I
Love You
“I love you.”
Three simple words, one unexpected response.
This Advent I am doing things differently. Don’t get me wrong, I
still have my pocket advent calendar filled with goodies (today
I got 2 lollies! Thanks mum! J Yes I am still a child, but it
makes life more exciting) and I also have my nativity advent
calendar – I wouldn’t want to forget what this season’s all
about would I. But in addition to these I am doing an ‘Advent
Challenge’. I have set myself 24 challenges to complete before
Christmas. I’m not talking anything major like skydiving,
winning the lottery (especially as I don’t play) or running a
marathon, but small everyday type things. Some of them are stuff
that I would usually do – putting up my Christmas tree, going
carol singing and watching the Muppet’s Christmas Carol. But
some of them are slightly harder like taking mince pies round to
my neighbours who I don’t really know, telling a non-Christian
friend why Christmas is so important to me, and giving a present
to someone without the expectation of one in return – as a lover
of presents this is a tough one for me!
So yesterday I decided to cross off the “Tell someone that I
love them” (and mean it!) challenge, and so picked up my phone
and called Kentucky to speak to my brother. Now Ian and I, when
we were kids, used to fight something chronic – during fights we
ripped the kitchen carpet, clothing and even a couple of bones
got broken! It’s not like we hated each other, it’s just that we
are too similar to always get on. You see I’m always right and
he mistakenly thinks he is….so trouble follows. As we have grown
up we have become good friends, helped no end by being on
separate continents! In fact we are also quite open about our
love for each other and will always end phone conversations with
“Love you”. So in some ways telling Ian that I loved him wasn’t
that challenging as he should know by now, which is why I
decided to start the conversation with it. It went something
like this….
“Hi!”
“Hey there!”
“I wanted to phone to say that I loved you.” (me feeling really
good at this point)
“Huh?”
“I phoned to tell you how much I love you.” (slightly confused
as to why he wasn’t grasping this)
“What?”
“I love you.”
“Why?” (I was proud that I didn’t respond with the sarcastic
comment that first entered my head!) “I mean, why are you
telling me this?”
This continued
for quite some time as my (not so bright) brother failed to
understand why I’d just told him that I loved him. Why should
there be a reason to express my love? Why should something that
we say so frequently change when it is said out of routine? I
was getting cross with him for not just accepting my love with
grateful thanks, but instead questioning my motives. I guess I
had expected a “Wow! Thanks! My life now has meaning!” kind of
response, instead of the “Huh?” I actually got – which goes back
to my challenge of giving without the expectation of me getting
something out of it. But Ian was right (I know, it pains me to
admit it!), I had phoned him to declare how special he was to me
so that I could cross it off my list of advent challenges. It
hadn’t been a spur of the moment statement but something on my
list of things to do, despite it being sincere.
I had never considered that telling someone that I love them,
someone who knows that I love them, would have been so hard,
would have challenged me so much. By making it a statement with
real meaning rather than a throw away comment, by opening with
it rather than it being an add-on ending, it had changed the
power of the those three simple words, and both Ian and I
couldn’t help but be affected by that.
So in the run up to Christmas I challenge you to challenge
yourself to do things you’ve put off, things you don’t feel
strong enough to do, things you always do but with a new
purpose. Oh and tell someone you love them at the start of the
conversation – you never know, it may change your life (not
recommended with strangers, as it may shorten your life!).
