Be the Friend You Want to Have

I am honored to share my thoughts as a regular contributor to TheCourage.com. I hope you’ll read the rest of this post over there and check out so many other great words of encouragement by a variety of great writers. It’s the internet’s new “happy place”.

Be the Friend You Want to Have

Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:10 NIV

I’ve gotten it backward for many years. I’m just shy of 50 years old and I think God has finally gotten through to helping me understand how this whole friendship thing works.

I need to be the friend I want to have.

I’m proceeding in my relationships with a different outlook. I’m trying new things. I’m risking. The risk is the hardest part. Being vulnerable is not enjoyable. Pain hurts. I’ve lived long enough to know I will get hurt – sometimes by those who have the ability to hurt me the most.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” – C.S. Lewis

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