The God of My Head and the God of My Heart

One of the things I've discovered in therapy is that the source of much of the pain in my life is my inability to forgive myself for being less than perfect. Even worse, as my understanding of myself has grown, my standard of perfection has changed too. For example, I used to berate myself for being gay. Now I berate myself for not coming out when I was younger.

Now the God that's in my head loves me just as I am, loved me in the closet, loved me out of the closet, forgives my every imperfection. I need that God in my heart, for the God of my heart is constantly judging me, expecting that everything I say and do, even what I think, will be perfect. Where this God came from I don't know, but this One has been with me since my childhood. Perhaps some well meaning Sunday school teacher gave me this idea. Or perhaps it comes from Mom and Dad. In any case this idea of God is essentially evil, because it sets up a situation where I can never be good enough to be an acceptable disciple.

So what am I doing about it? For one thing I'm praying about it, asking God to align my heart with my head. For another thing I am writing about it. I'm trying to accept the idea that the best I can do is all that God expects of me, and all that I have any right to expect of myself. I'm trying to absorb the idea that God loves me just as I am. That perhaps God needed me to be a straight appearing man to accomplish what I did in EMS.