I sat down to write something completely different with this week's Five Minute Friday word but had a light-bulb moment as I read the definition of 'enough' in the dictionary. This is something I want to mine out but will see if I can come up with something in five minutes (and it will be less than five minutes because it's one of those days with constant interruptions and the only way to have a full thought is to hide in the bathroom to buy time to breathe and pray for a spirit of patience and love to make it through today)!
Merriam Webster defines 'enough' as "in or to a degree or quantity that satisfies or that is sufficient or necessary for satisfaction; fully, quite; in a tolerable degree."
Wait a minute?! That's it???? 'Enough' is enough? It's satisfactory? It still meets and satisfies needs? It is still full and tolerable? How can that be enough? And then that's when I decided to look up the word "perfect".
Merriam Webster defines 'perfect' as "being entirely without fault or defect; satisfying all requirements; corresponding to an ideal standard or abstract concept; of an extreme kind." And 'perfection' is "an exemplification of supreme excellence; an unsurpassable degree of accuracy or excellence."
Being enough and perfection have always been my two goals in life. But the older I get, the more exhausting these goals become...there is more to life than constantly striving in everything. The older I get, I discover that I can spend all day perfecting a project, a song, a writing composition or academic essay, an accounting ledger, a home, but in the end, it doesn't give me the connection, friendship, and love I desire. Instead it exhausts, isolates, and keeps me striving for more. It's a never ending, never satisfying quest that leaves me always coming up short.
How much pressure do I heap on myself when I try to be perfect, to satisfy all of the requirements that people (even people I don't know) throw my way, to be the ideal standard and perfect godly example, and to aim for that unsurpassable degree of accuracy or excellence in order to prove I am enough? Better yet, how much pressure and weight can I lift off my shoulders if I realize that I am
already enough, that I am satisfactory, that I already possess character traits, talents, and skills that allow me to meet and satisfy the needs of those most important to me, that I am tolerable to others, and that I am sufficient as I am??
Being enough means embracing both the good and the bad. Perfection means embracing only the good and hiding the bad no matter the personal cost. Enough means reveling in the highs and enduring the lows in life. Perfection means overachieving in ways that demonstrate strength and competence yet doing whatever necessary to mitigate any sign of flaw or weakness. Enough is where life becomes doable whereas perfection is where life remains unattainable. Enough allows for freedom to grow and blossom while perfection continues to enslave and exhaust any sign of life. Enough creates room for rest, relaxation, and refreshment while perfection thrives on busyness, demand, and stress.
The challenge comes in restructuring my thought processes and to see that maybe enough truly is enough...that I can be content with being enough over striving for perfection. I'm in a season of life where I do not have the emotional and physical capacity to keep up with all the striving that perfection requires. And while it feels like I'm missing out on being all that I can be and I'm afraid that I'm going to lose my edge (or skills or talents), there is an undercurrent of relief that I can just rest for now, that I can simply be enough and know that it is enough!
Five Minute Friday (#FMFparty) gives writers a word prompt. We are encouraged to write whatever comes to mind about that word in just five minutes (although, I usually go longer bcs FMF helps fuel that spark in me to write). No editing, no perfection, only writing from the heart. To find out more, visit http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/. This week's word is "ENOUGH".
This is one more weekend where the words won't come as I stare at the FMF word prompt. I have a million thoughts running through my head yet when I put them together, they are too personal or too raw to put down on paper. Life transitions, changing relationships, new seasons, new lessons or old lessons relearned, unfamiliarity, familiarity, feeling trapped, feeling free, scared, excited, happy, unsure, beauty, disaster, life, death ... nothing is the same in my life as it was five months ago. In some ways, getting uprooted from where we were was a blessing in disguise for it opened the door for me to take steps I wouldn't have taken otherwise. However, in getting uprooted, it means there was a leaving behind--leaving behind friends, ministries, dreams, habits, etc. It's not easy leaving behind and it's not easy choosing to move forward at times. I miss the security of the familiar but am starting to enjoy the adventure and surprises found in the unfamiliar. It is in the unfamiliar where freedom is being found, where old patterns no longer work and require something new, where moments of courage resurrect hopes and dreams, where love enters longing spaces, where sweet moments nurture, and where darkness turns into day revealing something more yet to be explored. 
