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Part I
Isaiah 43:18 and 19 is a passage of great hope:
Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.
How often we miss the new thing that springs up because we can’t get over something from our past. It could be the distant past or what happened five minutes ago, but these things become the mud holes of our lives where we wallow on a daily basis and never find the way in the desert and the streams in the wasteland.
There is certainly a place for long-term, in-depth Christian counseling for people, and I’m fully aware of that great need. In my position as director of women’s ministries at my urban church, I am regularly dealing with women who need lots of help in order to move forward. We offer it in various ministries at our church and I often recommend a Christian counselor who has more education and understanding than I do about some emotional struggles.
But I am convinced that there are still many daily issues all of us face, which don’t really require a lot of advance education or knowledge to deal with successfully. We simply need to get over it.
There are eleven chapters in my book, Get Over It, and each chapter addresses something most of us need to get over.
I want to talk about getting over needing the approval of others, and getting over unrealistic expectations.
I remember early on in my ministry I had spoken at a morning session at a church and was taking a brief break before the afternoon session. Someone then delivered me a note from one of the women, and she was making a suggestion that a certain way I was presenting something was not effective and I should consider doing it differently—or not doing it at all. I can still recall the immediate reaction I had as I read her note: How dare she criticize me? Did she think she could do a better job than I was doing? It wasn’t as easy as it looked. I withered under any criticism of my performance because I so desperately needed approval from others.
That’s one sign of an approval addiction—you resent and reject criticism or even gentle suggestions. Another sign is that you try to solicit approval from others. Some of us can do that rather subtly so that it doesn’t come across as bragging or begging, but secretly we are trying to get someone to affirm what we’ve done or who we are.
It took awhile for me to recognize and come to grips with my approval addiction, but I remember when I began to realize that I was being recognized and remembered for being busy and productive. I started to ask myself, Is that how you really want to be remembered? Do you want your tombstone to read, “Here lies a very busy woman”?
After acknowledging my approval addiction and praying about it, I honestly have come to the place where I almost recoil inwardly when anyone gives me that kind of affirmation. I’m still busy and I don’t know that I’ll ever slow down a great deal. It’s who I am and how God has created me, but the need for others to approve of my abilities to perform has pretty much been replaced by a much better approval addiction—and that is to stand before Jesus at the Judgment Seat for believers and hear him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
Why do we need the approval of others?
Quite honestly, I think we’re all born with the need for approval and we seek it from our earliest years. We all need approval, but how do we become addicted to this need? It often begins in our early years. If your parents withheld approval from you, if they were more focused on punishment and correction than affirmation and approval, this could be a major cause for your approval addiction. If you never received recognition from other authority figures in your life—such as teachers or bosses—even late in life you could have developed an inordinate need for approval.
It’s always helpful to understand the source of our struggles, but using them as excuses does nothing but keep us powerless, in bondage to them. We’re adults now; it’s time to get over it and live free from needing other people to validate us.
How do we get over our need for the approval of others?
Here’s what I think: We don’t! It’s a basic need that’s born in us. Some of us have a greater approval need than others, but we all need approval in order to survive, to thrive, to be motivated and affirmed. What we have to do is to look for approval in the right place! Instead of asking other people to meet our need, and finding that it is never completely satisfactory or never quite enough, we need to live our lives for the approval of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
The Apostle Paul tells us how to do this:
2 Corinthians 5:9-10: So we make it our goal to please him (the Lord), whether we are at home in the body or away from it.
Galatians 1:10: Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.
1 Thessalonians 2:4: We are not trying to please men but God, who tests our hearts. . . We were not looking for praise from men, not from you or anyone else.
Our need for approval has to have a complete makeover. We have to consciously make it our goal to please the Lord and stop trying to please people. That means we have to renew our minds, clean out the old addictions for the approval of people and replace them with a consuming desire to please the Lord.
Choose one or two of the verses I’ve quoted and pray it into your life each morning. For example, your prayer might be:
“Lord, today it is my goal to please you. I want your approval today. I want to live in such a way today that you will be pleased and you will approve. I can only do this through your power in me. So, I pray that my mind and my emotions will be under your control.”
Praying directly from scripture is the most powerful way to pray, and you can be assured that when you pray based on God’s Word, you are praying like you should and God is honored. It will please Him—He will approve!
Well, there’s much more on this topic in Chapter 3 of my book, Get Over It, but that’s a good start at truly getting over an obsessive need for the approval of others.
Now let me talk a bit about getting over our unrealistic expectations. Ask almost any parent what they want for their child, and the answer will usually be some version of “I just want him/her to be happy. Happiness seems to be the gold medal of life for which most people are striving. After all, doesn’t the U.S. Constitution guarantee us the right to be happy?
Well, no, happiness is not guaranteed to us by the Constitution. It says we have the right to pursue happiness. If by happiness you mean the absence of anything unpleasant, and total satisfaction with the circumstances of your life, then for sure no one on this earth has ever achieved continual happiness. It is an unrealistic expectation.
Getting over unrealistic expectations is one of the best gifts you’ll ever give yourself. It will reduce your stress and enhance your joy more than you can imagine, and it will set you free from the bondage of expecting from people and things what they cannot or will not deliver. And the good news is, you have control over your expectation levels.
Undoubtedly our most common unrealistic expectations are the ones we have of other people. Most relationship struggles are created by our expectations not being met, and when those expectations are unrealistic, it puts a strain on that relationship that can be deadly.
All too often women think that husbands are going to make them happy all the time. Then they discover that their expectations of what a husband should be and do are not on the same page as their husband’s idea of what is required of him. And the tugs of war begin, leading to nagging, tears, angry words, etc. In a word, disappointment.
Of course, it works the other way, too. Men are prone to think their wives should always look lovely, cook great meals, maintain a spotless home, be supportive of them—whatever their idea of the perfect wife might be. And before long they discover that their expectations are unrealistic.
We single women can be possessed with the expectation that getting married is our doorway to completeness, and we develop very unrealistic ideas of what marriage will do for us.
Obviously we have a right to expect certain things from the people in our lives, such as love and care from our parents, loyalty and support from our mates, etc. But I’m referring to our unrealistic expectations—where we have been disappointed because we held the bar too high and didn’t put ourselves in the other person’s shoes.
Dear friends, there is no person on earth who can deliver on every promise and be everything we want him or her to be. If you’ve been living with unrealistic expectations of the people in your life, please get over it! Yes, for their sakes, but just as importantly, for your own sake. It is self-imposed misery to continually expect of others what they cannot deliver and what we should not expect them to deliver.
Whether it’s your child, your parents, your mate, your job, or whatever it is that has disappointed you, learn to focus on the good things and not always on what’s missing. When we set our life’s focus on knowing and pleasing God, we will not be disappointed. Jesus Christ is the one person who can always deliver on his promises, and I guarantee you, if you search for him with your whole heart, He will meet your expectations.