I Don't Belong
Have you ever walked into a room and immediately felt like you didn’t belong? Being thirty-seven years old, there have been many times where I have walked into a building and immediately knew whether or not I would be accepted. The moment I step foot in a room I can spot the ones who will welcome me into their space. They are the ones that make eye contact and say hi! There are no pre-conditioned requirements. You don’t have to look, believe, or perform a certain way. The simple word, hi, is the invitation to belong in that space whether you deserve it or not. They include you. At that moment you breathe a sigh of relief because the includer eliminated the fear of not belonging.
The fear of not belonging is easily carried through childhood right into adulthood. The memories of not being invited to a sleepover can haunt us as we walk into a PTO meeting for the first time. The feeling of not being good enough can cause insecurity to creep into the depths of your soul. It’s a feeling that can slap you in the face as you walk into a gym or workplace, as your eyes frantically search for the includer. The moment you realize you don’t belong is the moment you believe something is wrong with you.
The actions of the excluder can be so loud that it makes us second guess who we are. I will never forget the feeling I had when a group of girls refused to make eye contact with me in a room filled with athletes. I didn’t fit their mold, and they made sure I knew it. I looked around and said hi to the girl next to me. She smiled and we both knew we belonged in each other’s space because we had love flowing through our hearts. I didn’t have to know her name, athletic ability, or if our personalities mesh. We simply smiled and that is all that I needed. It only takes one person giving one kind word to uproot the lie that you do not belong. As women, we will experience excluders for our whole lives but we don’t have to believe the lie that they dictate our worth.
God created each one of us so perfectly. The second we choose to exclude another person we allow the enemy to breathe lies of deception. This topic is not floating around on social media. It hurts to recall my past of feeling like the outcast but, I want to call every woman to ACTION.
BE THE INCLUDER
Jesus came to this Earth and died for each one of us. He is alive today and loves each of us because He loves us. He doesn’t wait for us to have the perfect home, land a great job, or eliminate all our failures. It only takes ONE person giving a kind word to uproot the lie that you don’t belong. BE THAT PERSON. Say hi to the person in the grocery store line or at your workplace. Find the person whose eyes are searching for the includer and show them the love of Jesus in such simple ways. We can accept everyone just like Jesus accepts us. LOVE casts out all fear, and as a believer in Jesus, we have the ability to push out all the fear of not belonging from someone’s life just by saying hi.
Do you accept this challenge? I want to hear from you! Join our Facebook group by clicking the link below and post when you intentionally include and love on someone. I want to start a movement of Jesus’s love flowing from person to person just by noticing they aren’t invisible. Are you in?
“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.”
1 John 4:18
JOIN the challenge here: