Another lingering reflection, on a recent Randoms...:
Sometimes, we just don’t quite know what to do with the reality that we are only partially loved by everyone.
This one could be a little startling; so, it bears reading with some care....
Even though we think we want it, and as disappointing as it may feel, I suspect it is probably a great relief to any one person in particular — to not have the burden of loving someone fully.
And, such an observation, should invariably lead to another one:
While I may not be loved fully by any one person, I am still fully loved.
...that needs to sink in a bit.
In other words, the reality of the former doesn't eliminate the truth of the latter.
And, that is something that I can take a great kind of consolation in, because to be fully loved creates a great freedom — one even bigger than if that were able to be granted by any one person.
Some of the conflict we may feel about this may have come as much from how we have been enculturated — by things like finding a 'soul-mate' (from the culture at large — movies, books, etc. — not to mention the church). How often do we hear refrains like "you are my everything..." or "all I need is you..."? And, so, it's no wonder we are sometimes a bit confused by our desires to be loved, especially on certain terms.
The reality is we are loved in many many ways, by many many people. Our parents love us (yes, incompletely). Our siblings love us (incompletely). We are loved by our children. At times, we are loved in different ways by our neighbors, by our friends, by our community, by our church, by our society (all imperfectly, incompletely). Life loves us. So, while all of these love us only partially, altogether, it is still true that we are fully loved. Not to mention that God, by definition, IS love.
So, to put a finer point on it, we are, in fact, fully loved; just not by any one particular person (that would put them in the position of God — which is not a healthy thing for any human to have to be).
And, that should take the pressure off — ourselves, not to mention those we expect (or simply desire) to love us. The goal should not be to love perfectly or even completely. The goal is to love others wherever we can, however we can, whenever we can — and to let others do the same for us.
