I have a little secret. I think you might have one, too. In fact, I think we might both be keeping the same secret from each other. But I’m willing to blow my cover if you are. Ready? Here goes…. I struggle with control. I mean really struggle. That’s why I call myself a ‘Control Girl’.  

I have this insatiable desire to not lose control of the people and circumstances and outcomes in my life. But my very desire for control causes me to be out of control.

For me, it’s with anger. When I can’t control something, I get really mad.

For you, it might be fear. When you feel like you’re losing control of something, your anxiety becomes out of control.  

Either way; whether we’re angry Control Girls or fearful Control Girls, unless we own up to our little secret—our issues with control—we’re stuck with our anger or anxiety for good. 

You might ask, “How did she know? Who told her? I thought I had my little secret completely under… well, control.” No, I don’t have secret cameras hidden in that closet where you go to scream into a pillow or bite your nails. Actually, somebody leaked our secret to the press a long time ago. Way back in Genesis, after the first ‘Control Girl’ lost the first battle for control, God made it public. He said that, left to ourselves, we’ll each become horrible controlling women, plagued with anger or anxiety which intensifies with each accumulating birthday. 

The good news is that this decline into the slimy pit of controlling-ness is not inevitable. We don’t have to go there. We can be free. How?

Well it’s a process. It doesn’t happen all at once. But little by little, if we will put control back where it belongs–in the big, wise hands of the One who really is in control, we won’t be Control Girls forever. We’ll be like Jesus, who sweetly surrendered to God and said, “Not my will, but Yours be done.”