Jordan has been practicing massage therapy for over 25 years. She can be reached at 440-461-9774.
by Jordan Brown
As young children, we knew how to love with our whole heart. We never pulled back, saying to ourselves, “But I might get hurt!” We never asked for any guarantees: we just loved who and what we loved with our whole heart and no holds barred.
Slowly, as time went by, and we inevitably got hurt, we learned to put a few conditions on love. We told ourselves that love could be dangerous, and we’d better not love too much. We told ourselves to leave a backdoor open always in case things got too intense. We convinced ourselves that maybe love is not that great anyway, or that love is for sissies, or that we are not good enough for love, or that no one is good enough for us…In a million different ways we pretend that love is not that big a deal. But inside, we knew.
Afraid to suffer pain and fear, we start to smother our capacity to feel—period. But unwanted feelings don’t disappear, they just get banished to a dark corner where we can pretend to have conquered them.
We wage war on “negative” feelings. Addictions numb and distract us; we learn to blame and judge others to keep them at a distance; or we devote much time and energy to perfecting ourselves and those around us, hoping that if we can just be perfect that painful feelings magically will vanish. We rely on these types of strategies when we stop believing in us.
Here’s what we knew as babies: An incredible urge to connect with what we loved as fully as possible. We knew that we came perfectly equipped to do that job. We were alive and felt everything! And that was enough…we were enough…and we were in our own corner.
We can’t go back to being a little baby, of course, and wouldn’t want to, but we can still love with all our heart. It only takes the courage to fully be and believe in ourselves, and to know that we are enough, just as we are.
Our Clients are saying…
“I feel like all my muscles and bones are cheering and smiling! You hit everything! I’m just sitting here thinking about when I can come back.” — Carol T.
