Love all your enemies

Our enemies aren’t just people determined to act against our beliefs.

As I thought about what the focus for the last Joy in the Journey Radio program of 2020 would be, I found myself drawn to President Oaks’s most recent Conference address entitled “Love Your Enemies.”  Maybe it’s because this address is perhaps the most political Conference address I’ve ever heard.

Or maybe it’s because, as I think about what President Oaks shared, I can’t help but wonder about an alternative practicality.  President Oaks shares the obvious application of loving our political enemies, but is there another application?  Maybe one specifically for singles?

I believe there is.  Our enemies aren’t just people determined to act against our beliefs.   “For,” wrote the Apostle Paul, “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12).  We wrestle against the natural man and woman, our imperfections, and ourselves.

And yet the Lord’s command remains the same: Love your enemies.  Though it may seem completely backwards, this path brings the greatest joys LDS singles can experience in their single years.  And they can be yours when you love all your enemies.

Love your natural self

You’re thinking that’s totally crazy.  How can we possibly love the natural man and woman when King Benjamin famously declared, “For the natural man [and woman] is an enemy to God” (Mosiah 3:19)?  And how could that possibly bring more joy to LDS singles?

The natural man and woman are indeed enemies to God, so I’m in no way proposing you love that aspect.  I’m proposing you love your natural self, the person you really are inside.

You’re not just the product of evolutionary biology, although we all coexist with that aspect. You’re a beloved child of God with quirks — features of your personality and disposition that you’ve always had.  They’re part of what makes you . . . well, you.  But we often want to hide our quirks to fit in.  We view them as an enemy.

The greatest joy in life comes from embracing all the right things for you.  Of course, keeping the commandments and your covenants will always be among those right things.  But there’s more that’s right for each of us.  And your quirks — the unique expressions of who you naturally always have been, even before mortality — definitely qualify.  So love your quirks and that part of your natural eternal self.

---

Love your imperfections

And while you’re at it, don’t forget to embrace your imperfections.  That’s not what you’d normally hear from a booming self-improvement industry fueled by the assumption that tolerating imperfections equals acceptance of a miserable life, or at best a mediocre one.

Yet I’d never be a better man without my imperfections.  It’s the struggle to overcome challenge that facilitates growth.  My imperfections provide me with that challenge.  My imperfections help me become my best self, and thus, they help me live my best life.

Your imperfections can likewise help you.  I’m not suggesting you stop trying to eliminate your imperfections.  By all means put them on the next bus, train, boat, or plane out of town.  What I’m suggesting is your imperfections provide opportunity for the struggle that makes you your best you.  And being your best self lets you live your best life.

---

Love yourself

But having your best life means loving yourself.  Too often we don’t live the life we most want because we’re in our own way.  The best way to get out of your own way and stay out of it is to love yourself.

Many singles yearn for the companion who’d make them not so single anymore.  But they don’t love themselves — and by love I mean care for themselves the way God cares for them.  We all broadcast our inner selves to others, who intuitively pick up those broadcasts.  Others will sense if you don’t love yourself and want little if anything to do with you if you don’t, because they want to be loved, not used and certainly not despised.

In encouraging you to love yourself, I’m not suggesting you prioritize selfish desires.  I’m suggesting you get good with you, that you sincerely love the deepest part of who you are, because that will then broadcast to others.  And that can lead to joy you can’t have while you’re single.

So, yes, love all your enemies.  Love your quirks that communicate your natural eternal self.  Love your imperfections that provide opportunity for growth.  And love yourself in the deepest part of who you really are.  When you do, you’ll enjoy your single years more because you’ll embrace all the good they have to offer you.  And that will bring you more joy in your journey.

---

You can listen to the monologue for this episode of Joy In The Journey Radio for free by using the player here.  Feel free to continue the conversation by leaving a comment. Learn how you can listen to  all of this episode of Joy in the Journey Radio by going to the show page for this episode!