“It’s not our job to fix people; it’s our job to love them even while they are broken.” (Dave Willis)
I had an intense phone call with someone just recently whom I consider to be a good friend. He’s someone who’s been going through an extremely difficult time in life lately, having only begun his healing path to face his very traumatic childhood, one that would make most people shudder if they knew what he had to endure for nine years of it.
When he came into my life, I had nothing but love and compassion for the wounds he was slowly beginning to work through. As I got to know him better, I did my best to hold space for him during each of our phone calls, by allowing him to have a safe place to open up with no judgment or advice, unless he specifically asked for it.
Unfortunately, an old behavior resurfaced during our most recent phone call, where I attempted to play “Mr. Fix It”, solely because I haven’t had much success in my own healing and thought maybe I might with his. In other words, my ego tried to come to his rescue, even though I knew he wasn’t asking for that. And by that, what I mean is that I strongly suggested he needed to practice forgiveness if he wanted to heal and find some inner peace. I took it even further by offering a strong opinion taken from my own spiritual journey, on why he might have had to go through so much suffering. Because of these attempts to play “Mr. Fix It”, I ended up causing my friend a great deal of pain and anger.
This is precisely why it’s not our job to ever try to fix anyone, because it always tends to cause more problems when we do. Regrettably, I’ve done this behavior before with plenty of others throughout my life and not once have I ever seen anything good come out of it.
Now I must accept the consequences of my actions, knowing my friendship with this person may never be the same and could possibly take a long time to mend. My heart is very heavy because of this, but I’m choosing to accept that maybe I needed to experience this hard lesson again so that I’ll remember it all too well the next time I think about moving from a place of holding space for someone I love and care about, to one where I think I can fix them. As truly, only something much Greater than I can ever do that.
I pray that I may only offer my love and compassion for those who are broken, rather than my judgment and advice as to why I think they’re going through what they are. Because ultimately, I know it’s not me who has the answers, it’s something much Greater than I.
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson
