Giving Grace to the Perfectionist

We all have those things that we feel like we are in a constant battle with, and some days that battle is just brought to the light. Today was one of those days my friends, and for me, that "thing" I have to battle with is my perfectionism. Let me set the scene for you: I just finished my last day of my internship & was out shopping for apartment decorations with my best friend. We are both wired as perfectionists, and so when we stumbled across the "live by grace, not perfection" sign, it instantly was put in the shopping cart. That sign opened up a conversation about our feelings for the upcoming school year. As I am so excited for many things that come with this school year, a heaviness sits in my chest. The heaviness is that battle between God's grace & my strive for perfection.

Grace: undeserved love, freely given. The first word I memorized when learning more about God and the word I struggle with most in my life. If you don't know me, hi! My name is Emily and I am a self proclaimed workaholic/perfectionist, and I am really, really hard on myself. Every time God invites me to bring something I am struggling with to the foot of His cross, I bring the same thing just to pick it back up a few seconds/minutes/hours/days later.

The upcoming school year feels: Being wired as a perfectionist, beginnings are hard for me. I know I am not good with transitions & that is because I want to cling so tightly to the striving of being the best at everything. And here's a little slap in the face - no one is the best at the beginning of a journey - because that is God's time to work. In these seasons of transitions & beginnings God pushes me out of my comfort zone of perfect to stretch me & grow me to look more like the woman He designed me to be.

So you're probably wondering what happened after the adorable "grace not perfection" sign was bought, right? A break down at the dinner table happened. Yup. The kind that sneaks up out of nowhere when school is mentioned and it’s hard to explain the "why". Slowly but surely my grace-filled parents peeled back layer by layer my "why". I was so focused on the pressures that tested my perfectionism that I was completely skipping over the grace & joy that God gives when we step out of our comfort zones. The school year I was solely looking at from a lens of pressures took a 180 flip to now seeing all the goodness packed in the busyness of the days to come.


Here's some of the thing God has taught me through this grace walk:
- God doesn't want my perfect, He wants my heart & my commitment to growing with Him.
- All I should want is to live in relationship with the ever-perfect Jesus, a relationship that is already oozing with grace, a relationship that asks for nothing and still gives undeserved love.
- When I strive for perfection, I am giving my all powerful, Almighty God a pretty lowly throne in my life.
- When I strive for perfection, not only does my relationship with my grace-filled God suffer, my relationship with myself and others suffers as well. I cannot thrive if He is not at the center of my intentions.
- If I live within the arms of grace, that is where true growth happens.
- Grace, God's perfect love, casts out fear. When I am afraid of letting someone down/afraid of failure, I am pushing away God's grace and giving the enemy a victory.
- The devil is sneaky. He knows how God wired us and will twist those very things from good attributes (hard worker) to our kryptonite (perfectionism) if we aren't careful.


Verses to rest in that just ooze with GRACE & TRUTH:
- "'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest in me." (2 Corinthians 12:9)
- "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)
- "But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, 'God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.'" (James 4:6)
- "But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace." (Romans 11:6)

The walk I am on from perfectionism to grace-filled living is far from over - I know that for sure. But I also know that my God is a persistent God. He will never stop chasing me down & throwing grace my way every time I stray from His truths. I pray that this post can help & comfort those who have a hard time accepting God's perfect grace. I pray that as I walk from striving for perfection to living by grace I can be honest & boast in my weaknesses, for his grace is sufficient for me (& you too :)).