“The first step towards change is awareness. The second step is acceptance.” - Nathaniel Branden
As far as size goes, it was a small thing. Around the size of my pinkie-fingernail. Yet, I carried it around like a 100 lb sack. For forty-four years, whenever I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror, it was the only thing I saw. Come picture time, I’d run to the back or give a tight-lipped smile. I had allowed that small thing to become an excuse to living a small life.
It started back when I was 10 years old. We were having a fourth of July BBQ with family and before the fireworks started my cousins and I took our bikes out for a spin. They were my older and wiser boy cousins, and I felt honored to be invited along. Seated on my big “banana-seat” bike with 4th of July parade streamers flowing to the sides I rode with pride alongside them . We stopped at the top of the hill in the early twilight glow of that 1970’s summer evening and stared down the steep tree-lined street. Driveways filled with smokey bbq’s and families dotted the route in anticipation of the upcoming light show. Just a few hours before red wagons and tricycles emblazoned in red, white and blue were the center of attention. I never imagined I was about to be in the Half-Time Show.
It started off innocently enough. My two cousins dared me to ride down the hill with eyes-closed-no-hands. Being the youngest AND a girl, I felt the pressure to play along. So, I clenched my eyes shut, held my hands out to the side and started my free-for-all down Racquet Hill Drive. As the 4th of July streamers flapped furiously in the wind, I could hear my cousins laughing and cheering me on. Rattling and rolling, time stood still as I simultaneously picked up speed. My bike had begun to careen wildly out of control when the front tire hit the sand patch.
I don’t remember the crash. I was told it was EPIC.
I do remember the bike brake being extracted from my chin. My four top teeth – knocked out at age 10. A mother’s wisdom, “Don’t do that, you’ll knock your teeth out” – in an instant became solid words of painful truth. I do remember the toothless weeks that followed. The awkward caps on my teeth and the growing cloak of shyness right when middle school was hitting.
I do remember the forty-four years of temporary fixes to my teeth. It wasn’t like I never smiled or lived a sad, ungrateful life, but the awkwardness of my teeth was always in the back of my mind. I allowed it to rob me of seeing the beauty God had placed within me. Many times one of the caps would turn gray or chip and would have to be replaced. With a short term fix in place, I felt safe to smile again. Then a well meaning dentist would make an off the cuff remark about my yellow teeth and I’d go back to a tight lipped smile. Although It was a silent pain, only a few people closest to me even knew. I felt like this pinkie-fingernail small thing was a billboard broadcast to the world. I doubt anyone ever gave it a second thought.
Finally, at age 54 I plunked down the money, and with the help of Dr. Prais and his talented dental team I found my smile that I thought I lost at age 10. While it was an absolutely amazing boost to my confidence and I now smile from ear to ear, I’ve come to realize something quite incredible on the other side of pain.
Dr. Prais may have done a beautiful job of replacing my broken teeth, but he is not the one who gave me my smile back. My smile, my joy and exuberance for this beautiful life was tucked away inside of me the entire time. Without even being aware, I was making continual choices to let that small thing overshadow the presence of God in my life. It wasn’t only the teeth, that was just an outward sign of the inner chaos. There were other hard circumstances that I allowed to loom like a dark shadow cast over the light God intended for my life.
Age 52 marks the year that I put the stake in the ground and determined to start living an intentional, God honoring life. From that point forward, I’ve been taking daily steps to start learning and growing into the woman I was created to be. I have developed a strong sense of AWARENESS of where I stand and where I want to go. Conviction overtook me as I became aware that I had written a story about my life in which I was always the victim. You see it’s not our past that shapes us, it’s how we write the story about the past that shapes our life.
It was time to not rewrite my story, but to honor it with a brand new chapter and an unexpected plot twist. Where the damsel in constant distress makes an emboldened effort to rid her life of the strongholds that once held her down. It was a move to step into a transformed life, towards loving me and this one precious life, broken teeth and all.
Did you know that the origin of the word FREE is love? Consider the incredible IMPACT of this. When we make the effort to peel away all our layers, all our doubts, all our fears, all the things that limit us – we are FREE to love ourselves in spite of it all. It doesn’t stop there. By loving ourselves, we are invited to love the God that created us. We are then able to put all that into POWERFUL ACTION by loving the life we were intended to live – all the way down to the last drop.
Go ahead SMILE BIG, my friends! It’s time to Love YOU and Love LIFE. Are you with me?
