Today, I had coffee and a walk in the rain with an old friend. I mentioned to him how as part of my strategy for coping with the pandemic, I decided that I would reach out to and support others. I thought this through carefully while I was in Costa Rica. I knew that I was not afraid of getting the virus, though certainly I was going to run that risk at times, and it certainly wasn't something that I would want to have to deal with. But I wasn't, and still am not, afraid of getting sick. And I am not afraid of dying, much as I enjoy this life. But my future is in God and for this reason I feel safe, no matter what happens. I was afraid of the fear itself. I was afraid of soaking up the ambient fear and anxiety and terror that I knew people would be living with, because we live in an age of heightened fear and anxiety, not to mention that so few of my generation are morally or otherwise equipped to cope well with adversity. We are soft, spoiled, entitled and pathetic.
That was when, through prayer, I came up with the brilliant idea of reaching out and supporting others as my way of shielding myself from being afraid. To quote the writer of the first letter of John in the New Testament, there is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out all fear.
While on my way home the love of Jesus became my rallying cry. I think this has been successful. I am making a point of staying in close contact with others. In a couple of cases the contact is daily. We are, of course, supporting one another, and so it should be.
None of us is complete in ourselves, or by ourselves. That isn't how God made us. We only truly become truly ourselves when we are connecting to and reaching out in love to others. This has nothing to do with codependency. This has everything to do with fighting the ethos of selfishness and narcissism that has us in its grip and acknowledging that we are not the centre of the universe.
I have sometimes noted while walking outside how absolutely solitary someone appears to be when they are either smoking a cigarette or focussed on their precious little smart phones. Then I heard something interesting on the radio this morning. I believe it was a doctor stating that addiction is the opposite to human connection. This so makes sense. We are made to connect. If you believe, like me, that God is love, and that we are all and each made in the image of God, then love must somehow be what moves and informs us and our actions. Otherwise, isolation, darkness and destruction.
This isn't to say that we don't need solitude, which is quite a different state from isolation or loneliness. And certainly we need to live our lives in a state of balance so that we can adequately take care of ourselves while also caring for others. And neither should we forget how many people isolate because they have been so badly hurt by others, or because they are not cared for and must live and die unnoticed by others. I think this is why it behooves us to reach all the more aggressively beyond this isolation to touch other people's lives. We need one another. And we really need to relearn community. All for today, darlings!
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