Self-awareness is the Number One Ingredient

I think that being true to who you are is

the most difficult, the most difficult lesson that you can

learn as a grown up. I think that I spent

my twenties thinking that I knew who I was, but

I had no idea who I was, and I didn't

know that I was learning and figuring out who I was.

And that's okay.

I mean, if you're in your if you're in your twenties,

that that's.

That's what you're supposed to do in your twenties.

In my thirties, I liked my I like myself so

much more now than I did in my twenties, although

in my twenties I didn't even know that I didn't

like myself. I don't know if that makes sense, but

I you know, I have spent the last so I

am about to be thirty eight, and I would say

I've spent the better part of the last twenty years

trying to figure.

Out who I am.

And part of learning who you are requires mimicking other people.

Okay.

I mean you can take that with music, you can

look at it with preaching. Preaching, probably I can illustrate

better the very first sermon my husband ever preached, I

don't know if you've ever heard him say this before.

Was a Tony Evans sermon that he memorized. You got

to start somewhere. Okay, you have to have you have

to have heroes. You have to have a model for

what you what you want to be. And so it's

okay to have someone that you're like, Oh, I.

Just when he preaches it, it hits me. And if

I could ever do that for people, or when she

speaks in front of people, or the way that.

I watch this person lead it, I want to follow them.

So if you have someone that you want to follow,

then follow them and then mimic them and lead like them.

But then you can't stay there.

You have to develop, and you have to you have

to become your own person.

And I think.

Self awareness is the number one ingredient that you need

to be a successful adult.

And the funny thing is a lot of people never

get there.

And so if you have someone in your life that

you're that you're perpetually frustrated with that you feel like,

I just I can't my relationship is always struggling with

this person. A lot of times that person has little

to know self awareness. For whatever reason, they just it's

a it's a maturity thing. But maturity is strange because

you can you can be mature on the outside, you know,

I mean, you know, people like you know how to

act when you're you learn social behavior.

But some people never learn.

Themselves, and they never know what their strengths and what

their weakness are, and they don't listen to the people

that are in their lives. So, okay, I I'm a

little overextended in this season of my life. I feel

like you ever get to a point where you feel like,

if if one more thing gets added to my plate,

it's all going to crumble. So I feel that way

in my life right now because I am in the

middle of leading. I have a leadership group called LOL

And on the surface, it seems like, you know, what's

the big deal, Well, we read a book a month

and then we come together and I basically teach on

that book, which means I have to read the book

at a different level than everybody else is reading the books.

I'm not just like audio booking it.

Okay, I am taking a page of notes per chapter

on average of whatever book.

The last book that we read was twenty two chapters.

Okay, I picked the book, you know, so.

My own fault.

But so I'm doing that and I am preaching on

Mother's Day and I'm writing this Bible study for our

people in the fall. It's called building Friendships that Fit

and BFF and it's one of those things that, like,

I was super excited about, but now that my deadlines

are right up on me, I'm freaking out.

Okay.

So my point in telling you that is sometimes though,

you get to a place in your life where you're

overextended because you made a bunch of stupid decisions, and

other times you're just at a place where you know

that that it's an opportunity for the Lord to really

come through and to sustain you. And then you can

look back and be like, there's no way I could

have done that if God had not been guiding me

along the lung.

So the cool thing is, and my husband teaches this

that the more you pour, the more God pours into.

Is that okay?

So it's more like like the more you the more

you're pouring out, the more He's pouring in. So while

I was working on the teaching for lol I, they

were it was talking about blind spots and at this simultaneously,

I'm trying to in the Bible study. I'm trying attempting,

attempting to take a woman Bible character for each of

the four weeks and kind of look at that character

through the lens of friendship. Not there aren't a lot

of women women friendships in the Bible, but like a lesson,

it's more like a lesson.

In friendship that you can learn from this person's story.

So I'm in the Book of Judges reading about Sampson

because I thought, well, what better person to teach on

like bad friends than to talk about Delilah?

Right, even though it's a love relationships, it's kind of money.

But so I'm reading about Sampson, I'm reading about blind spots,

and it all sort of like comes together for me.

What could he possibly have been thinking? She said, tell

me the secret of your strength.

Every time she did exactly what he told her, and

every time the philistines came upon him, and then you know,

the fourth time, he actually it says the Bible says

that she nagged him to the point of like he

was like completely angry and done with her and whatever,

and then so he actually told her. So I have

all these theories on I actually don't think that he

I think that he didn't actually think that his secret

was in his hair, that he had just completely taken

for granted the fact that this the Lord would come

upon him.

I think he took that for granted.

And I think the absolute one of this absolute stadest

verses in the Bible is in that Judges. I think

it's Judge sixteen, where you know, she cuts his hair,

she's a simps, and the Philistines are up on you.

He rises up, you know, to defeat them, and it

says he did not realize that the power of the

Lord had left him and to Okay, so I'm coming

back full circle to the whole self awareness thing.

Blind spots are only blind to you if it's your

blind spot. It's your blind spot. You don't know. So

she was like, in essence, she was his blind spot.

So when I read the story, I'm like, how could

you not see that this woman was playing you all along?

But it was his blind spot. He couldn't see.

You can't see what you can't see, Okay. And so

I think that's the trickiest.

Part of self awareness is how do you have self awareness?

How do you even know, you don't have self awareness

if you don't have it.

And I also think that.

Where we the way that you find self awareness is

by listening to those around you. So when you have

people in your life that you trust and people that

you that have earned the right to speak into your life,

not everybody, okay, God, not everybody and not and not

even somebody who's been in your life for a long

time necessarily has the right to speak into your life, okay.

And and I mean again, that's that's what.

Pastor Siva was talking about yesterday when.

He said the who that who who validation? Who you're

seeking validation from? And sometimes the person that I'm seeking

validation from is the completely wrong person. It could be

a parent who you know just is nothing you do

is ever good enough for them. So if you're seeking

validation from them, you're just you're you're drinking from the

wrong well, you know. So the way that you if

you have a blind spot, you have to realize that.

You're complete you. It's it's your blind spot.

And the only way that if somebody's in your blind spot,

the only way that you can see them is if you.

Speed up or slow down, or move or change your position, right.

So I think that a lot of times God sends

people into our lives and he whispers things to us

through other people, but we don't want to hear it,

and we become we become defensive, and we become we

make excuses, we blame, and really it's God giving you

an opportunity to see a blind spot that you have

and giving you an opportunity for self awareness.

But you look at it as this person's attacking me.

And so I think that the two the two main

ways that you can gain self awareness are one in

the workplace, and that would be when you're.

At our workplace.

I don't know, I mean, I can't speak for it

if you work anywhere else but here, but I know

for a fact that out Elevation, that we are constantly

giving people feedback, positive and negative feedback. And we have

the end of your evaluations where you sit down and

you write out a whole long think I mean, God,

they are so long, and then your supervisor writes out

theres and then you meet.

Together and you like read your answers to.

Each other and all that, and if you get hired,

you'll have the opportunity to be a part of that,

and I think when your supervisor tells you something that

you need to work on your your instinct reaction is

going to be to make an excuse or to blame

or to defend.

Or you know, or even like deny like you can

and even receive it.

And I think it's okay too that initially when you

receive feedback that's really hard to hear. It's okay for

in the moment for you to experience all of those

things and for you to do all of those things,

to blame to whatever those things that I said, to defend,

to deny, to be like a complete denial, like no,

I don't do that, I didn't do that.

Okay.

So it's okay to have those initial reactions. But when

you get home and when you're processing through you have

to take that information. You have to go, God, do

I really do this? Is this really something that if

you truly don't feel like you do it, take it

to the Lord and be like, God, show me how

I do this.

But it's it's that's that's the.

Opportunity right there is in that difficult conversation. I also

think that God gives us self awareness through encouragement, but

we don't receive that either, you know, like when somebody says, wow,

you're you're really good at X or you you know

you did, you were incredible in that.

That was your thing, that was your moment, and maybe it's.

Like you don't want that to be your thing, you know,

like maybe like, uh, you want to be a singer

and don't all the worship people have to do like

pastoral whatever right in here. If you're a worship two

K two, you go through all the same stuff. So

maybe like what you think you want to do is

lead on stage. But but this person that you're under

for this cycle of your program is like, wow, you

I mean, you are incredibly good.

You shine at this, and that's not what you want

to shine at. And so you don't want to receive that.

And there was your opportunity to have some self awareness

in a good way.

And I think a lot of times it's it's.

More difficult to receive, to internalize and truly receive positive

feedback then it.

Is negative feedback.

Because negative feedback you can take and you can just

beat yourself up over and you be like, I suck,

I'm never.

Gonna be good at this.

I don't know why you know, Like, you can take

it that way too. You don't necessarily have to be

in denial. You can be like, I know I'm terrible,

I'm awful. I shouldn't even be in ministry.

I don't God doesn't even need me. He shouldn't use me.

You know.

Have you ever gone there? You know?

Right?

So that's that's you're brought.

You're you're You're not receiving it in that place either, Okay,

And so I think, like this whole idea of self awareness,

we don't receive positive feedback either because because you're you know, you're,

you got a.

Hole in your bucket, you're you're, you've been.

This is another little teaching that I'm working on the

woman at the well. So for the first week of

the Bible study, I talk about how you can't have

successful relationships with people you don't have a living, breathing

relationship with God. And how Jesus said to the woman

at the well, he said, you know, I have water.

To drink that, you know, he said, I don't know

drink from drink from me whatever exactly.

But we're I'm like over here drinking salt water and

God saying I have water that you can drink, that

you will not be thirsty anymore. But I'm over here

drinking from needing fulfillment from all the wrong places, from

all the wrong people. And if I'm in this place,

even if somebody gives me positive feedback, it washes right

through me. I can't receive it because I'm not full

in the right way from the right places.

So the other areas.

So I said, self awareness blind the whole thing of

blind spots and self awareness. One way that you God

can enlighten you to areas is in the workplace, in

our workplace, And the other way is in relationships with

the people that are closest to If you have somebody

in your life that you love and that you care about,

and they say to you in like, you know, usually

it's like in an argument or whatever, and they say.

Why do you always do that?

Okay, if anybody ever says to you, why do you

always do that? That is your opportunity right there to

go to great I don't know, why do I always

do that? Rather than well, I always do that because

you always blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. That's

that's your immediate reaction when somebody says, why do you

always do that? And again, I don't think God is

as concerned of my immediate reaction as he is about

my second about my actual action that I take. Okay,

So don't get so bogged down in the fact that, like,

I just had a knockdown, drag out argument with my.

Spouse about why are you always late?

Okay, and I want to be like, well, I'm always

because you don't help me. This is not an actual

argument that I have with my husband, I promise you.

But let's just let's just make up a scenario.

I'm always late because I'm the only one who dug

the laundry, unlosts the dishwasher, puts the kid's shoes on,

changes the kid's diapers, blah blah blah.

Blah blah. And I if.

You would help me out a little bit, I wouldn't

always be late. Right, that's your immediate reaction, Okay, But

let's take it to like your later thought.

Okay, So now you've had this big argument. Whatever.

Now I'm sitting down and I want to go back

and I want to process why am I always late?

Is it because I like to be in control? Is

it because I like for people to wait on me.

Is it because I'm insensitive and I don't pay attention

to what time it is? But I'm so selfishly doing

the things that i need to do that I don't

think about.

How I'm making other people wait on me.

And just like you process through, like let go of

the I'm always late because the only woman ever does

anything around here.

Well, welcome to adulthood. You know everybody feels that way.

News flash.

He feels like you never do anything and you feel

like he never does anything. Okay, so that's marriage, and.

Right, I mean that's marriage.

So so the sooner that I get passed that and

to the thing that God actually wants to show me

about myself, the more that I'm not going to keep

having that same old argument.

And I think that that's God is way less concerned

about how you reacted and how you need to correct

yourself as he is about you not continually making the

same mistake over and over and over again and having

the same argument with your spouse.

Over and over and over again.

It's not about what actually this is speaking from a

person who is punctually challenged, Okay, it's not a I

had to learn that I always have a reason for

why I'm late, okay, and sometimes it's a good reason,

like it's not my fault, and sometimes it is my

fault while I lost track of time, or I thought

I had more time than I did, or this happened

with the kids, that one would be not my fault,

or I got stuck in traffic. But if you're always late,

it doesn't matter. No, they don't care because.

You're always late.

So it always feels like you don't respect my time.

You don't, you're not You only think about yourself and

you know, get away from my illustration of you being

always late. But the point is, can you can you

get to the bottom of why why am I always late?

How can I fix this? How does it make other

people feel? And what baby steps can I take? So like,

for me, one baby step. I'm really into baby steps, Okay,

I am not like a So this the book that

we read, It's called The Me.

I Want to Be.

That was the book we read last month by John Orberg.

It's a really great book. If you've never read it's

old to me I Want to Be by John Orberg.

But if you are on this self awareness journey, I

hadn't suggest that book, but he talks about this idea

of trying softer, meaning like he's like, don't try harder,

try softer. So the best way I can illustrate that

for you is in like dieting and exercise.

Okay. If you are like.

Okay, I'm never gonna eat carbs or sugar again, I'm

gonna exercise every day, well, you may have great success

from that for maximum twelve weeks okay, But if you

go twelve weeks never eating anything fun and exercising six

or seven days a week, you're gonna burn out.

So you might have short term success, but you're probably

not gonna have long term success. Okay.

So trying softer is more about making a small change

that can have a lasting effect. So like for me,

with the idea of being punctual, I came to this

place where I was like, Okay, I can't be.

On time for everything. I just I can't. But I

can make a goal of things that I will not

be late for. Okay.

So I will not be late for church, and I

will not be late for picking up my husband for

our dates.

Okay. So I'm doing awesome at the first one and

I'm doing pretty.

Awesome at the second one, okay, And I've finally come

to a place in my life where if I know

that my husband, if we've said we're gonna leave at

six or a lot of times for our date night,

I'll pick him up here.

I'm gonna pick you up at six.

I'm gonna pick him up at six o'clock because, honestly,

because if I'm late, if I roll up here fifteen

minutes late, then we're gonna get in the car mad

at each other for our date.

That's fun, you know, but.

Way to start off your date night with everybody.

Being like.

You know, if I'd have known you were gonna be

fifteen minutes late, I would have worked fifteen minutes longer.

And so, okay, I'm not gonna be late for that.

I'm not gonna be late for church.

But if you're having lunch of coffee with me, I'm

probably gonna be five minutes.

Later, Okay.

I mean so there, I'm working on it, and maybe

in ten years, if we're having lunch of coffee, I

won't be five minutes late, but I can. I'm gonna

bite off what I can chew. In this season of

my life. I'm gonna find one thing that I always

do that I wish I could fix, and I'm gonna fix.

One tiny thing about that.

And I'm not gonna say I'm never gonna be late again,

because the problem with me is I never know what

time it is. Okay, Like honestly, half of that's why

I said I need a clock, because half of my

watches I wear just they're just jewelry.

I don't know. This watch doesn't even have numbers on.

It, Okay, So like if you if you struggle with

telling I'm not a good watch for today, it's really

just jewelry. And because I'll look at it. In fact,

I did this. I did this the other day. Where

were we, Oh, it was Sunday night with the backstage

past sing Saturday night with the backstage pass, and we've

been taking pictures with.

People for a long time.

And I looked at my watch and I was like,

somebody said, oh, it's late. We gotta get you guys

to eat.

And I looked at my watch and I was like, yeah,

it's eight o'clock. I said, is it eight o'clock or

seven the clock? Because like, you know, my watch and

that numbers so that that's my thing. But at least

I know that about myself. That's self awareness.

Okay, Why am I always late because I never know

what time it is? So what am I gonna do?

Make it a digital clock. I'm gonna send myself timers.

I'm gonna make my all the things that you know

late people need to do. I'm trying all of those

things and trying to figure out what works for me.

But that's that's what self awareness is.

Self awareness isn't necessarily fixing the thing about yourself. It's

but you said, knowing and then making and making accommodations

for it.

Okay. It's not like I'm always going to struggle with

being late.

Okay, but I have to know that if I don't

know that, I can't even fix it.

I can't even be on time for the things that

are important.

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