Today, we're pleased to share with you an audio essay written and read by Jen Oshman, entitled

An Open Letter to Women's Straining Under the Burden of Expectations.

Jen Oshman's book is Cultural Counterfeits, Confronting Five Empty Promises of Our Age and How We were made for so much more.

An open letter to women straining under the burden of expectations by Jen Oshman.

Dear sister, are you tired as you listen to this letter?

Are you worn down by the weight of the countless roles and

expectations in your life? Are you feeling the pressure of doing more and striving harder to please

the people around you? My answer to each of the above questions is yes, without a doubt and without

hesitation. I am tired. And I'm not sure I'm doing life right. Am I too much?

Or am I too little? We only get one chance at this lifetime and I don't want to mess it up.

Here's what's hard. Life and people are fickle. As I study our cultural landscape and look to the left and to the

right to see how other women are living, I see constant change and evolving currents. Like waves of the sea,

the expectations placed on women today build, crescendo, collapse, and swirl. The waves roll in and the undertow rushes out. If they would

just stay still for a second, just freeze in time long enough for me to know exactly how they

should look, then I might discern how I should look too, or at least where I should aim.

Not only is the culture around us ever

shifting and constantly changing, but we are too. Our bodies are limited and vulnerable. We

continuously grow, sometimes in ways that are advantageous and sometimes ways that are not.

Our circumstances never stay the same. One season leads to the next,

and our capacities and callings transition with them. Like the culture around us, we too are fickle.

If you and I make either the culture around us or our capacity within us, the foundation of our peace, we will never find

rest. Neither the standards of this world nor our own abilities are solid ground. We must stand on

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