#264

"Dear human: you've got it all wrong. You didn’t come here to master unconditional love. That’s where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love. Universal love. Messy love. Sweaty love. Crazy love. Broken love. Whole love, infused with divinity, lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of messing up. Often. You didn’t come here to be perfect, you already are. You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous, and then to rise again to remembering. But unconditional love? Stop telling that story. Love in truth doesn’t need any other adjectives. It doesn’t require the condition of perfection. It only asks that you show up, and do your best. That you stay present, and feel fully. That you shine and fly, and laugh and cry, and hurt and heal, and fall and get back up, and play and work, and live and die as you. It’s enough, it’s plenty."

— Courtney A. Walsh

I should probably read this to M 'n' m. And make them listen. Make them turn off their devices and listen. Make them think about it. And then we'll turn the Cyclone game back on. Actually, the Cyclone game is over. They just beat the #1 team in the country at Hilton. And the cool thing is... they were favored. So what about condition and expectation? They are powerful frames or lenses. I love the Cyclones, but conditionally; I expect them to win. I love M 'm' m without condition. It's true; my love for M 'n' m doesn't have an adjective; it doesn't need one; none would work anyway; they would be woefully inadequate, even a very, very long list of adjectives. It's awesome and terrifying. But mostly awesome; as parents we wouldn't trade it for anything. And I've mentioned this before: What if God loves us this very same way, as a parent? Hmm. It's easier to think about the Cyclones.