There’s this Secret Guilt going around that we’re imposters waiting to be caught, and some day we’ll catch up to an awesome version of ourselves.
It’s a desperate hope that we’ll eventually do what we’re preaching with our mouths and our blogs. But—the finality of settling into our own skin never arrives. We chase a future phantom of “got-it-together” that is always out of reach.
I remember a famous pastor who deleted his entire backlog of podcasts from his first years of preaching. He “no longer agreed” with those old messages. I thought it was pretty humble. But I also thought, “What about those people who heard his old messages? What if they followed through on that stuff? Are they screwed? And ten years from now, will he delete his stuff from today?”
Every artist I’ve met says their first drawing, song, poem, novel, or choreo was no good. They’re hard on their first creations. But: Don’t we all have our trial runs before moving onto greatness? Don’t we all have growing pains? Is there no room for mistakes? And what about those people who enjoyed our very first creations? Did we fool them?
I’ve heard so many say, “I was so empty when I made that thing.” Or, “I didn’t even deserve to teach that thing on marriage, my own marriage was failing.” Or, “I wasn’t even following my own advice.” We are hard on our past selves. We bank a lot on the future. Mostly no one ever thinks they’re good enough to do what they’re doing right now.
That’s the secret. We’re all gliding along, just barely, on the little we know today.
Most of us, I’ve found, are busted up vessels making the best of what we have with our three lb. brains. We’re winging it. We’re in media res. We aim for the good, however that looks at the time, with the most knowledge we have in that moment. If I knew then what I know now—the only thing I know now is there’s still more to know.
We need a bit of grace for our past selves. They tried.
God knows, I’m still learning, still discovering, still finding my way through the mess of it all.
— J.S.
