Maybe, Just Maybe, You’re OK

The age-old conundrum:  What’s wrong with me?

Perhaps nothing.

Maybe the only thing wrong with us is that we think something is wrong with us.

This, of course, does not mean that we have hurdles that we shouldn’t overcome.  It doesn’t mean that we don’t have sadness or guilt or jealousy or anger, at times.  But when we begin to take those aforementioned struggles and turn them into an assault on our wholeness, than we’ve gone off the rails.

There’s nothing wrong with you.

Yes, you have times where you’re down.  You don’t know which direction to go in.  You feel lost and aimless.

There’s nothing wrong with you.

There may be times when you’re sick and really struggling to get your health back on track.

There’s nothing wrong with you.

I had sickness as a close and unrelenting friend for years.  But…

There was nothing wrong with me.

I felt like I had really screwed up.  I felt like I had missed the point on something really, really big.

There’s nothing wrong with me.

I have a very old friend who is currently being abused by her boyfriend.

There’s nothing wrong with her.

I still don’t know what I want to do when I grow up.

There’s nothing wrong with me.

My sweet little girl is exceptionally shy and cautious.

There’s nothing wrong with her.

I have friends who, despite wanting to be married by now, aren’t.

There’s nothing wrong with them.

Do you know how I know that there’s nothing wrong?

Because there is no such thing.

An ego will create a world in which right and wrong dominate.  But that’s an ego.  And none of us need to be schooled on the ego.

Spirit, on the other hand, knows no such judgments.  Spirit looks at the atrocities unfolding in this world and feels compassion and sees the light at the end of the tunnel.  It sees through the darkness and holds only the light.  And despite our best efforts to hold everyone accountable and punish and judge and persecute, Spirit just sits and watches and loves and sees the light at the end of the tunnel.

Does this sound like pie in the sky?

Take your darkest, most sensitive secrets and lay them out on a table in front of you for a moment.  Lay them out like a portfolio.  Now take away the rights, the wrongs, the judgments and the arrogance.  And look with loving eyes.  Look at this portfolio of experience through the eyes of, lets say, a saint.

Is there compassion?  Yes.

Is there empathy?  Yes.

Is there understanding?  When you look at the situation from all angles…when you consider all the wounds, the belief systems, the level of knowledge at given times, the level of ignorance at given times that built this portfolio, then yes, there is understanding.

Now take those dark, sensitive areas of your life and see them not as WHO YOU ARE, but experiences that you’ve had based on the knowledge and wounding and ignorance that may have been present at that time.  And now ask yourself:  Are you the sum of your experiences?

Or are you more?

Look at a five year old.  If you asked that five year olds’ parents if he was the sum of his walking, talking, riding a 3 wheeler, drawing pictures and tackling his sister, they’d look at you like you were crazy.  They’d say, he’s our beautiful, diverse little boy.  He’s not his walking or his talking or his behavior at all.  He’s just our little boy.

Do you see where I’m going with this?

I’m the biggest assailant on my own character and personality that ever lived.  Okay, maybe not THE biggest, but I’m pretty relentless.  And yet down in my gut, in my heart, I know there’s nothing wrong with me.  There never was.  Yes, I’m more conscious now than I was 20 years ago.  But 20 years ago, I was just as ok as I am today.

How?

I exist.  I’m here.  I show up everyday.  I do my best.  And underneath all of the struggles and fears, there is a whole and complete being.  That being is WHO I AM.  All else needs to be unlearned.  Not fixed.  Unlearned.

That is all.

There is nothing wrong with you.

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