You are here to be loved

It is not your job to become less human, but to become fully human; to rise in your holy humanity, and be more and more true through each experience and moment.

What does that mean?

That more and more, you lay down your weapons of distraction, the proverbial masks that you hide behind, the image you project to protect yourself.

It means that you show up, you tell the truth - not just with words, but with your decisions, with your love and loyalties, with how you live and move around in the world.

Truth-telling is something you live into.

The more you trust that you belong here, the more that you allow yourself to fall into grace rather than shame, the more you stop living to get approval, the more you believe that you are fundamentally good and that you don't need the permission or validation of others to be yourself, the more you will settle into who you really are, and the veil between you and others and the world and God will get thinner and thinner and thinner; vulnerable and intimate and ever so safe.

The very first thing said over the creation of everything - the earth and the water and the sky and the moon and the stars and the sun and the animals and the creatures and the plants and the flowers and the trees and the produce and humans beings, was that it was all

Very, very, good.

It is good to be you. It is good to be here. There is no rescue mission in place to take you away from your humanity and from being in the world. This is it.

This is your holy and wondrous moment. Here and now, with skin and blood and strengths and weaknesses - all of it, this, as it is, as you are.

And I write this with confidence because when the Gospel stories were written and told it was about a God who became manifest in human form here on earth; a Divine being who took on flesh and blood and breath and made its home among us.

It was about a God who spoke of what it is like when we learn to love and have courage and be kind and seek justice and be ever so true, and more and more true, to ourselves and to each other and the earth and all of us together, as we journey on.

Whenever the Biblical Text mentions heaven and hell, it is not referencing a place you go when you die, depending on whether you've said a prayer or not. It's about the reality we create for ourselves and others here and now. Heaven to earth. Heaven on earth.

Friend. This is not a rehearsal. This is not a game. Your humanity isn't some cruel trick or test or lesson to see if you're good enough for God. You are here to be loved, to love, to increase your capacity for peace and wonder and glory and goodness. That is the premise and the end goal.

Rumi said:

"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."

It is not your spiritual vocation, your holy calling, to shed your humanity and become less and less of who you are.

Your journey here is about shedding all those things that keep you from love and from living, from your true self, healing all the things that keep you from connection and community and wholeness. It's a journey about coming home to yourself, as Christ did. As Christ still does.

Note To Self: It is not your job to become less human, but to become your full and true and holy self. It is good to be you. It is good to be here.

Continued in the series "Note To Self", this week with a subscription in the App.

Written by Liz Milani.
Instagram: @thepracticeco