“I AM ENOUGH. PERIOD” reads the sticky note on my bathroom mirror. It’s there for a number of reasons. To fight imposter syndrome. To remind me Who made me and Whose I am. To take off some of the pressure (that I put on myself.) To let go of questions that are not mine to answer, and being content to live in that space of “now and not yet.” And most of all, to remember what one of my mentors says, “God don’t make no junk.”

Maybe you face those questions, too. Or you live with doubts so big they shout. As I have been re-learning in this season, not one of us are perfect. Releasing that self-expectation frees me up to try new things, work on new skills, and live with the criticism of others.

None of this work is automatic. None of it is easy. It seems to me that resting in my successes and failures brings its own kind of peace. In the quiet, I can feel waves of peace flowing over me. And then “knit happens” and I am back to struggling and losing confidence.

Even in these ebbs and flows of being nestled in a holy peace, I am learning so much. First, that I can live in and out of the flow of peace. It comes in pieces. I’m cushioned and resting in peace like limo’s smooth ride, then I’m bumping along like a beat up jalopy on an ungraded dirt road. (Ever ridden in an old farm truck? Then you know what I mean!)

There’s another reason why I like this photo so much. It puts the focus on the internal message, not the person. It reminds me that God’s peace is a gift, not something to be earned. I am enough, just as I am, to receive the Spirit’s peace. Period. Since we live in a contractual sort of society, there is an emphasis on do more, be more, buy more, own more. It is exhausting (emotionally, mentally, financially). Stopping the cycling of want, want, want and resting in the enough, enough, enough is countercultural. But it is also inner peace-making.

I am Enough. Blessed be.