Thought for Today... Strong or Soft?

Not long after I started positing again I received a sweet message from a long time friend - probably in the top three longest friendships I have had.  

I've know D since I started high school, those years that formed the basis for who I am today in many ways.  It's been 25 years and still her voice rings out through the distance in memories and reminders, in reminiscing and keeping in touch - all wrapped in love.  

Her message resonated and also caused me to question - she told me I sound strong and how she feels much the same.  She commented...

"It is amazing how unconditional love makes us stronger and bolder."

I can't deny the beauty of unconditional love but I question whether it makes us stronger or bolder - or whether it softens us, gives us the space and support - unconditionally - to dance into who we are deep inside?

I've always been strong - independent.  Being on my own, navigating the world and trying to succeed bred a certain toughness within me, the strength to withstand the forces that otherwise would try and bring me down.  I was hardened and surrounded by a wall that only a select worthy few were ever allowed to breach.  It kept me safe but it was also lonely.

Now that I have found my forever partner, the man who allows me to shine into myself I feel softer - that not only has he been able to penetrate the fortress that I had constructed around myself but he has also smashed it to pieces and in doing so has revealed me in all my perfectly unperfectness to the world.  

It doesn't feel scary though as it once did when I was on my own.  There is a safety to it in that I know that he will be there to catch me - no matter what.  Unconditionally.   

In showing me his love - and that he loves me for all that I am, I have found safety, a space to sink into my softness and be who I am, who I always have been - hidden as I was behind that wall.  

D also wrote that in being loved we are now...

"Free of the worry of what others think and self aware and positive."

These things live within us, are always there.  Standing on our own it is sometimes hard to find love for ourselves, we use the light of others to see this beauty, fleeting as it often is.   But if we can find a way to soften our hearts with or without another we are powerful and strong beyond measure.  

It is in finding softness that we become strongest.   

Your choice today - strength or softness?