I can not stop thinking about something I read last week. In my experience, the things that strike me most, are the things that I already believe but am either too scared to voice an opinion or too lazy. So every now and again someone says something that deep down I have felt for a long time, but articulates it in a way I never could and says it with a confidence that I never could. The chapter was talking about image, or at least that's what I took from it. If you believe that at one time there was a 'fall' of man, then this chapter put forward one very important consequence of this original disaster. The idea goes that at some point humans and God where in an extremely tight relationship and, as I'm sure you can imagine, being in such a close relationship with God had its advantages, one of which was security. The fact that humans felt accepted and loved was never disputed or discussed, it just was. They just were, and they knew of no other way, how could they when they walked and talked with Love itself. Now the chapter very convincingly suggests that ever since the fall, and the subsequent separation and fracture of this relationship, humans have maintained this natural obsession with acceptance and love. Nothing new there, but then, none of this is new. Humans, desperate to satisfy this craving, look hopelessly to each other as the answer to their problems. Think of parasites. Humans are love parasites. They are acceptance parasites. But a parasite can't get anything it needs from another parasite, it needs say.....a sheep. Something that will satisfy it for life, you see where this is going.. But back to the book. It was talking about clothing, or electronics or houses or anything that we do, say or buy in a desperate effort for someone else, (who is no different) to think better of us. Why do we care so much about clothes? or looks? will it help? We'll be doing it our whole lives. Now I'm not convinced you need to believe in God, or a God to agree with this, but I'm struggling to wrap this post up with anymore then one alternative. What if we could be 100% confident in ourselves? what if we got the results back, and by doing absolutely nothing we where accepted? Not just accepted but ACTIVELY loved and pursued. What if before going to the mirror we knew we where beautiful?
Just a thought.