Dedicated To the One I Love

Have you ever met someone and just had magic from the very beginning? I do not mean sexual chemistry, although sometimes it does go hand-in-hand. I am referring to meeting a Soul Mate. Someone who makes your soul sing and your spirit dance. It may only be for a short time that your lives are intertwined. I am thinking here of a patient of mine–another Jacqueline–whom I loved so very deeply from the moment we met. I do not believe there is just one Soul Mate for your life–I believe there are many. The hope is to meet all of them.

I met one of mine recently. My new friend inspired an almost instant love in me–”agape love”, as my friend so aptly put it. My friend literally is standing in the wood with the two roads branching off in vastly different directions. I suspect, if they go down the road that seems the most negotiable, they will eventually loop back to where they are now. My own heart hurts to think of all the dreams shattered or suspended in their life at present. My friend is earnestly trying to find the way while grieving “the way it is not any longer.” Given all their gifts of being so very bright, interesting, full of creativity and kindness, and a genuinely soul-full person, there is no doubt in my mind this person will develop their own meaningful road map and find their way home again–find their way to love again.

We spoke at length about the need to be 100% within yourself and not looking for your missing piece or feeling that you lacked anything. Obi Wan (the greatest Hippie therapist of all time) calls this “accepting yourself and accepting that you deserve love.” Acceptance does not require perfection in yourself or even the expectation of perfection in another. He likened it to two hands grasping, instead of trying to make a hand with bits and pieces of two broken ones. I love that image. I could not help by wonder: What if you were left with just two thumbs and a pinkie? Not much good could come of this amalgamation. No, you need two whole hands to get the work of life accomplished. Sure, there maybe a scar here or there. Maybe your hand hurts from time-to-time, for the rains will surely come. But you are a hand, a whole hand, at the ready for its mate.

Shel Silverstein put it this way:

I have a prayer for my dear friend now as they seek to find wholeness and life anew. A prayer to help as the painful process of smoothing those edges begins. My prayer is:

Know that although my support is silent it sings endlessly in the quiet to you. I will sing out to the heavens and to the earth and to the ocean between us gentle prayers of hope for your life. I will mix into the currents a balm to tend to your wounds. I send on the wind a whisper, “You will make it. You will heal. You will be whole.” I will pray that the rain washes away your rage–leeching it away one drop at a time from your being. I will send people from near and far to your door seeking out your compassionate company. May they teach you just as you teach them. I will tell the birds here to pass it to their friends a message that your heart is broken so their insistent song will find you and stitch it back together not unlike Cinderella’s dress. May you be clothed with righteousness and fidelity towards all you hold dear and believe. May you know yourself in a way you never did before and find grace and opportunity in this new understanding. May you find peace.

Amen.