Threatened

There are different ways in which we can feel threatened. It could cause us to sink into ourselves, question our faith, question the very reason we do what we do. To feel threatened means that the way in which we live our lives is being attacked. The attack hurts, and with most people makes trying impossible.

Change can feel like a threat. Confidence is in the eye of the beholder, and we are our own worst enemy. Think of the job setting in which a new person is hired on to learn how to do a job that another person has and has had for years. The new person wasn’t hired to replace the senior person but rather take on some of the workload and yet the senior person still feels threatened. The confidence is shaken, the self esteem is rocked, and there isn’t a need for it to happen. We tend to think we aren’t good enough if the company had to hire on others, we couldn’t make the cut, we fell behind in our tasks when it really isn’t so.

Our kids can threaten us to loose our minds. Teenagers take what’s left of our sanity, faith, thoughts, and everything else and dance on it like their favorite song came on and it’s on repeat. As a momma with two teenagers I have been blindsided so many times I don’t know which way is up. As I talk with other parents of teens I know that I am not alone in the struggle to keep going every day. Teenagers are threatened daily as they willingly go onto social media, and are told what they should look like, think like and act like. This isn’t so much a soapbox but a sad realization that there are no more secrets in this world. If someone messes up the whole school knows about it in no time flat, because of social media. As parents we try to raise our kids to use their brains, be polite, believe in the good and in God and we feel like we have succeeded until the teenage years hit and it is all thrown back into our faces. Here lies the feeling of being threatened.

The last thing we should do is back down when these types of threats occur. We need to know our worth, we need to know our kid’s worth. We need to know that the people around us have worth. We need to fight the assumed threat with a counter attack. When we tell ourselves that we are not cutting it, that we are lacking, we need to change our thoughts. We need to replace with encouraging words, thoughts and actions. We feel better when we do for others so why not do it for ourselves? That builds the confidence back up and quiets the threat.

We need to fight for our kids, fight for them on our knees in prayer. When they decide to do something out of the norm we talk with them, fight for them, and be there for them. Society will tell them how to be a certain way, but families can still teach them to think for themselves. It is not easy because they will still make choices that you don’t want them to make but if they know they are supported and loved the threat will be quieted.

I admit there were recent time in which it was rough for me as a momma. The decisions that were made and then voiced to me hurt my heart and made me want to turn and hide. There were tears shed but there were also prayers lifted. To the world the decisions wouldn’t be seen as huge but for me they were. All I can do is love, pray and support my kids. That’s all any of us can do for ourselves for each other, and for our kids. There is power in believing that love conquers all. With love comes joy. I hurt but my joy runs deep. There is my strength. I can love my family and the people around me because of it. Until next time:

Oh honey,

Don’t worry about being merely beautiful. Be bold. Be wild. Be strong. Be confident.

Be independent & intelligent. Be fierce. Be brave enough to be real in this fake world.

Redefine beauty.

Brooke Hampton