This little ditty by Robert Madu stuck in my brain the moment I heard it:
Facebook, Facebook, tell me how my life should look.
Instagram, Instagram, tell me who I really am.
Because they do.
Except it’s rubbish.
Happy, healthy women showing off happy, healthy families with happy, healthy bank accounts stare back at us as we scroll away in the supermarket checkout lane. It’s not surprising we feel lacking as we compare our anything-but-shiny life to their bright-and-smiling, just-for-the camera lives.
We live in a glossy culture where if it looks glossy it must be glossy.
We are bombarded with glossy perfection a thousand times a day on TV, online, and in magazines where beautifully curated homes with pristine children adorned in neutral tones skip playfully through the forest or read quietly in dappled sunlit tree houses.
No one posts pictures with captions like “This is me fighting with my teenager who I found sneaking out last night” or “This is my cute new bag (where I stash my secret little orange bottle of pills).” And I’ve never seen a selfie with the hashtags #lonely, #depressed, #abused, #unworthy, #ashamed, or #unlovable.
We hope if we present life as perfect, it will be perfect. So we fake it, paralyzed by the thought of anyone knowing the truth.
The world’s image of what abundant life looks and feels like is a myth; it’s smoke and mirrors perpetuated by social media, TV, and movies, and it’s fueled by our own insecurities. “An abundant life is a perfect life” is a myth. “We can create it ourselves if we work hard enough, are good enough, and please God sufficiently until he blesses us” is a myth.
Jesus never said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it more fabulously.”
We compare our everyday imperfect reality with other people’s moments of curated perfection. We make ourselves both creator and curator of our abundant lives, but we’ll never get there, because what we’re trying to create is an illusion.
Then, when tragedy or heartache leaves us gasping for air, we feel disqualified from any kind of abundant life—fake or real—so we miss out.
When life’s difficult, we compare the reality of our broken, painful, right-now life with other people’s perfectly filtered social media posts and end up feeling like lonely failures. We exclude ourselves from the very thing we long to experience so desperately—the full life God has for us.
I’m not a particularly tidy or organized girl, but the one thing I like to compartmentalize is my life. I allocate things—emotions, circumstances, outfits, workouts, you name it—into specific boxes: good, bad, painful, right, wrong, fun, challenging, and even boring. It feels safe to have everything neatly labeled, but I’ve realized that life with God isn’t so black or white. It’s more like an artful mixing of black and white into the most beautiful dove gray.
I’ve felt deep worry and hope in the same moment, held hands with both peace and panic, and danced with one arm around joy and the other around pain. I’ve discovered that opposing emotions can somehow nestle side by side in the palm of my hand.
It’s blown my mind, to be honest.
I don’t understand how, but hooked up to IVs and heading off to surgery I’ve felt comforted and alone all in the same moment. As I waited for pathology results I trusted God fully and yet doubted him deeply.
Don’t ask me how it works (perhaps time travel or a split personality?), but what if it’s God’s abundance fully present even in the middle of a life that’s anything but abundant?
Life isn’t clear-cut after all, and I’ve learned this profoundly simple truth: life doesn’t have to be pain-free to be full.
*****
This is an excerpt from my new book Breathe Again: How to Live Well When Life Falls Apart and I’d love to send you the Intro and 1st Chapter straight to your inbox for FREE.
YES!!! SEND ME THE INTRO & 1ST CHPT!!
Breathe Again is for anyone whose life has fallen apart, either over night or slowly over time. If you need a no nonsense, down-to-earth practical friend who’s been where you are, who’ll help you dig for the rubies buried in the rubble on your life, this is the book for you.
It’s not a quick fix, “how to keep going” kind of book. It’s a road map to finding all God has for you, right in the middle of all life’s thrown at you. Just click the orange button and I’ll send you the first chapter and intro so you can begin to breathe again right this minute.
“When life’s difficult, we compare the reality of our broken, painful, right-now life with other people’s perfectly filtered social media posts and end up feeling like lonely failures. We exclude ourselves from the very thing we long to experience so desperately—the full life God has for us.” I just love this Niki! I can’t wait to read more of your story and I am loving getting to know you through your writing!
Love,
Rebekah Fox, your fellow hope*writer
Hey Rebekah,
Thanks for stopping by. It’s so true isn’t it? How we compare ourselves and our lives and rob ourselves of all God has for us?
Thankfully God isn’t in the comparison game!
Niki, I love what you said about simultaneously experiencing joy and pain. So often when we go through a difficult season we focus on the joy that lies on the other side rather than searching for joy in the midst of our trials. Thank you for reminding us that the two can coexist and that we can live a full, abundant life even when our situation is less than desirable.
Niki,
This is so good and true. Life often throws us curve balls and it seems awkward, uncomfortable, and like we are the only ones who don’t fit in with everyone else’s curated life.
I love hearing your heart and story and knowing I’m not alone even though my battles are different to yours!
We all need one another! Cheering you on!
Joèl Povolni
We really do need one another. As I like to say, thriving is a team sport and no one wins alone!!
Yes to this! Thanks for writing this, Niki! It’s an important message!
So good Niki!! I know my life isn’t perfect and I’m willing to share that on social media. My problem is (like you said) thinking the people I follow have perfect lives. So I get down about myself when I can’t achieve a peaceful, problem-free existence.
It’s a great reminder that we all have things to deal with in life.
We really do all have something! No one gets to skip the tough stuff unfortunately!!
“Maybe it’s God’s abundance fully present even in the middle of a life that’s anything but abundant?”
So so good. How often we need that perspective shift when we feel like everything is crumbling around us. Very excited about this book!
I love this article and your message! Thank you for being so transparent!
“Jesus never said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it more fabulously.””
This line is so important! When I was first diagnosed with a rare disease, I was certain I was being punished. But I’ve since discovered that we were in fact never promised an easy life. I’m not sure where the lie came from, but I’ve certainly found more abundant life accepting the truth that I wasn’t promised an easy life.
It’s so true. We were never promised an easy life.
I heard Lysa Terheurst say it’s because we were originally made perfect and living in perfect world (Eden) that we now crave and long for perfection. That, she says, is why we somehow think life should be easier. Kind of makes sense to me!
As someone who recently sat in my husband’s hospital room for almost a month while the hours and days went by way too slowly, I can relate to the feeling that life felt a bit less than full at that time. I fought hard against those feelings and decided to make a list every day of where God showed up in the middle of my pain. Amazing thing to do. I agree with you, Niki, that “Life isn’t clear-cut after all, and I’ve learned this profoundly simple truth: life doesn’t have to be pain-free to be full” Powerful and truth. Thank you for what you have shared.
Thank you, Niki.
Needed this today.
I can’t tell you how many times I have scrolled facebook with a growing knot of anxiety in my gut. Sometimes it’s not even the content, but it is simply the fact that I can’t seem to stop looking. I feel like I am soaking in all these things to attain to and that my own life right in front of me is passing me by, but yet, I don’t want to miss anything. It is such a trap and feels so good when I take a break from it or set parameters of time when I am going to be on it. I loved this…”We exclude ourselves from the very thing we long to experience so desperately—the full life God has for us.”
That is the very thing I feel…I’m excluding myself from the fullness God has planned for me. It is a tool that I should manage, not a tool that should manage me. Thank you for your honest words, Niki. I like you more and more all the time. 🙂
We really need to know that comparison is not necessary and challenges are sometimes needed so that we trust God more and appreciate the things (living and nonliving) that we have. I can’t wait to finish the book. It’s a must read for everyone. More of God’s grace, Niki.
Yes! There is such profound tension in the life of Faith. I’m with you. There’s beauty in learning to hold this and that with peaceful acceptance. This book is going to settle so many troubled hearts, Niki! Thanks for writing it!
This is so true, Niki. Life is wonderful and horrible, sometimes at the same time. Your honesty—and humor!—are much needed and much appreciated.
I loved the book “Breathe Again”, as a cancer patient it helped me realize to Thrive and not just surviving! Even if your not a cancer patient and life throws lemons at you or maybe rotten eggs this book is not one to be kept on the shelf, but shared and reread.
I have severely limited my time on both Facebook and Instagram because of some of the things you discuss in the article. I don’t have the “perfect” young adult children, and unlike many of my peers, neither are married and no grandchildren yet either. I loved your book.
This book Breathe Again by Niki Hardy.. is raw, authentic, and will hopefully inspire anyone who has faced or is facing, pain, adversity, grief, or loss while at the same time facing life and the choice to live fully in the midst of it all. Thanks Niki Hardy!
I totally can relate to opposite emotions at same time. Trust and doubt. Comforted and alone. Totally get it!! I began a blog years ago titled Glimpses of Faith and Struggles. My goal was to live life full of struggles but have faith in the midst. My prompting was everyone else only shows good things and that’s not reality.
So true, Niki, that the world serves up a life that is one inch deep while Jests offers an altogether different foundation of infinite depth.