Stasi Eldredge encourages readers to realize who God created them to be—‘embracing God’s dream of you’

Stasi Eldredge has felt like a failure many a time—in her past, in her struggles with weight, in her role as a mother. And she’s not alone. She believes that many women see themselves as failures in some area of life.

But she now understands that while she fails, she is not a failure. This freeing revelation is rooted in a biblical understanding of her identity and God’s love. In Becoming Myself: Embracing God’s Dream of You, Eldredge guides women toward becoming who God always wanted them to be.

The best-selling author, who teamed up with her husband, John, to write the best-seller Captivating, is also leader of the women’s ministry at Ransomed Heart. In Becoming Myself, she shares personal stories of pain and joy—her mother’s pressuring her to lose weight, mistakes she made in relationships, abuse she suffered from a stranger. With a personal touch, she addresses the reader as “my sister.”

With God’s help, people can truly change, Eldredge says, but it’s not a matter of shaming or disciplining ourselves into it. Rather, it’s a process God invites us to, one that requires time and surrender, but which results in a “beautiful paradox.”

“The more God’s we become,” she writes, “the more ourselves we become—the ‘self’ he had in mind when he thought of you before the creation of the world.”

Eldredge emphasizes the importance of honestly reflecting on the past in order to heal and move forward. Her own past included tension and alcohol in her childhood home, plus the pressure to be athletic. She writes that at her core she felt “the tangible ache of wanting to be accepted, approved of, and enjoyed.”

She believes healing begins with God’s view of women, who are image-bearers of God and co-heirs with Christ, who are “valued, worthy, powerful, and needed.”

Two chapters address the effects of a woman’s mother on her life. Others urge women to not only accept themselves, but also to embrace who they are and to become women of faith and worship. 

“Love is always the highest goal,” Eldredge writes, referring to a love of God, of others and of “the woman God has created us to be.”

For more information, visit www.davidccook.com. To order, call at 800-743-2514.