There’s a part of me that isn’t ready to write this because it’s not perfect.
I wanted to be ready. I hoped to have my website up and my LinkedIn perfected before I showed the world I was on my way to becoming a Catholic Mindset Coach. Ready to launch myself into the next phase – of my career, of my family life, of everything. I wanted to be an expert and prepared in every way before taking this step.
I tend to be like that with things. I like to be ready, prepared, and then I take the leap of faith. The irony of that isn’t lost on me.
“If I’m ready for it, then where’s the leap?”
But oh! How lovingly the Lord shows us His way, especially when it involves the minor task of deconstructing life-long ways of thinking.
Let me back up a little bit here… My journey to coaching has been an inevitable one. My natural gifts and love of people, coupled with a robust youth ministry, mentoring experience and encouragement from friends has been a part of the trajectory that led me here. I figured I would take the Metanoia Catholic’s Catholic Coaching Foundations course, set up a little practice and have a new profession. Easy peasy, right?
Ha! Again, how lovingly God shows us His ways, especially when we think they will be straightforward.
Since signing up for Catholic Coaching Formation in December, the perfectionist in me has been slowly dismantled.
“Whaaaaat? Clare we couldn’t tell you were are perfectionist at all!”
Yeah, yeah, big surprise. Anyhow…
I knew being in the program would cause me to grow and help me refine the rough places in my heart. Little did I expect the way the Lord would gently break me open. Quickly, and with the accuracy of a surgeon, He would lead me to the parts of my heart and mind that He wanted to heal and free.
The starting place was this thought – I have to make myself good enough, then I will be loveable.
This wasn’t an unfamiliar thought. It would come and go, motivating behaviors and stirring up emotions as it did. Like an old college friend who comes to town and takes you to dinner – only dinner turns into drinks, and drinks into shots, and shots somehow turns into matching tattoos. I knew when that thought was around and I often indulged it, which resulted in poor decisions.
Every time I woke up with that “thought hang-over”, my heart would hurt, and I would believe even more that I could never be enough and, thus, wasn’t truly loveable. But how gently and lovingly the Lord shows us His ways.
Through my first coaching session with name drop Megan Mohan, the Lord showed me how much I matter. In just a few journal entries He 1.) reminded me that His plan is amazing, beyond what I could ever imagine, 2.) that I don’t have to be perfect to follow that plan, and 3.) that I am loveable as I am – flaws and all. And it’s only been a month. Sheesh!
It’s funny to think that even if I had it all together before I set out on this next phase that even then it would be so flawed because I am imperfect. It would be a continuation of the lie that I need to be perfect to do anything good. I would unknowingly (but not really unknowingly, let’s be honest) affirm the prideful thought that held me back from a deeper relationship with and reliance on the Lord.
When this is published, I might not have a website or even actually be ready to coach. And that’s ok. Because it doesn’t need to be perfect, it just needs to be His.
What a freedom it is to write those words and know that this place of woundedness is being transformed into a deeper reliance on the Grace and strength of Jesus.
Philippians 4:12-13
“I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation… I can do all this through Him who gives me strength.”
