Day 10: Making Peace with God

Today is the last day my blog is hosting the experiences of 10 different women through the BYU Women's Services and Resources Recapturing Beauty campaign. Go here or here to read more about the 10-day challenge, and enjoy the last post in this series.

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Day 10 is written by Caroline Bickley. Caroline Bickley is a friend who I met in high school and got close to through AP English. Caroline is a junior from Gilbert, AZ attending the University of Arizona in Tucson and studying English with a double minor in Education and Creative Writing. She's a member of Kappa Alpha Theta, and she loves Harry Potter, the Office, and lattes. 

            Hello hello Kylie’s blog! It is such an honor to be finishing up this wonderful 10 day challenge particularly with this topic.

            I’m going to be honest with you guys, my relationship with God has more ups and downs than a roller coaster. Now, this has nothing to do with my faith. Ever since about 8 years ago my faith has been my rock and been the very thing that keeps me steady. But in my opinion I think that my faith and my relationship with God are two different things. They coincide, yes. But they are indeed different.

            Anyways, the point of the whole philosophical sermon you just had the pleasure of reading is so I could say this: when Kylie sent out the list of challenges we could choose from I saw this one and jumped on it. At that point my relationship with God was rainbows and butterflies great. But as per usual, within the next few weeks I had another dip and by the time it came time for me to do the Making Peace with God challenge…..I’m gonna be honest with you guys again.....it was literally the very last thing that I wanted to do.

            I was mad, I mean like practically furious with God. Like if I listed all the reasons why we’d be here until next Christmas. I had a lot of contempt built up in my heart. But because of this challenge I knew that I couldn’t put it off and I knew that I needed to be proactive in finding a way to heal this problem…and boy, did I ever.

            At a camp I worked at this past summer I discovered this video. I had watched it once or twice and thought, “Alright, that’s a cool message.” So in my attempt at being proactive I decided to watch it again, and I am so glad I did. When she spoke the words ,“You tell me everything, You tell me about ME” I had to pause the video, grab my laptop and write this because I finally knew what I was going to say:

            You. Yes, YOU, in this very moment reading, scrolling, and staring at this screen are the single most awesome, precious, and fiercely beautiful person to have ever existed. You are marvelous just simply by being. And do you know how? Because you are KNOWN. And I mean really and truly and fascinatingly KNOWN by your God. He loves every single thing about you. Even the things that you don’t love. He loves you for the insecurities you face, He loves you through the pain you put yourself through, He loves you for the workouts you complete and the one’s that you skip, and He ESPECIALLY loves you during the times that you think you hate Him. He loves you, because he KNOWS you. Knows every single thing about you. And the best part about all of this is that He doesn’t love you despite everything He knows about you. He loves you because of everything he knows about you. And how Earth-movingly awesome is that?

            I watch this video pretty much every morning and I can honestly say my relationship with God is changed because of it. Now I’m sure there will come a time in the future, whether it be in a year or it be in the next 2 minutes, that my relationship with Him with go through another rough patch. Only this time I’ll remember that I am loved by God, because I am known.

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And that's a wrap! Thank you so much for everyone who read this series over the past 10 days, the 9 beautiful women who wrote about their experiences, and Ashleigh at BYU Women's Services and Resources for helping me make this happen. You all made my vision come true, and I can't wait to do it all over again next year. You are all beautiful!

If you're here in Provo and you completed the challenge, come on over to the Wilk Garden Court tomorrow night from 6-7pm for our closing ceremonies and Bollywood dance lessons! You can also pick up your free Beautiful t-shirt seen here each day for completing the challenge. I'd love to see you and meet you guys there, so come say hi and introduce yourselves!

If you're also blogging about the Body Image Challenge, we want to see it! Add your post below and link back to this one so we can all share this experience together!