No one likes having an enemy, and yet each and every day we are faced with an enemy... Every time we start a new day, when we stumble into the bathroom and look in that mirror, we face our own worst enemy... When we do something wrong, it's his fault; when we say the wrong thing, he's to blame; when we lose our temper, it's all him; when we lust, envy, procratinate, hate, judge, condemn, show bias, bigotry, show prejudice- all can be laid at the feet of that man (or woman!) in the mirror... We are our own worst enemy...More specifically, our mind is our enemy, for our body merely follows the direction it's given. It is our mind that directs inappropriate responses, it is our mind that sabotages our efforts to do or be good, for our mind is the home of our ego; a sadly flawed and desperate creature, wanting happiness, contentment, satisfaction for itself without the ability to achieve it by itself... That is why Paul admonishes us, as Christ followers to constantly "renew our minds" (Romans 12:2, Ephesians 4:22, Colossians 3:12) or set them on those heavenly things... Our minds, without the Spirit, are deceitful and corrupt, and can be decieved...
One of the great deceptions of our mind is often so subtle we don't even realize it, or if we do, we do too late. It is in the area of relationships. We build in our mind the perfect mate, the one who has all those characteristics we think will make us happy, the one who meets our heart's desire, and there that person lives, in our mind. When we meet people we compare them to our ideal, and when we find that person that seems to meet those reqirements, we commit. Yet oft times what we want so overshadows reality that disappointment is inevitable, for no one can be ideal all the time. No one measures up to an ideal; no one can hope to accomplish what our mind desires. For in our mind our ideal makes us happy without effort on our part, and in reality that just doesn't happen. So we experience disappointment, and we move on, for it is the responsibility of our mate to measure up, and they just don't (or so our mind tells us). Or, we look for someone who's close to our ideal and we begin the process of trying to mold, or change them to meet our expectations and, if successful, often find what attracted us to them is now gone... Our mind says it is not our fault, for they didn't measure up.
Reality says we need to love and accept each other for who we are, what we are, and in those areas that we don't mesh well don't look to change the other, rather change "me", for ultimately I am responsible for me. It is not easy to accept responsibility for ourselves; it is so much easier to blame others, to blame society, to blame God. Yet it is essential that we learn to accept responsibility for ourselves, for accepting ourselves, warts and all, is the first step to learning to love ourselves. If we can't love and accept ourselves how can we expect to love and accept another?
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