I am so, so, so tired of it.

I’m tired of never being thin enough. Never being pretty enough. Or having the best job. Or family. Or life. Tired of needing to measure up to what the world has deemed “good enough.” Tired of everybody working so hard to maintain such a perfect “good enough” image, of everyone being so wrapped up in how other people view them, that they forget to live. Of having to count every calorie you put in your mouth or work so late you miss time with your family so you can try and be good enough.

Who says they get to make the rules anyways? What right does the world have to tell me what I can and can’t be? To tell me what is acceptable and what is not?

That being said, I am so completely guilty of this. I have caught myself many times spending more time worrying about all the ways I don’t seem to measure up, and forgetting to just live. Worrying if people are judging the size pants I wear, or if my decision, when the time comes, to be a stay at home mother is going to be “good enough.”

But

I think if we were perfectly honest with ourselves, we are all guilty of this in some way. Trying to measure up, to be good enough. Working hard to project an image that the world will deem good. Good enough.

Which is why I’m so thankful I don’t have to be good enough. I’m thankful that I don’t have to sacrifice my life to try and maintain a good enough image. Because the sacrifice has already been made for me.

I am thankful that although I may never be good enough for this world, through Jesus Christ I am “good enough” for God. Through Christ I don’t need to worry if I’m thin enough, or rich enough, or whatever enough. Christ took every reason why I am not enough and took it right to the cross for me.

And even if religion isn’t your thing, I think we can both agree on this point: we will probably never be “good enough.” The world will continue to judge what we weigh, how we look, what we do for work, etc. There will always be someone out there who is “better” than we are. So maybe we need to focus less on the image we try and present and if we measure up or not, and focus more on just living. Spending less time worrying about what the world wants us to be. Just, living.