Comparison is the Thief of Joy

I saw this word art on Pinterest a while back and it struck a nerve at the time. I struggle to remember that there is only one of me, and to quote Martha Graham, "There is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. 

The world will not have it."

When I read the pinned quote, my mind jumped immediately to how many ways I consider myself not good enough. But while in the car driving home from the grocery store this morning, I realized that it works the other way as well. To compare what I have to what others do not have, to wrestle constantly with why I was not born into a life of poverty, has the great potential to steal the joy of my many blessings.

I asked the Lord the other morning why I'm so richly blessed. The answer I got back was, "I've blessed you so you can be a blessing." And so I try to start each day asking Him to show me how I can be a blessing to others.

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Well, good grief. I hit publish on the last post, and then looked at my list of blog posts. This one has been sitting in draft mode since November 2012. Y'all. That's just sad. So I'm getting out of my own way, stopping the blocking my own expression, and the world will have it. Who knows how I was going to continue on with what I had started to say. But the first three paragraphs feel important, so here you go. :)