I’ve been told countless times, “You make your life look so easy. You seem to have everything under control. How do you do it?”
Newsflash … I have NOTHING under control.
Who really does, anyway? Aren’t we all just faking it until we make it? Aren’t we all stepping out the house with a smile on our face and a determined sense of confidence that ensures that we, IN FACT, have everything under control? Meanwhile, our cars look like the dump, laundry piled for days, dirty dishes hidden in bathtubs when company comes over, our kids eating cereal for dinner, and us going to bed forgetting to shower. I mean really, I could go on for days.
But let’s be real here … no one actually has it together.
Thanks to Facebook, we get to only post what we want people to see. Our perfect little family holiday portraits, the awesome vacation we just went on, the job promotion we just landed, how in love we are with our significant others, how smart our kids are, etc. All of this SEEMS like we have everything under control.
False. Couldn’t be more false.
Nobody’s perfect. No one has it together. No one has everything under control. Before you compare your life to another’s through looking at their seemingly perfect Facebook or Instagram page, or even just watching them skate through life so effortlessly – think again. The truth is, the more perfect their life SEEMS to be, it just so happens it’s probably the opposite. The image of their perfection is more important to sustain due to their LACK of having everything under control. It’s a show, a performance, and it looks like a perfectly wrapped package.
I know this to be true because I am guilty of putting on the show. If you actually walked with me through my day-to-day routines, you’d be aware of how “together” I’ve really got it. You’d catch a glimpse of me yelling at my daughter to hurry up in the mornings, feeding her a Poptart on the way to school, not even brushing her hair some mornings, spilling coffee on my shirt walking into work, telling my students, “don’t ask me another question” because I’m exhausted from previously answering ten million questions, coming home to plop on the couch, scroll Facebook, Instagram, do it again, clean up the glitter my daughter just spilled ALL OVER THE PLACE, cook (yes, cook) a frozen pizza, getting asked to go do something fun but respond with “no thanks” because I’m too tired, shower, and go to bed without touching a dirty dish or putting anything back in its place. And as I’m going to bed I question my profession, my path, my purpose, I look at my bank account wondering how I’ll make ends meet, and ask myself “what am I doing with my life?”
THAT is real life. THAT is how much I have everything under control.
But I know I’m not alone in this. I know there are countless adults who are failing at this whole adult thing but trying desperately to “put on the show.” There are days when things FEEL under control and together and everything is in place. But more times than not, I’m living a complete mess of a life. The thing to take away that it’s okay to not have a perfect life, and more importantly, it’s okay that others know your life isn’t perfect, either.
I love when people like to call themselves control freaks, as if they have to have everything under control. Please. You will never have everything under control no matter how hard you try. Only the Utmost Highest Heavenly Father has everything under control and we need to all chill out, let go, and accept the fact that life is messy and there’s no need to pretend. Everything always works out, everything always falls into place the way it is supposed to. No need to put on a show. We’re all in this together and how comforting it is to know that this whole fake facade we see through social media is just that – fake news!
