Brain Slapped

Have you ever been watching a movie where a character is freaking out so some one decides to slap some sense into them? I mean, really, (although we have all wanted to) who has the guts to actually do that? But this is not my point. My point is that the reaction of the person who is slapped is unbelievable! 

After being struck in the face they proclaim

"Oh! Thank you! I really needed that." 

Seriously? 

Until this week I thought it was ridiculous. Impossible.

Don't worry, I didn't get slapped and I sure haven't slapped anybody (yet). I did, however, have that incredible reaction to a slap in the brain.

 Al Willard, the wisest, kindest, most ancient man I know waltzed into our workplace this week and exclaimed "Here we have the daughters of God! Can there be anything more exquisite in all creation?!"

That was it. For real. That's all. That's all it took. My head was spinning. 

I nearly made my customary smirk to my darling co-worker as if to say

"Don't old men say the sweetest things?"

But I couldn't. He wasn't being cute or charming. He had challenged my logic to the nth degree.

Tonella (the said darling co-worker) and I had just been lamenting over something related to female beauty maintenance, diving further into the sickening ideal of beauty in our culture before literally drowning ourselves in the question of WHEN and HOW long would it take us to believe the truth about ourselves. Tonella is really smart so we can have these labyrinth conversations without missing a beat at our job:)

I wanted to internally argue with his compliment but all the pestering things I didn't like about myself, physically or whatever couldn't stand a chance against those words. Because they are TRUE.

I can't imagine anything or anyone who could be more amazing, more gorgeous than the daughter of a god.

How much more the daughter of THE God.

So there it was, all my life experience and emotional wounds were up against Al Willard's simple comment.

All my freaking baggage, false and failing mindsets about beauty and identity were running scared in the wake of his innocent sentence.

I was brain slapped. 

And I really liked it.

Thank you Al....

And God.

Song of Solomon 4:7