A Friday Intro: (Limits and Letting Folks Down)

From January 29, 2021

Hi loves. An excited, warm WELCOME to you lovely new faces ‘round here. I like you so much already.😊

It is Friday🎉 and this is a week I’m glad to see the other side of. I haven’t felt super awesome last few days, and I’m on the upswing, finally.🙌🏼

(Also: I’m wearing this itchy heart monitor, I’m on day 10, and I get to take it OFF tonight! Thank you, Jesus! If anyone wants to pray it gives us some answers, I’d be grateful.)

Okay. For this particular #fridayintroduction, I wanted to share with you something I’ve been processing a lot the last several months~

A friend once shared this illustration with me: each type of boat is built to carry differing weight. The right amount of weight causes a boat to work optimally. Too much or too little weight for its capacity, and a boat will sink, move too slowly, etc.

I see this played out in my own humanity all the time. If I don’t carry enough weight for my capacity, I will be sluggish, even gradually move into depression. Too much (in terms of my schedule and to-do list), and I easily wear myself out, to the point of causing health issues.

As an empath and an HSP (google "Highly Sensitive Person" for more info), it's been a source of shame at times that I run out of energy more quickly than most, that I must move at a slower-than-average pace in order to keep my body and soul functioning optimally. This pandemic season has highlighted it to me over and over again though, how I live most freely and authentically when my life moves almost embarrassingly slowly.

No really, I do mean *embarrassing.* This past fall I had to lay down 3 different projects I'd committed to, all within just a few weeks of each other, simply because my body could not carry the weight of the responsibility I was putting on myself. Emotionally I'd felt great about what I'd taken on, but my body was like, "um, NOPE." Multiple health concerns arose all at once and my time and energy were suddenly consumed by doctor's appointments, trying to get things figured out. There's still a lot we need to unravel.

Laying down my commitments at that time felt like the *worst* kind of letting people down, and though they were all so gracious, I was humiliated. It took me months to work through my shame.

I am slowly learning to become friends with my limits, though, the older I get. As I relax and unashamedly inhabit my own capacity; as I use my energy to do what brings my soul the most life while carefully keeping the rest of what I do within healthy-for-me limits; as I live without fighting, shaming, or pushing against my limits, I am expanding to genuinely like who I am.

**My limits do not decrease my value.** Embracing them allows me to honor God by showing up wholeheartedly within my own life, and bringing what I’m made to bring to my family, to my friends, and to the world.

{Image Cred~my beautiful daughter, Maia.}