Hello, Beauty Full by Elisa Morgan

Author:Elisa Morgan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 2017-03-31T16:00:00+00:00

Brain

I finished the interview, and my host wrapped the segment with a heartfelt plea for prayer and provided a phone number for viewers to call. Done. I had felt God spread his offering through the message he had guided me to share in this television taping. It was a good moment.

When I returned to the green room to gather my purse and head out, a staffer stopped me and sheepishly asked if he could record a side bit for the web. Just a few easy questions, he promised.

Well, sure, I thought. I was used to putting my desires in neutral when it came to ministry. When I was booked for an engagement, I had learned to flex my schedule and plans to God’s leading and the needs of the venue I served.

I sat in front of the microphone, and my host fired off the question, “Can you name the twelve disciples?” It was a game-show kind of moment, and like many contestants I’ve seen botch their slots, I went blank. To be honest, even if I had been prepared, I’m not sure I would have known the names of the twelve disciples without opening the Bible. I mumbled something like, “Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.” Oh wait—those were the Gospel writers. Were they all among the Twelve? I sputtered, “And Judas. And then there was Paul. And Nathanael.” Where had that anointing gone? I felt so duh . . .

It surely wasn’t the first time. So many of my efforts have been offered with a wince—would I be “found out” this time? In my finals in graduate school, I’d been asked to explain a book of the Bible—a teeny tiny book in the Old Testament. That I’d never read. Oh my.

Today I still doubt the adequacy of my brain. Such a stigma has been nicknamed imposter syndrome—the phenomenon where, despite evidence of competence, we’re convinced we’re frauds and don’t deserve the success we’ve achieved.26 Oh, I’m whip-smart when it comes to emotional intelligence. I can intuit a feeling or mood or need before I even enter a room. And my mind for movie trivia is stupidly smart. (Wait—isn’t that an oxymoron? Oh dear, there’s the word moron!) But whatever I know that I know is eclipsed by what I’m afraid I don’t know or have forgotten now that I’m older.

My husband gets mad at me when I talk (write) this way. He knows I’m smart and wants to stomp on such diminishing self-think like he would a cockroach in Texas. A lot of women downplay their intelligence like this.

Not every woman struggles with intelligence, to be sure. Some women cling to their mortarboards like life preservers, trusting degrees, titles, and publications to define their identities. One of my cohorts in ministry confesses, “I have the need to be the smart girl. And often it does bring affirmation. But who I am is so much bigger and more significant than that—when I look inside and realize it.”

The thing is, women are smart.

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