Sometimes we enter relationships that propel us into a level of healing that we’ve avoided for far too long. A level of healing that has the potential to break us, and maybe that’s the point. To be broken to such a degree that the Kintsugi of our reconstruction becomes a work of art for the whole world to see. To have the gold that’s woven like a thread into the broken pieces expose the shame of regret for not loving ourselves at the level of divinity we are called to love. This is where the rubber meets the road in “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Because I cannot love another authentically until I love myself fully. Jesus was sending the message of inner healing and authentic self-love. “To thine own self be true” walks a fine line.
The world teaches us the exact opposite. Give until you are depleted, then cowboy up and give some more. That somehow sacrificing yourself to depletion is some noble act. That loving yourself is selfish and haughty and self-serving. You can pretend to love yourself as long as it’s inauthentic. That’s allowed. All the while you are giving up your power to a system designed to drain your soul of the very divine life force given to you by the Creator.
The airlines instruct us to put our own oxygen mask on first before we try to help anyone else. Emergency medical technicians are trained to make sure the environment is safe for them before entering a space to take care of the injured. And it makes sense because you’re of no help if you’ve passed out from lack of oxygen or are laying on the ground bleeding out from a gunshot wound. Yet we are taught to self-sacrifice in unhealthy ways and never taught to honor ourselves. We are never taught how to step into our sovereignty. We’re left to figure it out on our own in the midst of our healing.
And I don’t know about you, but the spiritual community is more confusing than ever. It’s as though the pendulum has swung the other way. Relationship gurus flood the spaces with “Do this, not that,” and “Say this, not that,” as though every person were identical. As though every relationship did not carry its own unique fingerprint in this universe. As though there is no natural intuitive ebb and flow. As though two people have to be each fully healed to enter into partnership. I exaggerate, but the theme is pretty close.
What if we carried an attitude of “Show me how good today gets”? What if we expected our partner to grow as we grow, developing capacity intuitively, in unconditional love that doesn’t self-sacrifice in the toxic way the world teaches? What if, as we each heal as sovereign individuals, we had someone who holds our hand when we’re standing out in the rain, in the storm? To be the energetic first aid because they’ve put their oxygen mask on first. What if we did that and held onto our authentic self-love and sovereignty? To help someone we love rebuild, rewrite their story into a beautiful piece of artwork, and to stand with them as they clean up the mess of their creation. This is partnership, yes? Not perfect. Present.
I think life is too complex and too short to put living it in a box for comfort and convenience; to narrow it down to 350 pages of instruction. I think this is why we’ve all been given intuition, spirit guides/guardian angels, and a soul with an incalculable capacity for love. It’s our job to figure out our healing for ourselves, not what someone else thinks we should do. I think that it’s in the process of figuring it out, no matter how messy it gets, that we heal ourselves. So don’t mind the mess of the gold that gets spilled as I work on my Kintsugi. Just enjoy the beauty of the gold as it is. ✨🌹✨