Hospitality, as you know, is my great passion. When I distill down what I care about most in the world, it comes down to the words loving welcome. I want to be a person who offers a loving welcome to everyone I encounter, who makes people feel a deep sense of home and belovedness, who offers everyone in my path a safe place to land, a loving presence. I want people to feel seen and known and welcomed and nourished when they’re with me, like they matter, like they’re loved.
And if I’m very honest, there is one person in my life that it is excruciatingly hard for me to welcome with love. And that person is me when I’m struggling.
I will absolutely roll out the red carpet for you. I’ll make you a middle-of-the-night omelet if you arrive late, stock your favorite whiskey if I know you’re coming, make sure you always have a blanket and a bite of something delicious within your reach. But here’s the bad news: historically, I withhold good things from my own struggling self every chance I get.
I’m working really hard on this, and throughout the last year, even, I can see that I’m getting a little tiny bit better at it. It’s not my first language, and maybe I’ll always default to withholding and have to remind myself to toward gentleness, but I’m inching. I’m baby-stepping ;)
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