I’m convinced that God, who began this good work in you, will carry it through to completion – Phil 1:6

Confidence… thrives on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection and on unselfish performance. Without them it cannot live.
– Franklin D. Roosevelt

So many of us believe who we have been created to be just isn’t good enough. I know the feeling, I understand it fully. I have had it most of my life – I still struggle with it in some areas of my living, which is why I am always aware! I want to be the BEST I can be. I want to reach my highest potential for happiness. I want to be who God created me to be and do what I was created to accomplish!

Someone recently told me that they ‘liked my confidence’. That it gave them ‘hope.’ Somehow it kinda hit me weird, I immediately heard the old voices telling me I was ‘talking too much’, ‘I just wanted attention’, that I was ‘vain’ – I felt like maybe I was being ‘too much’ and I felt myself pull back and not speak as much as I wanted to.

So, of course, I have thought it over for the past few weeks and processed the comment, why I felt that way and, I gotta tell you, the more I ’roll around’ in her comment – the more I am really liking it! Ha! I want people to have hope, I want to be the instrument of hope and peace! My confidence comes from the faithfulness, healing and miracles, which I have experienced over a difficult and broken life! It is not about self confidence – it is Christ-confidence!

I know this is much, much bigger than me! I have confidence because I have discovered the truth of the unconditional love of God! I am beloved, you are beloved! Every soul on earth has this vast value and this beloved status!!!!! Wooo hoooo! Now that’s something important to share!!!!!!!

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won’t feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.     Maryann Williamson – Used by Nelson Mandela in his 1994 inaugural Speech

http://songsfromthevalley.com/April-10-3.7-Beauty.pdf