During this past month, I have been stretched in many ways— both beautifully and painfully. For those of you that don’t know me, I am a feeler. At this point, a lot of you are probably asking what on earth is a feeler, so let me give some background and context.
Before going on the World Race, we all have to take the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator; this test is a introspective self-report questionnaire with the purpose of indicating differing psychological preferences in how people perceive the world around them and make decisions (thank you Wikipedia for providing this description LOL.) My Myers-Briggs personality type is ENFJ— to break it down for you, Extraverted, Intuition, Feeling, Judging. (I would suggest looking up the Myers-Briggs if you aren’t familiar with it)
For awhile, I didn‘t really understand what my Myers-Briggs meant except that I identified with the descritive characteristics included in the ENFJ category. To be honest, I have a hard time understanding the importance of these personality tests because I don’t like the idea of being labeled. Simply put, I don‘t like to be categorized.
I struggled with this a lot because for the first month on the race, my entire squad kept talking about personality tests, like the Myers-Briggs and the Enneagram, and it drove me insane because I felt like I was being boxed in. I went to God with this, and asked Him why these personality tests bother me so much.
What he revealed was a punch to the gut— he said, “Julia, the reason you don’t like these personality tests and their defintions is because this is often how you view yourself and your relationships with me and other people. You define yourself, and don‘t give yourself the grace and room to grow.”
When God revealed that to me, I was shocked. But IT MADE SO MUCH SENSE. Throughout my life, I lived in fear that people only saw me as a textbook definition— they couldn’t see room for growth or change in me, but what is crazy, is that is how I viewed myself,
How you see yourself is how you will think others see you.
Literally, my mind was/is blown.
After having this conversation with God, I decided to talk this over with one of my team mates. She told me that I needed to spend time with God asking him who I think I am and asking him to help me believe and know it.
This is what God and I came up with:
Who I am in Christ
- “You are a child of God (John 1:12)”
- “You are empathetic and emotional— you relate well to others.”
- “You are the color YELLOW: bright, joyous, and a beacon of light to those around you.”
- “Encourager!!!”
- “You are romantic”
- “You are a servant of Christ!”
- “You are a beautiful daughter of God!”
- “You are a feeler!”
- “You are charismatic!”
- “A mountain and a gentle breeze”
- “A storyteller”
- “An artist”
These are who I am, and how God sees me. After writing this down, God gave me a vision— a sunflower! Sunflowers are my favorite flower and representation of myself. He says, “you are like a sunflower to me because you grow in the direction of the light— you don‘t question it, you just grow. They are not always in bloom, but they have their seasons, just like you.”
WOW. Talk about growth and about how good God is. I am excited for this journey that life is and to continue to grow. I am emotional and I feel things a lot, but that is OK. It is ok because I have this hope that God will help me steward my gifts well and will always see me as enough and change me. That’s why I love his grace because it is unchanging and always sufficient.
“There is nothing in nature that blooms all year long. So don’t expect yourself to either.”
Love,
Julia
P.S. We made it to Haiti, and it is BEAUTIFUL. I really love this country, and will have a blog post about that coming soon. God bless!
