Learning To Surrender Sooner

Wherever you are on your journey, I’m so glad you found your way here.

I learned early in life that being myself didn’t always feel safe. Little comments, laughter that lingered too long, being left out of plans—tiny cuts that taught me a quiet equation: if I wanted to be accepted, I needed to adapt. 

So, I did. I became fluent in people-pleasing. I studied rooms and reshaped myself to fit them. On the surface, it worked. I fit in. I was liked. But somewhere along the way, I misplaced me.

It worked… until it didn’t.

In my twenties, the scaffolding collapsed. I couldn’t keep up with being who everyone else needed me to be. Success didn’t stabilize me. Self-help didn’t heal me. Performing couldn’t give me the sense of self I was chasing. 

That’s when Jesus found me in the pit I couldn’t climb out of. He didn’t audition me—He rescued me. He named me His. I tasted that newness like coming up for air after far too long underwater. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

And still, shadows remain. I know who I am in Christ, and yet I still feel the pull to put on old masks. I say I only care what God thinks, but some days, I care far too much about what people think. 

That’s the tension I live in. The gap between who I am in Him and how I sometimes still show up.

This past week exposed that gap in fresh ways. At our wedding planning meeting, I felt both joy and fear. We’re building a ceremony centered on Christ—communion, prayer, honoring my Jewish heritage—publicly, in front of people who might not understand. I don’t want to change what God has asked of us to calm my discomfort, but the thought still came: what will they think? Will this be too much?

Later, on a call with our planner and photographer, a few comments landed sharper than they should have. I felt ignorant for not wanting the trendy, Pinterest-perfect thing. I don’t like what’s “cool.” I like what’s holy. But the old voice crept in anyway: you don’t know enough, you’re doing it wrong, you’re not normal.

Even volleyball pulled at the thread. One mistake became two, then five, and suddenly I wasn’t a woman playing with friends. I was a teenager again, spiraling, convinced I’d never be good enough. 

At a family dinner, no one said anything wrong, but I still felt that familiar ache of being the odd one out. Nothing was spoken. My nervous system just remembered.

In the middle of it all, my eyes fell on a journal I hadn’t touched in a year, my shadow work journal. I felt God nudge me to open it. I flipped to a page called “Getting to the Root of Your Shadow” and started writing before I could overthink.

 What’s triggering my shadow? Not being accepted. Not fitting in. 

What thoughts am I having? I’m weird. I’m embarrassing. People are ashamed of me.

Why can’t I just be normal? 

What emotions? Shame. Sadness. Anxiety. Fear. 

What words surface when I close my eyes? Weird. Embarrassing. Outcast. 

What memories flood in? Being left out. Laughed at. Called “too much.” Masking myself for years to be liked, until I lost track of who I really was.

I wish I could say those feelings felt like they were behind me. They didn’t. They felt present. 

They weren’t even what I would have named if you asked me what was going on inside, yet once I put pen to paper, there they were.

Here’s what I’m learning: 

My reactions don’t define me—my response to God does. The old story may still echo, but it’s no longer in control of me. 

“The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe” (Proverbs 29:25). 

I’ve lived tangled in that snare, but the Gospel keeps reorienting me. 

My worth is not earned; it’s bestowed. I’m not maintained by performance; I’m held by love. Jesus isn’t asking me to curate a persona—He’s inviting me to abide. “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love” (John 15:9). 

Remaining is different from performing. It is presence.

So, when the old accusations rise, I’m practicing different responses. 

When shame hisses, “You’re weird, you don’t belong,” I answer with Psalm 139: I am fearfully and wonderfully made. 

When the critic sneers, “You’re not enough,” I lean into Isaiah 43: He has redeemed me and called me by name; I am His. 

When anxiety whispers, “You’ll never get this right,” I remember 2 Corinthians 12: His grace is sufficient. 

And when I spiral, trying to control how I’m perceived, I return to the question: whose approval am I after right now? “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God?” (Galatians 1:10).

This is where perspective holds power. 

These struggles aren’t proof I’m failing; they’re proof God is still forming me. They are invitations into deeper healing, where He is unlearning me from the fear of man and reorienting me toward the fear of the Lord—the steady, freeing awareness that His voice matters most.

Sanctification is slow. 

It’s honest, like Romans 7: “I do not do the good I want to do… this I keep on doing,” and hopeful, like Philippians 1: “He who began a good work in you will carry it to completion.” 

It looks like ordinary obedience: pausing before I react, breathing, and whispering, “Lord, I want Your way here.” Choosing truth over trend. Presence over performance. Walking by the lamp at my feet, not demanding a spotlight on the whole road, just enough light for the next faithful step.

I still feel the pull to mask. I still care more than I want to about what people think. But those feelings are no longer my master. The chains of approval are loosening. 

The gap between knowing and living is narrowing—not because I’ve learned how to perform better, but because I’m learning how to surrender sooner. 

I’m not auditioning anymore. I’m abiding.

Here’s where I land today: I will not forfeit what God is forming in me to keep others comfortable, including myself. I will not conform for the sake of optics. I will choose what is holy over what is trendy. I will feel awkward sometimes and still be anointed. I will write words that feel too honest and trust that honesty is the doorway God uses to set captives free, starting with me.

Maybe you feel those same echoes, too. Maybe shame tells you you’re too much or not enough. But those voices don’t define you. Heaven already has.

The world may call us weird, awkward, or too much. Heaven calls us children. And that is enough.

With love,Godly girl