Becoming Confident

I am far from arrogant.. far from cocky, but I feel everyone should exercise confidence. I will explain why as this post unfolds. However, at 35 years old, I realized, I exercised confidence in nothing I have done.

I learned that I was only confident in two categories, school, and for a long time, my body. I know that may sound weird, but I began this blog to be honest.

To learn how to be confident, God led me to the root of why I was insecure. Could he have just given me the confidence I was asking for? Of course, but I believe part of this process was giving me a full understanding of what I really needed to pray against and heal from. The deep root of insecurity began with perversion and rejection. I must warn you; this is very transparent.

ChildHood

I was around 6 or 7 living in the Bronx with my mother and stepfather. My mother allowed me to maintain a relationship with my real father, who had since remarried and had other children of his own. My father asked me to live with him in Virginia, and I was excited to go. I listened to my mother cry in the apartment building hallway when she decided she would allow me to go. It was a true sob from her core, a sound I will never forget and of course I didn’t understand then, but as a mother, I understand now.

Living with my father changed me in so many ways. My stepbrother and stepsister (my stepmother’s children), unbeknownst to one another, took turns raping and molesting me. For me, it wasn’t just the physical, it was much more mentally destructive than I knew. I would wake up from my sleep and feel something being done to me that I didn’t understand and when he was done, I was able to peel the semen that he left from my thighs. I didn’t even know what to do with it. My stepsister made me perform acts for her, to her. She would beat me up and steal my clothes as a child, I was too afraid and intimidated to do anything outside of what she asked me to do. Where was my father? He was an “on the road” truck driver for Perdue.

For the sake of time, I will say I did make it back to New York. My mother came and took me back while my father was on the road, but it didn’t stop. Later, my mother did admit to me, that I was a different child. That spirit of perversion sat with me, so much so, that it continued to call in new ways to attack me. I continued to be raped and molested until I was 16 years old, by whoever was brave enough to do it. My aunt’s husband, my stepfather’s best friend… The list dragged on, but then I got saved at 16. I was baptized with the holy spirit and had even been given the gift of intercessory prayer. Of course, the enemy didn’t want that! So, he sent what he knew worked, in the form of my mother’s brother, who raped me in my own bedroom as everyone slept. I remember crying out to God that night, but I felt nothing, so came anger and more rejection. I decided that it would be the last time another man took something from me without my permission.

College

By the time my first year of college began, I learned the art of seduction and became something like a siren. I was confident in my body, because by this time, I just knew that’s all men wanted from me anyway. I knew my looks and my body worked, not my awesome and charming personality. Not one man asked me what my middle name was, a date, not even what I liked before they mentioned my body or made some sexual reference, so I gave it to them in the way it benefited me. Perversion invited confusion. Confusion had me really believing I was doing something better for myself, that I was protecting myself, but also seeking what I needed from men in the form of validation, attention, and love.

Relationships/ADulthood

By the time I was an adult and a mother, I was told by my real father that he never wanted me and that it was too late for us to ever have a relationship. Rejection. My stepfather favorited my sister and treated her blatantly different in some ways than how I was treated. Rejection. He admitted later that he was angry with me from something I had done as a very little girl, which I will not tell because there’s too much confusion associated with the story, but I will say, if his version of the story is true, he did have a reason to feel upset with me, but if the story I told was true… but still, rejection. My stepfather and I began to have physical altercations at the age of 14. How do I know love from men at this point? Abuse, perversion, and rejection.

It reflected in my relationships. I loved physically abusive men, attempting to change them to love me better but also satisfied in knowing that they loved me. I could tell because they abused me and rejected me. The devil doesn’t like covenant. He doesn’t want relationships to work, not with families, marriages, or friendships. I had none. Nothing in my life worked and it was so chaotic.

insecurity and Confusion

“If you get nothing else from this story, remember this… Insecurity is a symptom of fear and rejection. Rejection makes you feel like you’re not good enough. Confusion is a symptom of perversion.“

I had never experienced the fullness of healthy relationships. My favorite person was actually my sister, more than I had ever expressed but I rejected her, because that’s what I was used to. I began to think, it can’t be everyone else, it has to be me. I didn’t understand. What’s wrong with me? God wouldn’t even help me, rescue me, or love me. Rejection. I was nice, loyal, forgiving, loving, and a giver. What is wrong with me? The enemy was on a mission to destroy me.

If you get nothing else from this story, remember this… Insecurity is a symptom of fear and rejection. Rejection makes you feel like you’re not good enough. Confusion is a symptom of perversion. There is no clarity and right of mind in perversion and that’s not just a sexual intent. Perversion is anything that alters a person or a thing from its original intent and that breeds confusion. I had 35 years of rejection and perversion to pray against and heal from. I didn’t know myself, my voice, God’s voice. I didn’t know what I was even put here to do because I was so far away from my original intent.

Confident in God’s Voice

The bible says seek first the kingdom of heaven and everything else will be added to it. The bible provides us with instructions on not just how to live, but how to live unbothered! This doesn’t mean that problems will not come, but we are supposed to love and trust God enough to be confident that he will handle it. HE GOT YOU! I didn’t believe that at first, because where was he when I was being raped before I even understood what sex was. Where was he when those men were trying to kill me? There’s a difference between the enemy trying to destroy you, the results of your own choices, and God’s hand in growing you. Most of my childhood was the result of generational curses/patterns and the results of decisions my parents made. Soon it was the decisions I made. I look back and realized God saved my life quite often and drew me in and I rejected him because I thought he rejected me.

I had to learn the true intentions of God and who he is. I began this journey listening to people say they were in love with God, and it hit me, that I knew I feared God, but I don’t know if I’m in love with him. I know him, but I don’t KNOW him, but I wanted to. I decided to read the bible to get to know how he thought of me, what he liked and disliked, and what he loved. Yes, the bible tells you all of this. I wanted to learn to trust him to lead me. I’ve tried it on my own for so long and it didn’t work.

But again, let’s be honest. I would listen to people in the church say, if you want to make sure God is talking to you, you can find it in the bible. He’s not going to tell you something that goes against his word, which is very true. HOWEVER, the bible doesn’t guide you in where to go, you have to develop a relationship with God to know how he deals with you! If God tells me to build something, write something, go somewhere, help someone, not do something, not go here, not to be in a relationship… etc etc. I have to know how he talks to me. I was so lost! I want to know that if he tells me to go right and not left, that I know for sure that it’s him and not myself. God uses my gift of discernment. It’s a deep gut feeling in my stomach, a feeling, that something just isn’t right or that something actually is. Most times I can’t explain it, I’ll just know, but always, in some way, God would give me a confirmation, whether it be through someone else, or the Bible. I would pray and God would confirm that he answered my prayer or that someone needed exactly what I prayed for because I would come out of prayer questioning whether or not I was actually being used. I would question simple things like how to use holy oil or going to school for two degrees at once. Some people didn’t understand what I was doing or why and sometimes I didn’t either. Revelation: God gave me a purpose for me. Just like he gave one to you. Why should I have to understand your purpose? That’s not my business, that’s the father’s business and your spouse if you have one.

I became confident by understanding these things:

1. Who God is, his love and intent for me
2. The difference between the natural and the spiritual and the affects that each have to one another
3. That I am one of a kind, who God has equipped with gifts, skills, and knowledge and although I may not know now how each of them will be used, if I seek him first, he will guide me in how to use them for his glory when he sees fit
4. How God talks and deals with me
5. If I seek him first, he will add everything else, and withhold no good thing from me.

Confidence in God gives me confidence in myself. Confidence in God is key. You can’t be insecure and be about your father’s business, because when he tells you to go, you must go. When he gave tasks to people in the Bible, Moses, Joshua, Noah, Abraham… shoot, everybody… they didn’t ask around for confirmation. Noah looked crazy building a boat. Moses looked crazy marching into Pharoah’s house making demands. People like, “bro what are you talking about right now?” They didn’t ask for clarity or permission. They were at least confident in knowing they heard God’s voice! Then they were obedient and being led by God, they were confident in themselves because God gave them everything they needed to complete the task. God gave Moses the gift of leadership and Noah the gift of carpentry. I’m pretty sure there’s more, but Noah didn’t say God I don’t know how to use no hammer! True, Moses was scared and insecure at first. He went back and forth with God about his skills and what to say. Moses had a question for everything! What if they ask me this? What if they don’t believe me? But I stutter? How can I talk? In my opinion, I think God got irritated with Moses, but how many of us actually pull a Moses? God says something and it’s like, but wait, what if? How? What does this mean? What am I supposed to do? It’s insecurity. It’s fear. Developing confidence is key in knowing that if God said it, it’s done! He already gave you what you needed or else he wouldn’t have told you. I just don’t believe with all the things God has to do he’s about wasting his breath to say something that doesn’t need to be said but he does love us enough to offer reassurance, patience, and guidance as he did with Moses.

Understanding the spiritual gave me what to pray against. The enemy doesn’t stop. We are in a war whether we like it or not! I was 6 or 7 years old. The devil doesn’t care about your children and how old they are. I still have days where I am unsure, but I am not insecure. I was unsure whether God gave me this task to start this website, but I knew God gave me the gift to write. I was scared of what people would read, the judgement, the feelings I may hurt and being vulnerable. I was afraid of the rejection, so much so that before I posted this, I was so nervous I was about to cry. I called people to ask for acceptance and to help me see it through, but they didn’t answer. Which I will yell at my sister for later, because how dare she be too busy to answer the phone. (kidding) One other person who has been helping me in this journey. How dare he, LOL. But God continually puts me in a position where I am forced to be confident in him. Earth is the devil’s playground, so I know this is not going to appeal to everyone. People will twist and turn and make things bad, but I can’t worry about that. I have to be confident in God and who he intends this to be for and above all, I have to be obedient. He will work out the rest.