Welcoming Ourselves Whole

Several years ago, in an online class, the instructor opened our time together by

saying, “Welcome.” We were invited to just sit with the word, welcome, and then with the concept of welcome and then releasing both the word and the concept, we allowed ourselves to just be in the experience of welcome. “Glad you are here. Glad YOU are here.”

As I basked in that experience of welcome it occurred to me that the simple act of

welcoming could be a transformative path toward wholeness. In Unity, we talk about God or Spirit as Wholeness. As being “whole, perfect and complete.” And because we know God to be Infinite and everywhere present, we then know that wholeness is our nature.

Yet how many of us don’t feel whole, let alone perfect and complete. We don’t feel

whole in this world which is divided by race, culture and politics. And we don’t feel whole within ourselves with abandoned bits and pieces of ourselves stranded along the timeline of our lives? Those parts that we shun or lock away because we feel embarrassed or ashamed of them or because they’re stuck in an old belief of

unworthiness, or unlovability.

This can leave us yearning for inner peace, for a sense of feeling whole. Welcome

can be that powerful, yet overlooked, pathway to wholeness.

What comes to mind when you think of the word, “welcome?” I think for many of us this word conjures images of welcoming others - into our homes, into our lives, into our communities.

Welcome can be transactional. For example, when we are welcomed to the hotel or to a restaurant in exchange for dollars. But true welcome goes deeper than that—it’s about creating space for another person to be fully themselves. This kind of welcome is a gift that touches something deep within us.

Welcome is a big part of what we do here at Unity of San Antonio and is something that many of us experience as part of this community. When we say welcome here, we mean that we welcome each everyone just the way that they are.

Welcoming others can also be a radical act. Think of the great social movements in

history that were based on inclusion—civil rights, women's rights, LGBTQ+ equality -when we extend welcome to those who have been excluded, we are participating in the work of healing not only individuals but also society as a whole.

Going deeper into welcome offers another layer of challenge: welcoming all of life’s experiences, even the difficult ones. We live in a culture that encourages us to avoid pain, to push away discomfort, and to pursue happiness and pleasure. But life, as we all know, is not always easy or joyful.

What if we learned to welcome even the hard moments—grief, loss, uncertainty, and failure? When we say, “This, too, is part of my journey”—we create space for integration and growth.

In Buddhist teachings, there is a concept called Radical Acceptance. Buddhist

teacher and author, Tara Brach writes, “On this sacred path of Radical Acceptance,

rather than striving for perfection, we discover how to love ourselves into wholeness.”

This doesn’t mean that we condone harmful actions or passively accept injustice.

Rather, it means acknowledging reality as it is, we become more whole because we stop resisting aspects of our experience.

Perhaps the most profound aspect of welcome is learning to welcome ourselves.

We live in a world that constantly tells us that we are not enough. We are bombarded with messages that we need to be thinner, richer, smarter, more successful, and many of us spend our lives trying to be or become someone other than who we are.

But true wholeness comes from embracing our full selves, including our

imperfections, and our vulnerabilities. Imagine what it would be like to say, “I am

enough, just as I am.” How would your life change if you welcomed your flaws, your

mistakes, your fears, and insecurities as part of your wholeness?

This is what we teach here in Unity.

Unity co-founder Myrtle Fillmore wrote: “Unity’s mission in the world is to help

people release those fears and hurts that bind and confine, that we may experience and

express the love that we are.”

Unity teaches a practical spirituality, a teaching that supports us in recognizing and remembering that we are already whole, remembering that we are whole because we can’t not be.

The first part of any New Thought affirmative prayer is the strident reminder that

there is only One, and being One, It is whole. And we are of it, because we can’t be

outside of something that is the only thing. Thus, we are whole.

This is our foundational teaching - this is New Thought’s foundational teaching. We need to get it in our bones: there is only One and we are of it because we cannot not be.

We are Love. We are Peace. We are Wisdom.

As we do this work, it naturally softens us, opens our heart, makes us more

compassionate towards ourselves and others. As we welcome each other, welcome our

experiences and welcome ourselves as we are, here and now, we recover our

wholeness.

This work we do welcoming ourselves whole isn’t selfish, it’s not self-centered, it’s

centered in self. In some ways it is some of the most unselfish work we can do, because

as we welcome ourselves whole, as we learn to love our whole selves, we discover that

we can love others in that same way. “Love your neighbor as yourself.” As yourself. If we cannot love ourselves as whole selves, then how can we love our neighbor as they are?

As we close in on the upcoming election, we would all do well to remember this.

Regardless of how this election turns out, there will be people who are happy with the outcome, and people who will be unhappy with the outcome. And we will have both happy and unhappy people here in our community.

And yet, each face in our community is an expression of the divine, intentional and

on purpose. This is true also in our greater community. Every face you see is an

expression of the divine. We are all waves in the ocean of infinite consciousness. We are each unique and individuated expressions of the Most High - of the All That Is -of the Ground of All Being.

This can be difficult during times when our beliefs and fears are rising to the surface. It is easy to fall back into the illusion of separateness. And so, I invite you to really lean into your spiritual tools over the next few weeks as things in our outer world heat up.

If you feel anxiety or fear rise up in you, pull out your spiritual tool kit and select a

tool - following your breath, opening your heart again, reminding yourself that you are soul, an expression of Love and Wisdom, so that Love and Wisdom guide your actions.

The community of Unity of San Antonio created the following vision: “As Divine

Love, we envision a spiritually transformed, peaceful world.”

If we truly believe these words, let us commit to holding that vibration of a spiritually transformed, peaceful world, as we move through the next few weeks and beyond.

Let us go to the polls holding our vision in consciousness: “As Divine Love, we

envision a spiritually transformed, peaceful world.” Let us cast our ballots from this place in consciousness.

And on the Sunday following the election, let us return to our community

remembering that we at Unity of San Antonio say to each other, “You are a beautiful expression of the Divine and you are welcome here.”

Not, “You have to change and be better in order to be welcome.” Not “We’ll welcome you when you’re perfect.” Unity of San Antonio says, “You are welcome as you are. I am welcome as I am. Let us remember our wholeness together..”

Welcome is a radical act of love.

Welcome as a path to wholeness invites us to step into a space of unity—unity with others, unity with life, and unity with ourselves. To welcome others is to recognize that we are all part of the same human family and the same spiritual family. When we welcome life’s experiences we come to understand that both joy and pain are part of the fabric of existence. And to welcome all aspects of ourselves is to realize that we are already whole, just as we are.

I invite you to carry this spirit of welcome into your life. Welcome the people you

encounter, especially those who are different from you. Welcome the experiences that life brings, even when they are hard. And most importantly, welcome yourself—your whole self—with open arms.