“I want someone to love and accept me just as I am, that unconditional sort of love.” If I had a dollar for
every time I have said that I know I’d be rich! Let’s just say it has been a futile search so far LOL! But the
other day, I was sitting, and a thought crept into my mind… would I, one, know unconditional love if it
was standing right in front of me and two, would I even know what to do with it? What does it look like, what would it feel like feel like? Is there such a thing as unconditional love?
As a Christian, I am taught that God loves me unconditionally, yet I spend so much of my life trying to
earn God’s love. Is it that I don’t believe it? Or is it that I do not know how to receive a love that asks for
nothing back? I think one of the reasons cults can take a hold of so many people is because life has
taught many of us that nothing is for free, not even love. That we need to do certain things to earn that
love and acceptance from someone else. Whether it’s the expectation that we need to be “good” to be
loved by our parents or behave in a certain way to be seen and valued by our teachers or be a certain
way in order to fit in with our peers, there seems that there is always a price to pay to earn love and
acceptance.
As a single woman, it gets even more complicated. Depending on your age especially as you grow older,
body size or shape, success or lack thereof, level of attractiveness and a whole other list of very subjective things, you are reminded almost every day that you are not good enough or worthy of unconditional love. Add in culture, be it familial, ethnic, generational or professional, to the mix and it becomes a rather muddled mess of uncertainty, anxiety and a need to always prove our worth to somebody or something.
But here is the thing, do we love ourselves unconditionally? Do we know how to? Because it’s hard to get
something from the outside that we have never really had on the inside. How often have I said, I will love
my body when I lose 20 pounds, or used a product that I thought would alter the appearance of my skin
in order to feel more confident or called myself clumsy or stupid. The unconditional love we seek so
much from the outside, from people and things, what if we started by giving it to ourselves first?
How would it look like to love myself unconditionally, just as I am right now, in this moment? What if I
was kinder and gentler with myself, my abilities, my shortcomings, my strengths, my failures, my
mistakes? What would happen if I gave myself more grace? How would that then shape my world?
I don’t know about you but I think I am ready to find out and so instead of waiting for someone to love me just as I am, to give me that “unconditional sort of love”, I am going to begin to love myself first, just as I am. Instead of only being my number one critic, I am also going to be my own number one cheerleader. I will learn to fill myself up before I pour into others. I will lean more into those who pour into me as I have realized more and more lately that I am surrounded by a solid circle of people always willing to pour into me.
And then maybe just maybe, God’s love may actually start to make more sense for what it is, a love that
is pure, for me and above all, unconditional.
The Musings of a Wandering Mind 