I don't care what you think... and I say that in love.

I'm sick, tired, totally and completely over, and never going back to the way I was before.

I must be honest. You all know me. (I'm assuming this... if not, "Hi! Nice to meet you!") I am a horrible, shameless people-pleaser. If you've read any of my past blogs, you know that this is true. You know that this is my pitfall, and you know that it's what I've been wrestling with for the past month. (And what I should have been wrestling with for the past 10 years...) But here's the deal...

I'm done with:

Waking up in turmoil because of possible problems or angry, bitter confrontations.
Watching every movement of a person's face for disapproval while I'm talking.
Trying to organize and control others' reactions to me.
Doing things that I hate simply because I want to be loved.
Making myself physically ill because of arguments and disagreements.

And I'm ready to:

Passionately serve God with every breath in my body.
Love others self-lessly, but AFTER I love my heavenly Father.
Hand over my controlling tendencies and realize that how I want people to respond may not be how God wants people to respond.
Realize that as long as I act according to what my Father desires, I don't need to worry about others' reactions.
Rest entirely in Him as the only one to give me true peace.
Make Him the center, the focal-point, the drive, the over-seer, of everything I do, think, say, or aim for.

I know, these are **duh!** statements, but they are ones that I have grossly and horribly neglected to the detriment of my service to God, and my growth in Christ-likeness.

Only by aligning my focus entirely with Christ, only by making pleasing him my one desire, only by stripping away all the scaffolding of human approbation and support that I have built so ceaselessly around my life and my way of thinking- only then can I truly love others. The problem is, I re-ordered the first and second commandments: I put loving people before loving God. Consumed with other's and making them happy, I ignored my God, and failed to please him. Now I realize, only when loving God comes first, can I truly love other people.

So I will pray for wisdom, I will find my truth in His Word, I will seek godly council, I will wrestle with the Holy Spirit, I will develop a finely-honed, tender conscience, so that I may be sure that my decisions and life are first and fore-most pleasing to God and (if necessary) to God alone. After that, I need not care how others respond.

And then I think I can biblically say,

"I don't care what you think!"

And say it in love.