God Is …

Hi! My name is Mycky (Mycole, if you’d like, but Mycky to most). I’m the oldest of three, which makes me a natural born leader, encourager, but most of all – a perfectionist. Unfortunately, that perfectionism spilled over into my relationship with Christ. It warped the way I saw myself, viewed God’s love for me, and saw other people. Perfectionism suffocated the innocence and purity out of my relationship with God. It had to be perfect, it had to be done right, I was to make no mistakes… or so I thought.
I was no stranger to the person of Christ, but I had no idea who He truly was. I had a relationship with Him through the experiences of others. My relationship with Christ was the equivalent of the relationship you would have with a distant cousin; I knew of Him, I had feelings of love towards Him, met him, but I didn’t know Him.
I remember just a few weeks before leaving for college I was in the middle of my devotion time and I prayed this simple, but ever so sincere and real prayer,
“God, I want you to stretch me during this next phase of my life. I want to grow into all you want me to be; I want to truly know you. So whatever you have to do to make that happen? Do it.”
…… Listen to me, and listen to me well – be careful what you pray for! I’ve found it to be true for myself that God is very literal and you have to be VERY specific when you talk to Him. I was stretched, to the point that I felt that I would break. I grew in ways that were unimaginable. I actually got a chance to meet this man named Jesus, that I’d heard about my entire life. I met Him in a way that was sometimes uncomfortable, but was very real.
So, here’s my story, here’s what I learned. I hope that in some way my story and journey helps you through yours.

Always,
Mycky

Lesson Number One:
God is Peace
The weeks leading up to me leaving to begin college were very emotional, for lots of different reasons.
Reason 1: I was home schooled and very sheltered growing up. I didn’t really know what life was outside of the five of us (the five of us being my family). My life revolved around them. Everything I did, every decision I made, was based off of my family; and as beautiful as that is/was, it was also very dangerous. I had no sense of who Mycky was a part from her “klan”. I didn’t know a single thing about myself and I became uncomfortably aware of that in the weeks leading up to my departure.
Reason 2: I was a baby. Literally. I was only 17 years old and I was headed to college. All throughout high school this idea of graduating early seemed so cool! I was going to be an “adult” in the “real world”. All I’d ever wanted to be was a grown up – and the quicker I could get there, the better, or so I thought.
But as the weeks turned to days and my departure date moved closer, the very thing I thought I wanted the most, became the very thing made me feel very unprepared. I hadn’t lived life, I wasn’t as experienced as everyone else, how was I going to fit in? Not only was I only 17, I was 17 years old and I was entering college as a second semester sophomore; meaning that at the end of my “freshman” year, I would be a college junior. There were no freshmen in my classes, no one that was “like” me. Everyone that I saw had seemingly found their place on campus and their set of friends to call their own. However, I was still searching for mine.
Reason 3: I knew things were about to change and I couldn’t decipher if it was for the best or not. I was having second thoughts about picking a school out of state. Where I was going was outside of my comfort zone and I didn’t know what to expect when I stepped out. Would people from my church forget me? Would my family continue practicing our traditions without me? Would my room still be there when I came to visit? Would home still be and feel like home? When people asked me where I lived, would I say my home state or the new state? All of these questions and more ran through my head and they began to scare the breath out of me.
All of my worries and fears added up to and found root in one simple thing: I felt inadequate. I felt far from good enough. I was battling with the fear of failure, the fear of the unknown and the fear of losing control. This new chapter was completely blank and it was up to ME to fill the pages of it. What if I messed up, or didn’t complete this chapter as well as the last one?
Graduating from high school as valedictorian set the bar pretty high for all of my future accomplishments. It warranted comments seeping with high expectations, like:
“You know you can’t get anything less than magnum cum laude, right?”
“Girl, you know you have to keep all A’s in college.”
“Oh you’re super smart; college won’t be a struggle for you.”
But what if it was? What if I wasn’t prepared for this? I was so excited for this new chapter, but at the same time? I was equally as afraid of it.
Needless to say, those weeks were filled with worry, doubt, anxiety, excitement, anticipation, sadness and fear. But I learned that a bolus of prayer, fasting, and worship would diminish all of these emotions. It was the only thing I found that kept me from being overtaken by my emotions.