Sunday, May 1, 2011

I love you, and...

I love you, and I’m angry with you.
I love you, and I don’t want to play with you any more.
I love you, and you’re fired.
I love you, and I’m getting a divorce.
I love you, and I need for you to move out.
I love you, and I’m not who you need me to be.
I love you, and I won’t go with you.

Throughout most of my life I misunderstood what love is.  I thought more along these lines:

If I love you I should not get angry with you.
If I love you I should play as long as you want me to.
If I love you I should keep you on the payroll because you need the money.
If I love you I should stay married to you even as we live a lie.
If I love you I should offer hospitality to you indefinitely.
If I love you I should bend myself into a pretzel to be who you want me to be.
If I love you I should follow you to the ends of the earth.

Today, my thinking goes more like this:

I will not allow my anger to hide my love for you.
I will not take my toys and go home until I remember my love for you.
I will not fire you until I clearly remember your God given value.
I will not divorce you until I remember how important you have been in my life, and how grateful I am for your tolerance of me all these years.
I will not cast you out of my home until I am certain I am not also casting you out of my heart.
I acknowledge that diminishing myself does not demonstrate my love for you.
My refusal to go with you is not abandoning you, but setting you free.

Before I make any decision about “what to do with you,” I must first remember that I love you!  It’s the only approach that makes any sense because love is not personal, but universal.  I AM love; you ARE love.  I must acknowledge the truth of that in order to be true to who we both are.

2 comments:

  1. O-u-t-s-t-a-n-d-i-n-g ... really CORE ... I really like it ... Thanks ...

    ReplyDelete
  2. POWERFUL, BEAUTIFUL AND SO, SO TRUE!!!

    ReplyDelete

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