I may not remember the first time I ever saw pornography, but it’s image and impact will forever be emblazened in my memory. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t any older than 7 or 8, and even though it wasn’t anything more that “just a Playboy” (and I use that term loosely and sarcastically), I’ve come to realize that it’s one of the two greatest influences that led me down the life path I would eventually travel.
Although I was completely innocent to it and didn’t understand what it was in the least, it became a recurring theme in my life. Pornography began popping up in places that we, as parents, hope it will never rear it’s ugly head. At 9, I remember my snickering neighbor sneaking me out to the garage where her father had hundreds of magazines piled upon eachother. The things I saw in those magazine I would have no understanding of until I hit my twenties … I think that says more than enough. It later became a thorn in my emotional side with the men I dated, and eventually, I saw how this poison would impact the marriages of couples we knew so well.
This distortion of reality, this desensitizing of couples, this destroyer of trust, this cheapening of God’s expression of intimacy and love has become a fixture in my psyche, my heart, and my life. This reoccurring theme is one where I have had to painfully turn back the pages and reflect on what it has done, how it helped shape me, and how it’s impacted my self perceptions so much. Embedding itself in my heart and mind for more than thirty years, I chose to believe the world’s lie over God’s truth for my life … The truth that could set me free.
No matter where I turned as a little girl, the world was telling me how I should look, what I wanted to be like, and the type of woman that, eventually, would be worthy of love. The subtle (and not-so-subtle) sexualization of the world arond me was not at all lost on this little girl. With every passing year, I saw everything I was not growing into, I became increasingly aware that my physique was not lining up with that of the accepted and contemporary standard of beauty … And it was killing me.
When little girls grow up having no solid, affirmed sense of just how wonderful, amazing, unique, gifted, lovable, and special they are apart from their physical beauty, they have no other frame of reference by which to gauge their worth. When little girls don’t understand that they were created with a purpose and plan by a loving God, they have no other choice but to begin seeing themselves through the eyes of a world that has little other perspective or interest in them than the aesthetic … This is a road frought with heinous lies that sets them up for grave and tragic disappointment. This is a place of painful dwelling for one day, every little girl grows up realizing that there is always going to be someone more beautiful than they are. Someone’s chest is always bigger, someone’s always younger, and (in my case) everyone’s always thinnner. The chase for that which is so fleeting and destructible is the most empty chase a woman can ever embark upon. I know because I either lived in the heat of the pursuit or in denial of it for most of my life. Money gets spent, things get broken, and external beauty always fades.
The heavy influence that a distorted and unGodly view of physical beauty has had on my heart and life has been the single greatest negative influence on my life. It helped shape almost every opinion, perception, thought, or choice I was to have or make in regards to myself. It created a world where I could not peacefully dwell within myself because of the intense self-loathing that already existed there.
And so now, I sit here picking it apart, thought by thought, memory by memory, year by year, lie by lie. I am in perpetual surgery, allowing my God to dig out the cancer which needs to go in order for me to really live fully free in Him.
My existence has since been eternally altered by a loving, graceful, compassionate, patient, forgiving God … He’s patiently bringing the dross to the surface, gradually working out all of the impurities, slowly purging me of that which cannot coexist with His truth, graciously waiting while I hold up the whole process by clinging onto that which I so desperately long to let go and be rid of.
He is the amazing Healer.
He is the Messenger of truth.
He is the Doorway to real freedom.
He is the Giver of life.
He is the Everything I need.
It’s these things I have a firm grip on these days and despite the uphill climb it’s turning out to be, I’m gonna keep walking. I have no other choice … I want to be where He is, I want everything He has for me, and I long passionately for the wholeness He’s promised to restore me to.
One of the biggest realizations I had was in finally getting that I was teachable and that I don’t get all of that Truth right away … He teaches me and, if I’m willing to learn, I grow and change. It doesn’t happen overnight and it takes intentional, deliberate practice and discipline, but it can happen. There is great relief, as well as joy, in this for me.
What about you? What do you need to unlearn?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpNaEzX7W9E
