I wonder why it is that people (myself included) are often so eager to make it on their own.
Why are we afraid to ask for help? Why can’t we be vulnerable even with those we love the most?
I was talking to a pal yesterday and he was talking about how he reckons being loved is more important than loving. I’m not sure that that’s the case; but often it seems to me that it is much, much more difficult to be loved than to love. Accepting the love of friends, family, even God, means a certain level of acceptance of who I am… which is scary. I wonder, though… is it possible to really love if you can’t BE loved? And by that, i don’t mean love must always be reciprocated or that the popular people are also the people who love the most. What I mean, I think, is that our calling is not only to love God, but to BE loved by Him- it’s in accepting that astounding divine love that we can learn what it is to love on a human level. And we’re called to love our neighbour as ourselves- which necessarily entails a love of the self. Not in an arrogant, self-aggrandising way but in an acceptance of ourselves as beloved children of the Father-and as beloved friend, daughter, sister…
I don’t as such know where I’m going with this.
I’m just very aware of a general reluctance to open the self to the other- whether that other be friend or “enemy”, and I wonder what the world, our relationships, our politics even, might look like if we as individuals and as the church were more open- more willing to be loved and to love, more willing to be vulnerable and to live as community rather than in isolation.
Tell me stories.
