The perfect gift for me would be something I am working on giving to others, including my children or especially my children. Unconditional love. And by that I mean loving someone enough not to try to change that person into what you would have them be, or think is best for that person. But loving a person enough to let that person be who God created them to be. Even helping and encouraging that person to become that, even if it isn't the safe picture that you have envisioned for them.
I grew up feeling loved, never doubting that feeling. However, I was also always trying to live up to the perfect projected image that others had for me. And when I wasn't living up to that image I felt disappointment hovering just below the surface of that love. In some cases this disappointment was justified, but I had to find it out for myself, had to work through it myself, not because someone else said or 'knew' better. However in other cases that disappointment isn't justified and it hurts to still feel that disappointment lingering just under the surface.
To be fair, not everyone in my life has been that way. There are those whom have loved and accepted me unconditionally without trying to project me in an image they have for me. The only change in my life these people have spurred is that has come from the inward need to change to live out God's plan for my life. Sometimes that change has been hard, and in one specific instance that person had to bow out of my life for an extended period of time to allow me to see and realize that. But it has always been for my good.
That is my perfect gift.
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