As I have gone through this journey of self discovery, I am learning first how important it is to love me... ALL OF ME. All my defects, all my weaknesses. It all makes up who I am. Before I didn't want to accept any part of those things as who I am because of the shame I felt around them. What I am realizing now is that God gave me these weaknesses so that I could learn to rely on Him and His power to overcome those aspects of myself. I know first hand how God can turn weaknesses into strengths because he has taken this compulsion I had to eat from me. I am now going deeper in my recovery to work on other parts of me that I desire to be free from.
Because I have learned to love and accept me, I am learning to love and accept others as well exactly where they are. It's not my job in anyway to judge others. I try, as Og teaches, to jump into their world and see life as they may be seeing it. It helps me feel empathy. I know what it feels like to not be heard so I try my best to gift others a listening ear and to allow them to express themselves how they need to. I have always been someone that connects with others easily and I believe that has everything to do with the amount of love I have in my heart for them.
It's almost like God allowed me to go through extreme feelings of loneliness so that I would know what it feels like. I was in church the other day and a gal got up and talked about some of her struggles she has been going through. She talked about being in service to others and gave some examples of things we could do. One of which was to smile or write a note. She is quite heavy and I can only imagine how she may feel and where she is going for her comfort as she finds her way through these challenging times in her life. I ended up writing her a note, thanking her for her talk and for the angel she was in my life that day. Afterwards she came up to me and gave me a huge hug and thanked me. I have never met her before but because of what I am learning and putting into practice about having love in my heart, it allows me the space to connect with other fellow strugglers.
If only we could practice this one principle more in our lives, I feel there would be a lot more peace in this world. I love all aspects of my life. Not just the good one but I love the seemingly bad things because they are all teaching me. Knowing that all things shall give thee experience brings a lot of peace into my life.
I used to say in my work when someone would say something cross to me.. "Kill them with kindness!" That is what I did. It almost became a challenge for me and every time it was amazing to watch the miracle that occurred before my eyes. They almost didn't know how to react and eventually would come around. People just need to be loved and understood. I have not always been good at that and at times I still slip but I do my best and God makes up the rest.
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