Contemplating

Why is it that there are certain people (and we all have them in our lives) that can make us doubt ourselves? These people can reduce us to questioning ourselves, to shriveling balls of tears, to masses of self-doubt? Yesterday, my first *official* day of summer, I had two phone calls from two self-sufficient, confident women. They both had encounters with the someones in their lives who made them doubt themselves.

Sunday, Madison was an altar server at church. As she was on the altar, being precious, and I was in the congregation, listening to the service, I was struck by a single comment the priest made. He asked for prayers for "the physically, mentally, and spiritually sick." That single phrase has stuck with me -- how many of us know someone who is spiritually sick, who takes that sickness and brings it to us? Who pushes it on us? Who forces us to become someone we don't want to be in their presence?

And yes, I know -- no one can make you anyone but who you are. No one can change you but yourself. I understand all that. BUT. When faced with that certain someone -- be it your mother or your grandmother or your boss or whomever it is in your life that can push your buttons in exactly the right way -- we shrivel a bit in their presence. Change. Wilt. Become less of who we are. Spiritually melt away.

Thank God for girlfriends. For phone calls to friends. For people to listen. To say, "I know, it's not right...it's horrible...I know..." I know when I have had one of those self-doubt encounters, I want to feel cocooned, wrapped up and loved. That's what my best, closest girlfriends do for me.