A broken crayon still colors beautifully. Beautifully broken is where God does His best work.

I don’t want to speak for the rest of you – but social media has been a complete mindf*ck for me. I compare ev-a-ry-thing in my life to what I see on social media platforms – and not intentionally, by the way.

1) I am genuinely (honestly genuinely) happy for people doing well in life. You do you, boo and you keep it up! Hear me when I say this – their success/happiness/wholeness – it does not/could not/will not take anything away from you or somehow negatively impact you. There is enough for everyone!

2) While I am not necessarily wanting what I see (you do you & go on girl!), it does always leave me questioning “What am I doing wrong that my life isn’t as fill-in-the-blank?”

I am of the Gen X/Millenial era (shout out early 80’s babes!) so I know what it’s like to live without everything being public consumption (and also heavily filtered or manufactured). When I was growing up, the extent of my knowledge of someone was either witnessed firsthand or what my mama heard in line at the grocery store.

I am introducing social media to this topic of brokenness because I honestly never felt as broken or lacking as I did once “influencers” became a “thing”. Having filtered & manufactured lives constantly being praised and highlighted has given us all unrealistic expectations and has raised the bar even higher on how critically we judge ourselves and our shortcomings.

This is all to say that I honestly don’t think anyone has it all figured out or living their perfect life. That is INTENTIONALLY reserved for our heavenly eternity (also yes please, I cannot wait!). I think people are finally getting tired of the manufactured perfection and I love seeing this new trend of realness – but the damage has been done for most of us and it’s going to take a while to retrain our brains to be happy being just the way we are – beautifully broken.

Our lives are not meant to be filtered, fake, and scripted – life is messy, painful, and full of flaws. God never promised us a life without trials & tribulations, he simply promised to be with us through them all!

In the meantime – can we rejoice in our experiences and our differences, please?! Stop chasing that pursuit of perfection that will never be met.

This idea of a crayon doing its job and working beautifully even when it’s broken – I think that can resonate with us all (I know it sure does to me!). The crayon produces color & beauty even when it’s been torn or tattered, it’s split in two, and the labeling has worn off. Look, I don’t have children but I have tons of great kids in my world and they can completely obliterate a crayon box. It’s quite impressive really. Like why did you start shaving pieces off and then break it into 3 parts and then dunk it in your milk? And yet – the walls can still be ruined by that horrifically disfigured shade of purple.

Dramatic, perhaps – but you get my point. After all the damage, it still gives beautiful colors!

And now that you’ve envisioned a broken crayon still doing its job … now think of yourself as the artist. A stubby crayon will do just fine, but you know you’ll be able to get the most out of it if you sharpen it or mold it into a shape that you believe will produce the most amount of beauty. That is where God comes in.

We are all capable of creating beauty, EVEN while broken.

But … if you allow God to mold you into what He knows will create the most perfect art – why would you not?! Personally, I want there to be a purpose for all this pain I carry. I want to give all of my “brokenness” to God and have him transform it into beauty, because, let’s face it – he is the only one that can!

Hence this blog! And my Instagram (clearly I don’t love social media). But I know, I KNOW, that I was not given this trauma to just sit around and wallow in my emotional pain forever. God did not give me this to drown me. I believe I was meant to be reshaped – and here I am!

Your flaws do not make you undesirable. Your scars do not make you damaged. Your loss does not make you empty!

Beautifully broken is where God does his best work – will you let him work?

My prayer for you today is that you recognize that your life is never going to be without challenges, ugliness & pain. But… you can also recognize that nothing in your life – even the bad stuff – needs to be wasted. Everything can be used for the glory of God. And if you give it to him, I guarantee he’ll take that mess of yours and turn it into a beauty you could never have imagined. He’s that good – he’s that God.

XO

Tay