Native Tongue

​I could say I can’t help it.  But that would not be true.  I can.  I just choose not to.  I think it is true that so often I say the same thing but in a different way.  It is really just a different emphasis of the same thing.
It occurred to me this morning that that is really natural.  I would probably be more sus of me if I flip wildly from subject to subject.  There are things I talk about that are totally unrelated to what has gone before, or may come after, yet I often go back to the same topic.
Switchfoot would be the favourite band of Merril and I.  Has been for years now.  They change but stay the same.  I was listening this morning to the title track of their latest album, which is called “Native Tongue.”  The title track has the same name.  The words got me.  “Back before we learned the words to start a fight… Love is the language, love is your native tongue.”
I guess that is where I come from.  Like a multi-faceted gem, love has many angles and for me, no matter the topic, it comes back to that.  Something can be the most complex and hard issue, but my question is always, “how would love respond?”
It comes back to the guiding principle of my life.  “Just as you want people to be doing to you, do to them.”  I suppose I am big on fair.  It seems to me to be totally unreasonable to expect I could wish something bad on someone, and not expect the same for me.
It is only since I have been a Christian that I feel there is power rather than wishing.  I have no desire to adhere to something that is just important to me and is nice but in isolation.  Making people feel good I reckon is always good, and I will advocate it, but of itself the best I can hope for, is that it has a beginning and end.  My thinking is, a ripple may go on and on, but it is still within the confines of a pond.
Life is not always the way I want it though.  Sometimes really bad things can happen to me despite my not inviting them, or even seemingly deserving them.  But things happen.  For me, my response is paramount.  Am I going to respond in kind, or will I be true to myself?
I reckon a lot hangs on that.  Will I perpetuate the cycle or break it?  Someone needs to break it and it may as well be me.  It seems that is the only way to get away from “more of the same.”  I do not look for selfishness or self interest at the expense of others.  But I don’t need to.  It comes to me.
Love may not always be my native tongue, but I’m working on it.