Maybe I wasn't all bad after all

I was at one of my therapist appointments ( i know your all surprised i see a shrink right! LOL) anyway she said something to me that i never thought about before. Something that I think is really going to help me out on this Finding my JESUS FREAK journey. She said that when i came to know God and gave my life to Jesus i wanted so desperately to be a new person that I threw away all of who I was before meeting Jesus-the bad and the good- and that is part of the reason why I think I have lost apart of my freak but really I am just longing to figure which parts of who I used to be are okay to be again. Maybe I wasnt all bad after all.

 The truth is none of us are. But i think sometimes this longing to be "born again" can cause us to remove everything about who we were in order to have this "new life" in Christ. Maybe just maybe there were pieces of me that would still work on this journey with JESUS, maybe i need to really search for the parts of my life that are and have always been good? Is it possible that before JESUS I wasn't all bad? Well I discovered during a visit with one of my "pre-JESUS" friends that maybe just maybe Helen Norris (pre-JESUS) really wasn't ALL bad.
                          Its funny i hadn't spoke to this friend in a long time and she asked me why today and i didn't have an answer. Even if i did it probably wouldn't make much sense now anyway but as I reflect on it now I wonder if throwing away ALL of me to journey with JESUS I also let go of some pre-JESUS friends too, perhaps because they reminded me of who I used to be,maybe if i am really honest it might be easier to pretend to be a more "perfect" me post-JESUS with those who never knew me before. Lets be honest -the truth hurts. We were together this morning for a long time and i really enjoyed just being me with her. I didn't have to worry about letting the pre-JESUS me slip out or worry that she was somehow judging my behaviour. She could care less about what I do for a job or where my next speaking engagement is and especially how the mission is going-not because she doesn't care about all those things but because deep down she knows who \i was before and I am sure is happy that I have met JESUS but doesn't want to have tea with me because of all the "stuff" i do now. I found it easier to talk about Grace and how I have grown to love the people I used to curse with her because I knew my honesty wouldn't cause her to look the other way or question my "ability" to be in the role I am at HHSM. It felt free. It was the kind of moment where I knew if I had a breakdown of faith she wouldn't force me back to believing but simply listen knowing i would find my way back anyway. My friend is a Christian she and I were baptized at the same time almost 9 years ago. The amazing part is we are both major players in each others struggle pre-JESUS yet ironically both players in our faith journeys now.
                        I have met many great friends since knowing JESUS and this is not to suggest that I dont need them or appreciate what they have done and do in my life but today reminded me that there must have been something good about me before this journey and that God wants me to find that again. Maybe whats missing is the many parts of me that i threw away in a desperate attempt to never be that girl again? Its so easy to want the life that God has planned for me but perhaps He never intended for his original creation to be re-created just broken and put back together-thats 2 different things. I have been looking for new parts but what I was supposed to do was keep the old ones but reuse them,reshape them and re mold them for Gods glory. People know my testimony so they think they know who I was but testimonies are flawed in the aspect that we tell all the bad in our life before and all the good that is happening now. I know we are to take off our old selves and put on new but we are still putting it on the original creation right?
                     Anyway today turned out to be less about meeting an old friend for tea but about rediscovering that although there are some major things in my past i regret, am ashamed of and embarrassed by there are also things about me that have always been ok. Even if its only a couple of things,small things, they are still me , a part of me apart of me that God loves. I'm okay now and I think i might go searching for the couple of things about me that were ok then.
Thanks for reading and following my journey. Praying that you can look back and rediscover the good pieces of you too.