“Eyes on Me”: The Best Answer for Your Inner Slouch
I was the kid my parents would regularly remind to stand up straighter. Because I’d slouch. If that was you too, you know how you sometimes feel like you never outgrew the label of insecure adolescent.
You’re quick to dismiss the value of what you can offer. Swift to deflect attention, disbelieve an affirmation, assume a thank you isn’t genuine.
It can look like posture but feel like defeat.
With kids, there is less discrepancy between their body language and what they feel inside. But with decades of practice, we learn to stand tall even when we feel small. Smile to mask when we’re really not okay. Tip our chin up when life takes grit and drive and independence.
Although I’m better at faking it now, some days I don’t feel confident. Not inside.
I entertain the can’ts: I can’t get it right. I can’t figure it out. I can’t do it. And the dont’s: I don’t have what it takes. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t belong here.
The lies beat me down and tell me it’s all about me, my lack, my less than.
But I now know confidence comes from somewhere deeper than a mental override. Address just the posture and you’ll be constantly self-correcting. Our inner slouch is tied to who we believe we are—or aren’t. In order to fix the posture we must first face the mirror.
Already Pleased with You
Close your eyes for a moment and picture your younger self, gazing into a mirror. Stand behind her and note her expression and stance. What is she thinking, feeling, believing in this moment?
Does she know how she’s loved?
Does she believe she matters?
What would you whisper in her ear right now? Take a minute to write it down. Remind her what’s true:
She’s cherished, loved, and lovely.
She’s seen, included, wanted.
She can’t lose her place at the table because there’s no earning when Jesus has invited us already, just as we are.
Jennifer Dukes Lee calls it preapproval. She writes in Love Idol, “I have been preapproved. Already approved. Already accepted. I have nothing to prove.”
Let that marinate, the beautiful, freeing truth that God chose you as you are. Not as you will be or could be. Look your younger self in the eye, and tell her. Look your today-self in the eye and say it again: “you’ve been preapproved.” God is already pleased with you.
“Eyes on Me” is the Answer for Everything
I was much older before I discovered the way to stand straighter is to first go lower. To spend time on your knees before you face the mirror.
Adopt a posture of humility and awe and you find how little is about you and how much is about Him. It shifts your lens, sifts out lies about your worth, softens your heart, stills your tongue.
You see Him, up close and large enough to fill your vision. In an instant, self criticism becomes God adoration. Your heart swells and your soul stills. You’re on holy ground, and He’s all that matters.
There’s no surer way to keep your eyes on Jesus than to regularly press your face to the ground and feel the weight of God’s glory.
“Eyes on Me,” Jesus reminds Peter in that scene from The Chosen where a boatful of terrified disciples fight the storm and Jesus asks Peter to step into it. I can’t stop thinking how it’s the answer for literally everything.
The dream that’s out of reach. The responsibility that feels too heavy. The past you struggle to let go.
Jesus: Eyes on Me.
The battle in your mind. The labels you’re wearing. The boxes and check marks and not-enoughs.
Jesus: Eyes on Me.
Your inner slouch of insecurity, shame, self-sabotage.
Jesus: Eyes on Me.
The answer for sinking in comparison and self-criticism is eyes on Jesus. Like Peter, when we look at self and we find ourselves swallowed by insufficiency.
Jennifer Dukes Lee reminds us that “eyes cannot look in two directions.” Here’s what she’s after:
I want mine on Jesus—not on yesterday’s failures or successes, not on today’s agenda, and definitely not on the world’s scorecards.
Eyes. On. Jesus.
Before we stand vertically, we must think and see vertically.
Time spent horizontal, knees and nose to the floor, helps us see vertically.
5 More Ways to Keep Eyes on Jesus
The physical positive of surrender is instrumental in eradicating our inner slouch, but there are many other practices that also help us make much of Jesus. Here are five to try:
- Keep a gratitude journal. Address your thank yous directly to God and see how it changes the narrative in your head.
- Play a worship song on repeat. Let the words sink in until you believe them.
- Invite accountability. Share your inner struggle with a trusted neighbor, friend, or family member. Lies lose power when you call them out and truth named outloud is amplified.
- Make a truth list of Scriptures—written out or paraphrased—to read when you’re feeling the inner slouch. Like Jennifer, we each “need daily injections of gospel truth to immunize [our] flawed humanity.”
- Give yourself a visual reminder of how Jesus sees you. It may be a piece of jewelry, a phone wallpaper, wall decor from Hobby Lobby, a tattoo, or a coffee mug inscribed with a Bible verse.
Which one will you try today?
Let’s pray.
Jesus, when we crumble on the inside, judge our reflection in the mirror, or still feel young and insecure, would You whisper, “Eyes on Me”? You are the answer our souls long for. The healing our hearts need. The stable ground beneath our feet. May we behold You and make much of You. May our example help others around us to also keep their eyes on You.
Just a friend over here in your corner,
