I Stopped Performing. Here's What I Found Instead.
By Crystal Virgin
"Don't let the world change you. But turn to God and let Him change you. Those are two very different things."
I want to be honest with you about something: I am not a typical member.
I show up to church sometimes with kids whose hair looks exactly like they just rolled out of bed — because they have. I go to homeschool group without makeup, in a shirt I probably wore yesterday, and I don't always feel like talking to the other moms. I'm an introvert in spaces that reward extroversion, and I've learned that my mannerisms don't always land the way I intend them to. People have probably perceived me as unfriendly. Maybe a little grumpy. Maybe not the kind of mom they expected.
For a long time, I let that bother me more than it should have.
And then, somewhere around Easter of this year, I made a quiet decision: I was going to stop performing. Stop trying to be the version of myself that fits everyone else's picture. Stop spending energy I don't have on appearances that don't actually move me toward anything that matters.
It was one of the most freeing decisions I've ever made.
What Performance Actually Costs
I want to be clear: I am not a confident person. I don't walk into a room feeling like I belong there. I feel inferior to most people more often than I'd like to admit, and the "I don't care" attitude that I've developed isn't really confidence — it's more like a quiet recognition that I simply don't have the capacity to keep up with everyone else. Because I'm not everyone else. I'm me. And my life is built around my family and my faith and my own very particular, very imperfect reality.
What I've learned is that performance — the curated version of yourself you put on for other people — costs something real. It costs energy you could spend on your kids. It costs authenticity in your relationships. It costs the kind of inner peace that only comes when your outside and your inside are actually the same thing.
I got tired of paying that price.
My Oldest Daughter Is Not Easy
Part of what forced this reckoning is my five year old.
She is opinionated. Strong-willed. Powerful in all the ways that will serve her beautifully someday and are genuinely hard to parent right now. In public, she doesn't always perform either — because she's five and she hasn't learned to yet, and because honestly, I'm not sure I want to teach her that performing is the goal.
So we show up as we are. Sometimes it's messy. Sometimes I'm not smiling the way the other moms are smiling. Sometimes she's having a loud feeling in a quiet space and I'm managing it the best I can without losing myself in the process.
People see that. I know they do. And I've had to make peace with what they might think of it — of me — because the alternative is spending so much energy on their perception that I have nothing left for her.
She needs my real self. Not my performed self.
The Question That Changed Things
Somewhere in the process of letting go of the performance, I started asking myself a different question. Not what will people think? but what does God think?
That shift changed everything.
Because when I'm standing in front of God — not in front of the homeschool group or the church foyer or anyone's Instagram — what matters is not whether my kids had their hair done. It's whether I loved them well. Whether I was honest. Whether I pointed my family toward Him even on the imperfect days.
I decided back before Easter to let go of what the world thinks and orient toward what God thinks instead. To examine my life honestly — not to perform better for other people, but to ask: is there something I'm doing that isn't actually serving my family? Something I can let go of that would give us more peace, more connection, more of what actually matters?
That kind of examination is not about fitting a mold. It's about stripping away what doesn't fit so that what's left is more true.
Be True to Yourself — But Let God Change You
I want to be careful here, because "just be yourself" can become its own kind of performance — an excuse to stop growing, to stay comfortable, to never be challenged.
That's not what I mean.
What I mean is this: don't let the world change you. But turn to God and let Him change you. Those are two very different things.
The world will try to change you into something more palatable, more presentable, more like what everyone else looks like from the outside. God will try to change you into something more true — more patient, more loving, more rooted, more yourself in the best and deepest sense.
One of those changes produces peace. The other just produces a better performance.
I know which one I'm after.
We Are Making an Effort. We Are There.
My girls don't always show up with their hair done. I don't always show up with mine done either. But we show up.
And I believe — I really believe — that the Lord loves that. Not the polish. The presence. Not the performance. The effort.
If you are the mom who feels like she doesn't quite fit the mold — who is showing up imperfectly, who is parenting a hard kid in public, who sits a little apart at the group because the small talk takes more than you have today — I see you.
You don't have to be anyone else. You just have to keep showing up, keep turning toward God, and keep letting Him do the work that actually matters.
The rest is just noise.
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