Unconditional

"I could have loved you better, didn't mean to be unkind.  You know that was the last thing on my mind."  The lyrics belong to Tom Paxton, but the song belongs to my past.

Compassion seems to be creeping into my life in unexpected and uncomfortable places.  I find myself looking at life from the other side, from the side of "the enemy" so to speak and not feeling the old angst anymore.

I'm not sure where that comes from, but I do know it is real because it is even permeating my dreams.

Perhaps it is because I have experienced truly unconditional love from someone for the first time in a long time, at least someone outside the family framework.

There is amazing grace and power in unconditional love.  It is perhaps one of the rarest things on earth.  Most people talk about it, but very few people have offered it to me.

Most love seems to come with strings, or at least threads, attached.  If I snap those connections I know the love goes with them.  In the past I thought this WAS love.

Now I know better and it is making me a softer, kinder, richer person.