Being There For Your Partner

photo from Jeff Foster

My love,

you cannot truly “be there” for another

until you learn to “be there” for yourself.

Be there for your breath as it rises and falls.

As it slows, quickens, deepens.

As the belly expands and contracts.

Be there. Be a loving witness

to this extraordinary power that moves through you.

Be there for all your feelings, not just the pleasant ones.

Be there for the grief and the anger, too.

The ease and the frustration.

Be there for the sorrow, the emptiness and the fullness,

the wildness and the calm, the life and the dying.

Be there for all your thoughts.

The ones you love and the ones you hate.

The ones that scare you and the ones you seek.

Be there as they arise and dissolve.

Stay there as they stay and go.

Be there for the broken heart

and be there for the healed one too.

Be there for the answers,

but don’t abandon the questions either.

Be there for the clarity,

but don’t neglect the confusion.

Be there for all of yourself, my love.

Like a mother, there for her children.

And you will be able

to be there for all of me.

Look after me by looking after you.

Find me by finding you.

Let me in by staying near.

This is the paradox

of loving.

- Jeff Foster