Hola readers!

I use to look into the mirror and touch my reflection. My face newly washed, my acne scars visible without makeup. I didn't like the scars. They reminded me of being a little kid..and that my acne is still very real. My eyes are big, and I no longer hide them behind glasses. Not all the time anyway. Now I wear contacts. But not today. My lips were chapped, my nose shiny, my forehead bumpy, and my eyebrows bushy. I touch my reflection, my hand on the cold glass.
Who am I?
Am I who my reflection tells me I am?
I use to study myself like this often. When I was younger I would get so close I was almost kissing my reflection, silently criticizing the girl in the mirror. She was broken, she was covered in zits and scars, her eyebrows too big, her eyes...well they were Ok.
I was my own worst enemy. My only criticizer in the bathroom. But the Kara of the mirror...the one I saw myself the harder I stared...that's not who I am.

Who am I?

When I was about nine years old, I visited the small town near my grandparents house where I use to live. The girl I was best friends with at the time attended the same VBS I was, and my grandma made sure we were assigned the same group so we could hang out.
I remember standing at the craft table. She was across from me. I don't know what we were making, but I can still see her with her red hair falling over her eyes. She could wear makeup far before I could, and it showed.
She was popular with the boys, she was all smiles, she made everyone feel special...she was kinda my idol. I wanted to be just like her, ooze with such confidence for life.
But I knew I was so far from that. I was under confident, judgmental, and I thought too much about what people thought about me.
I remember her looking at me and then at our leader over the group and saying, "you know, Kara is such an angel. Look at her smile. She's an angel from God."
Me.
An angel?
She couldn't see the inside, the darkness, the questions, the doubt.
I was nothing like her.
Her words stuck with me. They didn't seem possible.
Who am I?
I'm not the angel my former bestie called me. Oh, angel I am not. When I look in the mirror I don't see an angel.

I'm not perfect. I'm not heaven. I've been called the darker side of Christianity.
Oh, I'm far from perfect.
Who am I?
I look in the mirror now. That Kara...she doesn't matter. The zits and scars and greasy hair.
My outside means nothing. Those imperfections are life, are realistic, are me.
And my outside is a shell.
My inside, that's what lasts.
One night God whispered words of honey to me, "your outside doesn't matter. I know your heart - that's everything."

My body is just a house for my soul, a temple for my Lord...it doesn't matter if I'm covered in scars, if I choose to not wear makeup, if my glasses hide my eyes.
It doesn't matter what I see. What I see doesn't matter.
It's what God sees that matters. That's where everything counts. He calls me beloved. He calls me enough. He calls me complete. He calls me loved. He calls me precious. He calls me wiped clean.
And that is enough.

Who am I?

Physically, in this imperfect world, I'm still trying to figure that out. I still can't quite figure out my style. I don't have a certain type of TV show I like. I read all kinds of books. I have a quick changing mind. Sometimes I think I want a tattoo...other times I never want one.
Who am I?
That question can take me so many places.
I'm the emotional girl. I'm the girl who got baptized when she was nine. I'm the girl who watches old sit coms, who's first celebrity crush was Richard Armitage, who wears converse with dresses, and who really hates public speaking...but feels called to it.
I'm the girl who questions every move she makes. She's terrified of planes but is flying for the first time Sunday. I'm the girl who was proudly home schooled, a PK, a girl with chipped fingernail polish and brown eyes that can get so wide Ricky Ricardo's got nothing on.
And I'm the girl who...
is a child of God.

And that's where it really counts.
When I live that fact out. When soak in that. When that becomes my life. When I look int the mirror and that's all that matters.
That's who I am.
That's who I am deep down.
And that's all that matters.