An Open Heart

One of the best and the worst parts of my job is how open your heart has to be. I'm actually good with having an open heart. I try to have the most open kind of heart I can when I'm at university during the year, but the expectations of people there are very different from the attitudes of L'arche. People don't expect to be open in all areas of your life. It's so different here. You share more than just a house with the people you live with. You share every part of your life. Every joy, every sorrow is there to be shared whether you want it to or not.

It is fantastic to see how much more I invest in relationships when my heart can be this open. It really is. All of my relationships benefit from this. It's not just the relationships that I form here. I'm more open and I'm deeper with all the people who are in my life. And it feels fantastic. I can support more relationships that I was able to prior to getting back to L'arche. The ability to support more relationships is great. It lets me develop friendships with the people I work with. The only problem is that it also makes me want the one relationship I don't have right now.

When your heart is so open, it's hard to not want someone to match that in you. To accept the fact that you want someone to answer the call you feel throughout your entire being is terrifying. To acknowledge the fact that you want someone to be there when you have a bad day, to cuddle and watch movies with, to make weekend plans with on a regular basis. That might be the most terrifying part of having an open heart. It's the wanting of something you don't have.

Having an open heart means that you let people into your heart, but it also means that you have to have the ability to let them out of it. And that's where the strength of relationships is truly required. In the ability to let those you love go.