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Teachings from The Tattoo Tabernacle Honoring Yourself We often think of our bodies as somehow separate from ourselves, as if
our minds were our true identity and our bodies a sort of pull along toy that
follows behind. The truth is that our bodies are the very vehicle for our
experience of being human. They are the physical constructions of our lives,
and it is through their very configuration and how we choose to live in them
that we play out the themes of our lives, through growing, changing, and
healing. Far from being something apart from ourselves, our bodies are
actually and marvelously exactly who we are. But the true beginning of wisdom
about ourselves resides in our bodies. For not only are our bodies not
separate from us, they are the very habitation of our being, cell by cell interwoven with our personalities,
and the container of the souls capacity for love. For the love of our soul is
embodied. It flows through our hearts and breathes in our bones; and to
partake of life fully, we must start from and return to this inescapable
knowing. As souls, when we come into life, we step out of the timeless
eternal and into the finite moment of living as human beings. In this moment,
and in the remarkable context of living on earth, we become both agents and
receivers of the gift of personality, that vast, amusing, unique, and
frustrating array of attributes and attitudes, from which we compose the
symphonies of our individual lives. No human being is exactly like any other; no matter how much you may share with, be influenced by, or bond with
another, only you can be yourself. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be
yourself. Just being born is a compliment. Having a chance at life, to feel,
see, and live it, in precisely the way that you will, is a sterling, never to
come again opportunity. It is easy to forget this. We sit in our lives, sometimes feeling stranded, and alone,
not liking who we are, not being happy to be here. But being a self, living out your uniqueness, is precisely the beauty of being alive, and
when you ignore or forget to celebrate your uniqueness, you insult, in
effect, the consciousness that gave you life. If you, who live breathe,
suffer, and enact all that is yours uniquely to experience, are unable to
value all that you are, who can? And who will? Honoring you is your job. No
one else can do it. No one else has the knowledge or experience. To honor your self is to know your self, in truly a valuing
way; and no love you have or share will reach its full dimension until and
unless you have first learned to truly honor yourself. Honoring yourself
means seeing you, recognizing you, loving and cherishing you. It means that
of all the human beings on the face of the earth, you celebrate yourself: your depth; your sensitivity; your wisdom, what ever
it may be; your talents, whatever arena they fall in; the mysterious,
beautiful path of your own particular history; your inner beauty; your body;
your emotional, physical, spiritual strengths; your wit; your humor, your intelligence, all that you have been, all that you are now,
all that, in time you will be. So honor yourself. From this conscious loving
acceptance of all that you are will spring all the love you can offer to
others. Amen
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