Present Over Perfect

unarmed: no noise, no activity, no ear-splitting volume. Just
the water, the coral, my son’s small sweet hand.
And so I began to peer into the darkness, that plunging
sense of deep inadequacy. It’s always been there. Frankly, I
didn’t know other people didn’t have it. I thought that at the
center of all of us was black liquid self-loathing, and that’s
why we did everything we did—that’s why some people
become workaholics and some people eat and some people
drink and some people have sex with strangers. To avoid
that dark sludge of self-loathing at the center of all of us.
As I started to talk about this, though, gingerly at first,
and then with increasing vulnerability, I realized that not
everyone feels this thing I feel. Some people, apparently,
feel solid and loved and secure, in their most inside, secret
parts. WHAT?
Well, no wonder.
I still didn’t understand the solution, but more clearly
than ever, I understood the problem: the hustling that had so
deeply compromised my heart was an effort to outrun the
emptiness and deep insecurity inside me.
This was going to have to be, as Anne Lamott says, an
inside job. And so I began the daily, unglamorous work of
rebuilding that strong inner core—replacing that sludgy
hatred with love.
Silly as it may sound, I begin each morning by picturing
a heart—like a red cartoon heart. And I train my mind on
the reality of God’s unconditional love for me. For all
people, for everything that he’s created. When my mind