"It is God's Love that allows us self-love. It is God that enables us to be our own best friend."
A dear friend asked recently, "Are you a good companion to yourself?" It's odd not to be sure of the answer after all my years of living.
When I found myself alone as a child, I often drifted on an ocean of dreams. Staring up at the lone eucalyptus tree that hugged the white wall along our California backyard, I often found myself smiling. The clouds were playmates
I was a good companion to myself – more so than were any of my teachers, forever irritated by my choice to color outside the lines or crumple note paper & sail it across the room.
The world was my friend. It's troubles lived distant from my mother's rose garden with its pink-scented gifts.
Our avocado tree held the taste of green. The aroma that night-danced through the window of the bedroom I shared with my little sister was exhaled by a lemon tree not a spray can.
Dragons lived only in fairy tales.
With each passing year, the world estranged me from parts of myself. Encouraged by an extroverted father, prodded to be an aggressive male, I found my own company less and less pleasing.
It was from "successful" men that I was to find energy. The "winners" would teach me how to be one of them.
Society's milieu pressed me to meet others expectations – to be a straight-ruled version of myself.
As I traveled, I increasingly saw a stranger staring back from the mirror. I came to believe the world wanted only that stranger, not the rest of me.
But, to be secure in God's Love means that we will automatically be good companions to ourselves. That has been a challenging truth for me to rediscover and live.
As a child, I didn't need to be reminded of this. Back then, I enjoyed my company.
Today, I finally find that my life-scared, passion-driven heart is something to be honored and my own company something once again to be celebrated. Even the stranger in the mirror I once resented is now a friend.
We have survived. There is no need for us to inflict wounds upon ourselves. The world of our caregiving will always offer plenty of pain without our having to mix in shame and self-loathing.
Amid our own companionship, we can do more than tend our wounds. We can rest on a bed of joyful awareness.
It is God's Love that allows us self-love. It is God that enables us to be our own best friend.
The avocado trees remain. The lemons, afflicted by the whimsies of weather and the certainties of age, will always let us touch their pebbled skin.
The old house I grew up in has been replaced. The rose garden has given way to a swimming pool. But, along the white wall, the lone eucalyptus tree still scatters the California sun into shadows that shift with the breeze.
-Erie Chapman
*Photo – White Shape Study #2 – copyright Erie Chapman 2011
Journal of Sacred Work 
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