The Grown Woman's Guide to Online Dating: 5 Days of Finding God's Goodness in Datingنموونە

We might fear that our fiery opinions are too much for a man to handle. (Even if we’re obviously right.) Or we worry our gaggle of children—or the one child who feels like a gaggle—makes us undateable. Or we fear that our unique medical needs make us less attractive. Or that our emotional wounds are still healing. We fear that we are too much, and a voice named “you’re-too-much” confirms our suspicion.

But what’s particularly wily is that there’s another gal badgering us who is friends with “you’re-too-much.” And her name is, “you’re-not-enough.”

When we’re lying awake in bed at night, she whispers that whatever we wrote in our dating profile isn’t enough. 

Or she intimates that in that first awkward phone conversation we won’t be witty enough. Or she suggests that when he sees us in person he’ll decide that our bodies aren’t fit enough.

Like her catty friend “you’re-too-much,” she’s a real bully.

Am I right?

The whole double-edged lie of enoughness—that we are simultaneously “too much” and “not enough”—is sticky and twisty and tangly. And more than a little evil.

And while these deceptive gals are nothing if not persistent, we actually don’t have to be bossed around by them. When we notice those voices, we can replace them with what is more true: “I am, and I am becoming, exactly who God made me to be.”

Beloved, you are not too much. I know this because, despite whatever you are carrying, you are, in every moment, altogether worth loving. And you are also not not-enough. I know this for the same reason. Despite whatever you fear you are lacking, there’s nothing that can make you unlovable. Because these twin bullies are so bossy, you might have to put them in their place a few times. But I promise you, truth is on your side. . . .

Though it can be tempting to disguise or minimalize or inflate or mute who you really are, don’t do it, precious one.

Be.

Who.

You.

Really.

Are.