One of the things Jesus has been doing in my heart during my time so far in missions is reminding me of how conversion is continuous and radical. There is still plenty of work God wants to do on my heart. I am a far cry from perfect and need plenty more transforming before I am the saintly woman I want to be. Jesus keeps bringing up little ways I can allow Him to transform me again and again. One way was by cutting my hair this week.
Not unlike most women I know, I have always struggled a little bit with body image issues. I know for sure that women’s beauty is a topic horribly twisted by Satan, perfectionism, and comparison. All women are beautiful! All types of bodies are beautiful! My body is beautiful! Duh! I know that God has a very different plan for how we should view beauty and I have given many talks about it on retreats and to young women I care about. Still, my heart sometimes forgets my own beauty and Jesus is always there to remind me. I got another gentle reminder from Jesus this week that I want to share with you.
Last week, an elderly friend of mine named Doña Marciana was (and still is) very sick. I visited her day and night at her house before she was moved to a hospital in another town. I brought her family food daily, and as they cooked and ate I held Doña Marciana in my arms while I brushed her hair, rubbed lotion on her tiny body, sang to her, and wiped her tears away when she was in pain. This was a very formative and beautiful privilege for me as a missionary. It’s a story I would love to tell you another time. Anyway, I was thinking about and praying for her the other day as I was riding an exercise bike at the gym here in town. The gym is new and the owners just recently put in a bunch of mirrors on the walls so that we can watch ourselves and work on our form as we exercise. I had experienced this before at other gyms, but for some reason that day it made me very uncomfortable. To be honest, I wasn’t satisfied with what I saw in the mirror. My mind wandered from my prayers for Doña Marciana and I began to think about my body and how I wished it were a little bit smaller. A thought came to my mind that I would be happier if I were slightly thinner and more physically fit. That thought was ridiculously untrue, but the next one was even more shocking. I seriously had a thought that I would be a better missionary if I was thinner. Also ridiculously untrue and illogical. I tried to talk myself out of those thoughts, knowing how ridiculous they were. I recognized in that moment the thoughts were not of the Lord and ultimately came from my desire to be beautiful. I reminded myself of my beauty and tried to see it in the mirror. I was sweaty from our long work out and tired from a long day of ministries. My eyes, trying to avoiding thinking about my body shape, floated to my clothes first. I had stains on my shirt from coffee and was wearing shorts over leggings with old tennis shoes. I didn’t see my beauty reflected in my wardrobe, so my eyes shifted to my hair. I really love my hair when it is long, and since I cut it shorter last winter I have been waiting for my hair to be long enough to put in a long beautiful pony-tail or to rock a casual french braid. In the mirror I could see that my hair was almost there but still needed a month or two to have the length I like best. My eyes went from my stomach to my hair and I had another ridiculous thought. I thought “well, I don’t have the perfect body, but at least I still have the hope of having long hair.” This thought briefly satisfied me and I almost believed for a second that in a month or two I would have the perfect hair length and all the time spent exercising would give me the body I always wanted. I pictured a future me with hair past my shoulders and a smaller frame. I took a little breath to look at my watch and get out of my head and I asked Jesus to fill my thoughts with the truth, with His truth.
“Jesus, that’s crazy, right? I know being a little bit thinner with long hair has nothing to do with the joy you give me. It’s all lies. Right?” He filled my mind with an image of me holding Doña Marciana in her bed. I remembered the nights I recently stayed awake with her while her family slept in their tiny house, their roof leaking from the rain and the bathroom outside in the cold. The image in my head of her house snapped me out of my mindset. I was being so selfish! A couple of blocks away was a woman on her deathbed in a one room house, and here I was, thinking about what I look like. Just days before, Doña Marciana’s daughter had prayed in thanksgiving to God that her mother had a bed to die in, as some others can’t afford a bed. And here I was, praying to God about how he can help me look different to feed the twisted desires I have about beauty and what type of a woman I want to be. In that moment I remembered again the woman I actually want to be. I don’t want to be a woman whose mind wanders to being thinner and having long beautiful hair, I want to be a woman whose mind wanders to thanking God for my bed! I want to be a woman who serves the poor and loves the Lord in all moments....I certainly don’t want to make room in my heart or in my mind for the shallow thoughts I allow myself to have.
My eyes wandered back to myself in the mirror. This time, I saw my missionary cross. I wear it every day to let people know I am a missionary, that I come in the name of Jesus to serve and to help. I wear it every day to remind myself that loving and serving Jesus Christ as a missionary is the most important priority of my life. Jesus is my priority, the poor is my priority...not shallow thoughts and selfish desires.
Jesus reminded me once more that the idea I have of my own sanctity and future are not his ideas. As our Lord reminds us in Isaiah 55:8, “my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.” I sold everything I had to follow Jesus to the ends of the earth and serve His beloved people. I am here to serve, to love, to die to myself. I am here to focus on the Body of Christ in the people around me, not my own body and what its imperfections are. Why was it so easy for me to forget that? Why is it so easy for us to be distracted from who we know the Lord is calling us to be? Wanting to be in shape is not a bad thing. Exercise is great and I will continue to train both my body and mind to seek Jesus through discipline. I am so beautiful, I know this! Jesus continues to teach me this and remind me of my own beauty. These were just little thoughts I was having on a Thursday. Even so, our little thoughts and little temptations can remind us of just how far away we are from Christ and just how much we need to transform our lives. Actually, they remind us of just how much HE wants to transform our lives. We just need to let Him.
Once I realized how ridiculous my mindset was (one of my many small defeats as a full-time missionary), I wanted to make a resolution to grow and to be transformed by Jesus. I knew that I would not let these thoughts distract me from His mission. I remembered a quote I read awhile ago by Saint Jose Maria Escriva. It says “To defend his purity, Saint Francis of Assisi rolled in the snow, Saint Benedict threw himself into a thorn bush, and Saint Bernard plunged into an icy pond... You - what have you done?” I also remembered Saint Peter, who boldly asked to be crucified upside down when he was being martyred since he did not think he was worthy enough to be crucified in the same manner as Jesus. He had such bravery to do this as He was boldly proclaiming Christ to others. Saint Peter and Saint Jose Maria Escriva’s quote have always inspired me to be more bold for Christ, and I wanted to do something bold to defend the purity of my own mind.
I knew rolling in snow or jumping into a thorn bush would probably not purify me of my vanity, so I asked Jesus what He wanted me to do, and I felt His peace and Love as I heard Him ask me to cut my hair for Him. I realized that the hope for having long beautiful hair had become a hope for a beauty I was putting too much thought into. Jesus calls me to place all my hope in Him. Without the hope of my hair, I could place more hope in His beauty instead of focusing on my own. I thought it was a great idea, so I went home and cut my hair into a kind of lopsided, obviously unprofessional pixie cut, (with our kitchen scissors and the help of my teammates who tried to fix it after.)
We are not always called by Jesus to do intense things such as jumping into freezing cold water or being a martyr and requesting to be crucified upside down. Sometimes, he really does call us to those things and we should pray for the graces to respond to His call with bravery. Other times, he calls us to really look at ourselves in the mirror and make important changes that will help us become saints.
What do you see when you look in the mirror? Do you see your physical imperfections or even your delightful God-given features? Do you see a missionary? Do you see a saint? Maybe you love the way you look all the time (good job, pray for me and the rest of us who struggle with that from time to time). If you do, what are those little thoughts and temptations that distract you from Jesus and His Will for your life? We all have them.
Every time I look in the mirror now, I see an uneven hair cut I would never dream of getting (especially giving to myself). It is shorter than it has been since I was a very little girl, I don’t necessarily love it, and I already miss having a pony tail. I’m sure the shock of having a pixie cut will wear off soon, but I know Jesus will continue to use this to call me closer and closer to His very heart. My new hair-do is a constant reminder to myself to get rid of all things that do not lead me to Christ. As Jesus said in Matthew 5:30, “if your right eye causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away.” Well, the same applies with hair, right? So, I cut it off and threw it away. I cut my hair, but by doing this I also cut away some of my vanity and some of my selfishness. Jesus wants to fill us with positve and beautiful thoughts. To let Him, we need to get rid of some negativity and some of the lies we believe about ourselves. Remember, we are all missionaries. We are here to serve and to love others, not ourselves. Jesus continues to teach me that here in Mexico, and I pray He will continue to do so.
If Jesus called you to do something small for Him, would you?
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