Despite being a culture that says lying is bad, we sure do it a lot. We lie so many times. We lie to our friends. We lie to our families. We lie to ourselves. If any of those is true, it is the last one. I’ll say it again. We lie to ourselves. How many lies do we tell to ourselves on a daily basis? I have shared with you some of the quotes on the Depressing Quotes section on my Quotes board on Pinterest, but if you didn’t read that post, here are a few.
“Actions always prove why words mean nothing.”
“Nothing hurts more than trying your absolute best and still not being good enough.”
“’I’ll always be here for you’ they said… Then they left.”
“I give up. It’s not because I don’t love you, but it’s because I’m tired of getting hurt and feels like you’ll never care.”
“I think I’m afraid to be happy because when I do get too happy, something bad always happens.”
These are quotes that I would read every time that I was in a bad mood. I filled my head with these thoughts and actually began to believe them. I told myself over and over that these things were true, and as a result, I would fall into dark places that no one knew about. It wasn’t just me reading these thoughts. I was also writing them. There are many entries in my journal that are just as self-deprecating as the quotes in my Pinterest board.
I felt like crap day after day. For lack of a better term, I was depressed (non-clinically). I was going through the daily struggle of debating my worth, and guess what. I was lying to myself. I was telling myself horrible things, and I was making it into my reality. I was accepting these lies as truth. That is not truth. These are things that the devil wants us to tell ourselves to draw us away from God. I was making my emotions and insecurities the ruler of my life.
There gets to be a point where you have had enough of it, and you finally decide to go to God. How do you stop lying to yourself? Well, the first thing you have to do is to figure out that you are lying to yourself. We need to take a lie detector test, but no ordinary lie detector test. We use the Lie Detector Test which is God. Is it something that God would tell you about yourself? “No? Well, it is a lie! It is as simple as that.” Okay, so practically, it is a little more complicated, but there are many ways to help figure that out.
One way is to be… vulnerable (gasp). Yes, being vulnerable is hard. No one is less qualified than me to tell you to be vulnerable, but let someone into your life. Write down the thoughts you tell yourself and give it to them. As someone who is not you and wants the best for you, they will definitely tell you in what ways that you are lying to yourself. I did this once, and it was terrifying. I was about to take the paper and throw it away before they saw it, but I was too late. They set me straight on the ways that I was simply filling my head with all sorts of horrible things. Guess what! He dispelled those rumors. Did I believe it at first? No, but he loved me and reminded me of the truth.
What is the truth? Well, that is the second way to figure out what lies you are telling yourself. Read the Bible. God gave us the Bible for a reason. If what you are telling yourself contradicts the Bible, then it is a lie. The Bible says that I am fearfully and wonderfully made, and anything that I tell myself that is contrary to that is a lie. Anytime that I say that I am not worth someone’s time, I am lying to myself. When I think that I have sinned so much that God is disappointed in me, I have failed to tell myself the truth that He has revealed to us. Stop lying to yourself. I have made progress with this in the past few months since I have stopped journaling daily (causing me not to write down my dark thoughts that occur before I go to bed when I am alone). He is the Great Lie Detector, and we ought to speak His truth to ourselves rather than the lies we find ourselves subject to. Pray for His guidance because we cannot do it on our own.
Word of the Day. Una mentira (lie). We tell a lot of mentiras to ourselves on a consistent basis, but we need to replace those lies with the truth that God gives to us.
Reflect. (1) What are the lies you tell yourself? (2) What causes those lies to get in your head? (3) What have you tried to do to stop those lies? (4) How has that worked for you? (5) What would it look like for you to give it to God?
Verse of the Day. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. [Psalm 139:14]
Gracia Del Rey 