Did you grow up believing certain things like I did?  Things like . . .  You can’t swim for an hour after eating Cracking your knuckles will give you arthritis Swallowed gum stays in your stomach seven years Crossed eyes will get stuck that way  These aren’t monumental to our belief systems, but it turns out they really aren’t even true.    We all have things we’ve bought into from our culture, our internal narratives, or even our families. Although the examples above are fairly silly, there are more significant lies we may believe that can impact our parenting, our faith walks, and our identity.    Today I’m getting personal and sharing three of the lies I’ve been prone to believe in my own life (don’t worry, they are deeper than the ones listed above). Although these lies began as fairly harmless, they snowballed into an underlying philosophy that needed to be called out and examined with a lens of biblical truth.    Take a few minutes with me today to consider the three lies we all need to stop believing in 2023.    P.S. If you enjoy Pardon the Mess will you take a minute to share it with a friend? There’s no better way to encourage others than to share biblical truth with them. Parenting is hard so let’s help others walk the parenting road together.