Unconditional Love

Recently in my life I have been feeling very alone and sad.

Crazy, since I am constantly surrounded by people. My husband, 4 daughters, friends, team mates, an assistant (practising saint!), people at the gym - the list is endless.

In my 46 years I have had many periods like this in my life - I know the causes, I’ve done the work, I know the symptoms, and yet I still find myself in lulls.

My coping mechanism in the past has been to go out and get blazingly drunk, have a brilliant night with my friends and basically just forget what it was like to actually feel all of the deep feelings. It was so much easier to numb everything, forget and reset.

When did I realise this was my coping mechanism? At some point in the last 2 years! That’s a long time to be numbing the aches and resetting. Was I actually solving anything? Definitely not, the same feelings kept resurfacing until I actually dealt with it at a later date.

Does this awareness make the lulls and the pain easier. 100% no. Does healing mean I no longer have bad days. No.

Now I feel alone and sad and with the awareness that my coping mechanism is to let my hair down - I’ve been avoiding that very thing. Somehow I feel worse - I’m in limbo with how to fix myself. Where to seek help. Who/what is going to save me?

A few weeks ago - I opened myself up to some people and shared my thoughts and opinions on how I was feeling. This was tough as both people - who I value in my life - did not share my theory or respond how I wanted them to respond. Crazy really. Why should I have expected people to respond in a certain way - I actually have no right to that. They are entitled to respond in their own way - but equally - I am entitled to have my opinion and thoughts on this very matter of unconditional love. And so I share it with you - not because I want or expect you to feel a certain way. But because I value myself enough to share it and hope that by offering this part of me - it might help a small part of someone else.

"Gran"

In my lifetime, I have been lucky enough to be loved by some exceptional people. The kind of people who have loved and lost, missed out on things in life, experienced all that life has to offer, the good, the bad and the ugly and still managed to come out the other side hoping for the best in humanity and giving all people the benefit of the doubt.

These people showed me - didn’t tell me - showed me through their own actions and treatment of others, not just myself - that I was loved for simply just being me. That as a human, I was loved unconditionally.

My decisions, size, looks, actions, behaviours, relationships, work status, parental status, housing status, wealth, or personal quirks where nothing to be ashamed of. My mere existence qualified me to be worthy of love.

As time has gone by, these beautiful humans have left this world, as was their time. But in the process I have found myself mourning not only their presence, guidance and effervescence of life but the loss of unconditional love.

So many times in my life I have had to pick myself up. It gets tiring, hard and down right exhausting and yes, there have been times when I have not wanted to pick myself up anymore. I have found myself wishing for that one magical person to come and be my everything and lift me from rock bottom.

My mic drop moment this morning came when I thought.

“What if that magical person is actually me? What if I am enough to love myself.”

I have realised that I can actually offer this gift to myself. I can offer myself the same unconditional love that these amazing humans have given me. I can love myself and realise that I am enough just as I am.

Have I put this into action - not yet - these words and musings have come first. But there are bones in place in order to start practicing this.

So today - I pick myself up again and I promise to love myself unconditionally. In the process I hope to show others along the way that unconditional love does exist in this world.

My one wish is that everyone experiences unconditional love at least once in their lifetime, even if it comes from their own source.

From today for me “You are enough” means “You are loved unconditionally”.

Much love

Meags