I am enough from denise ullem

03 May I am enough from denise ullem

I am enough.

Surely I came into this world knowing this, yet somehow, I sloughed off this belief layer by layer. And replaced it with hard-edged, cruel fillers:

I am ugly.

I am dumb.

I am inarticulate.

I am certainly not enough.

The hows and whys of this deflating departure are sometimes sweeping, other times subtle. Influential people in my life believed in me; influential people in my life disappointed me. My life, like all lives before and since, rolled out with joys, deflations, cosmic wins and devastating losses. I cannot laser in on one target or declare one person, or event, the cause.

But I do know this: like an off-kilter mathematician, I formulated and adapted to a defined “perfect” (no mistakes, no guffaws, no doubts, no fears, no tears) and whenever I did not measure up, I was less-than.  This belittling, incestuous formulary, when permutated across years and decades, produced a sum worth way less than its actual value.  I became jaded and grayed. Small. Depressed.

I held, white-knuckled, to these beliefs.

But then…

when I understood that perhaps these beliefs were, well, a bit limiting, the rebirth of my truest knowledge of myself returned. I invested in myself. I learned to listen to the quiet, sometimes ardent, advice of my soul. I redefined perfect (messy; up and down; gritty; evolving; learning). I enlisted the help of seasoned, realistic travelers. I slowly, and then rapidly, jettisoned those caustic beliefs and returned to my earliest truth: I am enough. Perfect as is. I heard it clearly, like a beacon through the mist: I am enough.

My enoughness, when permeated across all my idiosyncrasies and talents, includes every angle, every bit—a very well-rounded formula of me:

Surly me.

Depressed me.

Mom me.

Wife me.

Friend me.

Elated me.

Mistake me.

Writer me.

Grateful me.

Practicing me.

Noticing me.

Creative me.

Authentic and true. I am enough. And I always was. And always will be. Enough.

………..

About Denise Ullem

Denise Ullem is a writer, a mother, a wife, a friend. She looks forward to an upcoming publication of an essay in Parents Magazine. She writes at www.musingsdemommy.blogspot.com where she delves into the universal grit of life, her challenges, sacred bits of joy and her journey to this moment. Where, even when (especially when) sitting on the inky edges of a long day, or month, she tried to remember that She Is Enough.