I was looking for a breath of life, a little touch of heavenly light, but all the choirs in my head say no.

I did an exercise that a little app on my phone suggested a few days ago. It was trying to teach me about gentleness, and I did learn about gentleness, but I learned something else as well. It asked me to think of my best friend and then to create a list of five words that described that friend. Not too hard. Then it asked me to think of someone that I don't get along with and to create a list of five words that described that person. Also, not too hard.

Next, it asked me to go through all of the words I had come up with and think about how it would make me feel for someone to use each of them to describe me. The good ones would obviously make me feel good. The bad ones would obviously make me feel bad, all but one of the bad ones that is. My words to describe someone that I don't get along with were: loud, argumentative, manipulative, mean, and different.

I have never wanted to be excessively loud. I have never wanted to come across as argumentative. I have never hoped that someone would describe me as manipulative. I have never wanted to seem mean to others. I have, however wanted to be different.

I chose the word different to describe someone that I don't get along with, because sometimes when you have a different perspective than someone else, or differing views on a particular topic, it can cause conflict. Sometimes even differing personality traits can cause tension or confusion. That is what I meant by including, "different," in my list of words to describe someone that I don't get along with. There is potential and value and so much to learn from our differences, but sometimes differences just make things hard.

There have been many times in my 22 years that I have wanted to be like someone else, different than myself. I can't really say that I've ever wanted to actually be someone else. I've always wanted my name to be Jill. I've always wanted to be whatever makes me, me. But often times I want to just borrow traits from others. Sometimes it's as superficial as, "I want your hair or your skin," but sometimes it is more like, "I want your courage, your ability to relate to others, I want your sense of humor, or your ability to captivate an audience."

I want what's not mine. I want to be me, but a better, more capable version of me. I want to be a version of myself that I can tweak a little, sometimes a lot. I talked about this dissatisfaction with myself and who exactly that is a lot last summer. Being on a team every day with people that were all so different from me was great, but it was hard. It stirred up a lot of insecurities, and hidden feelings of disdain that I had for myself and for specific things about myself, or things that I thought/think I was/am lacking.

I can remember an email I got one day last summer after posting what I am sure was a very dramatic blog entry. I got an email in which Ashley very gently reminded me of how counter productive wishing that I was made differently is. It's one thing to want to be better, to want to improve, but it's something entirely different to long to be made differently, to wish to have different strengths, different gifts.

"I watched the Voyage of the Dawn Treader the other night and the line that the little rat [Reepicheep] said keeps sticking with me. He said, 'Aslan gave me this tail, so if you don't let go of it, I will have to fight you (or something like that).' Just got me thinking how Aslan made you the way you are and it is perfect! He created you, Jill Burnette, in his image, and with all of the pieces and parts the way he designed and saw fit..." A.A.D.

She went on to say more kind things to me, and they were and are nice, but that right there is the point. Perfect. In his image. The way he designed and saw fit.

When I got to the last word, different, I didn't hate the thought of someone describing me as different. I knew that I was not supposed to like the way the words describing the person I don't get along with made me feel, but different was hard for me to dislike. What does that say about me?

It would be really easy for me to say that comes from a good place. I want to be different than I am today. I want to be better tomorrow. I want to love better. I want to trust more. I want to live well.

But that's really not what I meant.

Honestly, it is tempting for me to cling to the word different, because time and time again I do covet what other people have. I want their gifts. I want what they are good at. I want what they do well. I do not see the things I do well. I don't appreciate my gifts. I don't see the way that I was made perfect, in his image, the way he designed and saw fit. It's not about wanting to improve on the things that I have been given; it's about wishing that I had entirely different instruments.

And that can't be good.

Perfect. In his image. The way he designed and saw fit. Those words describe me right here and right now. So why would I want to be different? I don't know, but I hope that I can learn to wish for a continual sharpening of my knife, not for a new knife altogether.