Day 23 - Identity Part 1 To Yourself Be True

Every day is an opportunity to begin again and have a new beginning. The past has gone and laid before us are hundreds if not thousands of new choices. However, before we can make the decision as to which of these are right for us, we need to be able to answer two key questions; Who am I and Why am I here?

Without knowing who we are, it is a little bit like being a pineapple who mourns because she hasn’t got a smooth yellow skin but only a gnarly, puckered outer casing. We begin to regret who we have been made to be because we envy and even pine for a skin like a banana.

God has made us as fruit for the world. It is no good regretting being a melon because we have always wanted to be an orange. No amount of regrets or tantrums or dreaming will change us into something we can never be. Instead, we are asked to believe that all fruits have their own unique taste and texture and that God loves each equally or he wouldn’t have taken the time and loving care to design them and then bring them into being.

So, in order to truly be the best ‘me’ I can be, I need to know, accept and love myself as I am. Instead of looking at the gnarly exterior, the pineapple needs to celebrate that within her is one of the most gorgeous of tastes that many will enjoy. However, not everyone will like pineapples. For even when you are delicious, there will be one or two who refuse to like you. You can then try and twist and manipulate yourself into something and someone who will please them. However, even should you, by some miracle, be able to transform yourself from a pineapple into a pear, you can bet your bottom dollar that you will then discover a completely new group of people who don’t like pears.

So, the first lesson to learn is not only how to be yourself, but how to celebrate every part of yourself, even the gnarly external outside. For although the pineapple’s outside might not be as appealing as an oranges, it has probably been made that way to protect the delicious parts inside them.

So never regret any part of who or how God made you. Rejoice that in you he has expressed a little something of all he holds dear to him. The world might not see the fruit and juice within and dismiss you because your external beauty doesn’t catch their eye. But remember, the Lord knows and sees the internal beauty in each of us, even when we can’t as yet see it for ourselves.

The only one who we should care about enjoying our fruit is the one who made and created us as we are and who asks us to be the best possible us we can be.

If you had to describe yourself as a fruit, which fruit would you be and why?

Do you envy others and wish to be like them? If so who do you envy and why? Which characteristics do you wish you had and which do you wish you didn’t have?

How can you begin to accept the parts of you that are gnarly and instead celebrate all of who you are? Can you see how those parts of you might be protecting something of great worth within?