Traveling Companions — Relationship with Self and Others

No pilgrim travels completely alone.

Along the road, people enter our lives.

Some travel with us for decades.

Some for a few years.

Some for a season.

Some for only a brief encounter.

Others travel with us from a distance. They may be writers, teachers, musicians, artists, spiritual guides, historical figures, or people we have never personally met. Yet something they wrote, said, sang, created, or lived becomes part of our journey.

I have learned that the importance of a traveling companion cannot always be measured by the length of time we travel together.

Someone I have known for years may influence me in one way. Someone I encounter for only a few minutes may say something I remember for the rest of my life.

They are all part of the journey.

That is why I call this category Traveling Companions.

But there is one companion I sometimes forget to include.

Myself.

I am the one companion who has been present for every mile of my journey.

For much of my life, I didn’t always understand the importance of having a healthy relationship with myself.

I often felt responsible for solving other people’s problems.

If someone needed help, I wanted to fix things.

Sometimes being needed gave me a sense of purpose. At other times, I looked to relationships to supply something I thought I needed from someone else:

Acceptance.

I am learning that acceptance has to begin with me.

That doesn’t mean I don’t need other people. I do.

We all need companionship, encouragement, love, friendship, community, and people who sometimes see things in us that we cannot see in ourselves.

But another person cannot be responsible for telling me who I am.

If I depend upon someone else’s approval to establish my worth, I can become vulnerable to flattery, manipulation, and unhealthy relationships.

Jesus said:

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”

For years, I concentrated mostly on the first part.

Love your neighbor.

Help your neighbor.

Serve your neighbor.

Be there for your neighbor.

But there are two little words at the end:

“as yourself.”

I am learning that loving myself isn’t selfishness.

It means learning to see myself honestly.

Who am I?

What are my gifts?

What are my weaknesses?

What do I need?

What are my limitations?

What belongs to me?

What belongs to someone else?

That is where I have learned the importance of boundaries.

Boundaries were a missing part of my relationships for much of my life.

I am learning that a boundary doesn’t mean:

“I don’t care about you.”

It means:

“I recognize where I end and you begin.”

Your choices belong to you.

My choices belong to me.

I can listen without having to solve.

I can care without rescuing.

I can help without taking responsibility for another person’s life.

I can say no and still love.

And I can receive someone’s love without requiring that person to tell me who I am.

Relationships also become mirrors.

Other people sometimes help me see things about myself that I couldn’t see alone.

Someone may recognize a gift in me that I had overlooked.

Another person may expose impatience, pride, fear, insecurity, or prejudice that I need to examine.

Someone may challenge me.

Someone may encourage me.

Someone may disappoint me.

Someone may hurt me.

And sometimes the people who challenge me the most teach me something important about myself.

That doesn’t mean I have to remain in every relationship.

That has been another important lesson.

Not every traveling companion is meant to travel every mile with me.

Some relationships last a lifetime.

Others end because life changes.

Someone moves away.

We change jobs.

We leave a church.

Children grow up.

Friends develop different interests.

People who once saw each other every day gradually see each other less often.

Sometimes nobody did anything wrong.

The roads simply separated.

Other relationships end because of disagreement.

Sometimes reconciliation is possible.

Sometimes it isn’t.

Sometimes a boundary requires distance.

I can love someone and still recognize that continuing a particular relationship isn’t healthy.

I can forgive someone without necessarily reopening the relationship.

And I can be grateful for what someone taught me without believing that person needs to remain part of my life.

Then there is the separation none of us can prevent.

Death.

Someone who has traveled beside us dies, and suddenly we must continue without their physical presence.

But even then, something of that companion can continue down the road with us.

A story.

A lesson.

A song.

A saying.

A value.

A memory.

A way of seeing the world.

Something they planted in us continues growing long after they are gone.

That has taught me that a relationship doesn’t have to last forever to have mattered.

Two pilgrims can travel together for part of the road and eventually reach a crossroads.

One turns one way.

The other continues another.

The separation doesn’t erase the miles they traveled together.

I can grieve that someone is no longer beside me while remaining grateful that they once were.

I can remember what was good without pretending everything was good.

I can acknowledge what was painful without allowing the pain to erase everything else.

And I can continue traveling.

There is something else I have had to learn about relationships.

Love does not require sameness.

I don’t have to remake another person in my image.

Another person doesn’t have to agree with me about everything for me to respect them.

I can listen.

I can disagree.

I can learn.

I can establish boundaries.

I can allow another person to be who they are.

And I need the same freedom.

I shouldn’t have to become what another person wants me to be simply to keep that person’s acceptance.

That brings me back to myself.

Accepting myself doesn’t mean deciding that everything about me is exactly as it should be.

I still need to learn.

I still need to change.

I still need to admit when I am wrong.

I still need other people who will challenge me.

Self-acceptance means being able to look honestly at the person who is traveling this road—the strengths and weaknesses, good decisions and bad ones, accomplishments and regrets—and say:

This is me. This is the person who is still learning to travel.

Relationships are interdependent.

My understanding of God affects how I treat other people.

My relationships with other people affect how I understand myself.

My understanding of myself affects the kinds of relationships I form.

Each relationship touches the others.

So Traveling Companions will be about people.

Family.

Friends.

Teachers.

Mentors.

Children.

Strangers.

People who loved me.

People who challenged me.

People who disappointed me.

People I have hurt and people who have hurt me.

People whose paths crossed mine only briefly.

And people I have known only from a distance.

But these stories will also be about what those relationships have taught me about myself.

I am not trying to collect people who will follow me down the road.

I am learning how to travel well with whoever happens to share the road with me.

Some will stay a long time.

Some will leave.

Some I will have to release.

Some I will lose.

Some will remain part of me long after they are gone.

And someday, I will be the companion who leaves someone else’s road.

So while our paths run together, I want to learn to listen, respect, encourage, love, maintain healthy boundaries, and allow each person the freedom to be who they are.

Perhaps that is what traveling together really means.

We don’t possess our companions.

We receive the gift of their presence for however long our roads run together.

And while we travel, we learn something about them, something about ourselves, and perhaps something about God.

The Curious Pilgrim