Unconditional Love

“We’ll talk when I see her next time”, I thought to myself. My cousin wrote me a letter raising some questions about my beliefs. I knew it was going to be a long, difficult conversation and I decided to have it face to face. She was a young mother with 2 healthy boys, a beautiful home and a loving husband. I envisioned taking the kids to the beach and having a heart to heart conversation. Fate, however, had a different plan for us all. “Lucy passed away”, my mother told me on the phone a week later. Wait! She’s younger than me. I’m supposed to die first. Her unanswered letter kept torturing me for years to come. Pain in my gut every time I think of her. Unfinished conversations!
When I contrast that with my Dad passing away suddenly from a brain aneurysm, I understand an important lesson. You see, 5 years before my Dad died, we had long heart to heart conversations, letters and phone calls. I transformed our relationship from parent-child to adult-adult. I felt seen and heard. There was nothing left to be said or done between us. He knew the real me! A sense of completeness! When he died, in addition to the sadness, there was peace, calmness and acceptance. Finished conversations!
While death is inevitable, suffering is optional. If we treat every interaction like it’s our last one and complete our relationships, we lighten our mental and emotional load. Leave nothing unsaid or undone with your loved ones. Share your truth no matter how embarrassing, vulnerable, scary or dumb it may seem. The stress of holding it inside erodes you and the relationship faster than you think. Get rid of baggage that weighs you down and robs your life energy. Death with the resulting sadness and feelings of loss is inevitable. We don’t need to compound that with unfinished business. Sadness and loss pass much faster and easier if we don’t have the baggage of unfinished conversations. This feeling of incompleteness is what keeps pulling us into the past and trapping us in a prison where we are helpless. Make peace with death; Complete your relationships!

#death #love #relationships #transformation #cultureoflove