Love

Sometimes you find love in unexpected places, people, and times. To say that I'm suffering from low self-esteem would be an understatement. I constantly find all the things that are wrong with me and use those liabilities to stack the walls even higher around me.

This afternoon, I was sitting at my desk at work making phone calls to new and prospective clients. This is a large part of my day; I make close to sixty of these phone calls a day. I mostly answer the common new account questions, explain how to transfer an account, or buy a stock. I knew I had gotten a hold of an interesting client when right off the bat he told me that he invested based upon how God told him to invest. That philosophy is far from the typical responses I get. When he said "God" I immediately felt my stomach lurch. I am a recovering Christian. I had God and religion used against me in the most twisted ways as a child and even an adult. On top of that, I have a serious beef with God and why He allows such suffering as child abuse, sickness, and all the other evil this world contains.

This 75 year old man proceeded to tell me, in the most compassionate and non-judgemental way, that God loves me so much... that He loves all of us so much and that all He wants is for us to love Him back and live our lives in such a way that reflects His love. He went on to tell me that my phone call to him was no accident and how glad he was that I called him so he could share with me what he felt I needed to hear. I tried hard to bristle and convince myself that the phone call was nothing more than me just doing my job. But the harder I tried, the bigger the lump in my throat grew. Now, I need to mention here that I do not cry and I will do anything and everything to avoid it.

So there I am, sitting in my office with tears in my eyes, thanking this man for taking the time to talk to me. It was a simple human gesture that he made, taking a chance that I might not care to hear what he had to say. What he shared with me is really what every person needs to hear at some point, and that is that they are loved. Now, I realize that not everyone is "religious" in this sense but I do know that we all have an innate desire to be loved. Today was my day to hear it from a complete stranger on behalf of a God who I frequently express my displeasure and disappointment in. I can't say that I fully feel "loved" by God... yet... but I can say that today I felt more loved than I have in awhile all because a complete stranger took the time and the risk to simply affirm me as a person despite my unknown flaws to him.