Rooting for the home team

Every human being deserves to feel they are the center of someone’s world. Is there anything more fabulous than to walk into a room and feel eyes light up when you enter? Children especially need and deserve to experience that kind of adoration. There’s a difference between being spoiled and being loved and every child brought into the world is worthy of being loved. Everyone deserves to have someone(s) who think they are IT.

We all come with baggage as we enter relationships. There’s no way around that as things occur in life that change us. We get buffeted by its ups and downs and these events are bound to affect us. One thing we may not realize when we are young and in love is it’s very difficult to flourish in a relationship when one or both of the partners has come from an upbringing or a relationship where love and/or trust wasn’t abundant or expressed fully. Navigating this type of relationship dynamic can feel like rowing up Niagara Falls with a short paddle. People don’t realize how important it is to have their needs met until they are not.

It’s important that we all have a home team. A group of people in our corner rooting for us. The value of a home team teaches us how to select and maintain positive relationships by the way those on our team model love and support and how to be there for others. Not only is it important to know who is on our team, but just as important to recognize who is not. This valuable information can prevent mistakes in placing faith in the wrong people. It’s only through having this type of supportive team that people can discern between people with negative motives and those who have authentic intentions. It’s because of that solid foundation that people can foster healthy relationships when they’re adults. A team or tribe doesn’t have to be family; it can be cherished friends that we trust.

People who feel safe and loved are more likely to know their selfworth and when that occurs, they are less likely to fall victim to those who want to take advantage of them. They are more apt to select friends and life partners who have their best interest at heart and create positive relationships. Individuals who know their value stand up for themselves. They will not willingly stay in a relationship that involves narcissistic tendencies or bullying. The opinion of others pales when a person has self-confidence.

Nineteenth century author Mary Ann Evans, who wrote under the pen name George Eliot, is reported to have said that instead of looking for approval from others to just imagine what your dog thinks of you. She said, “Be the person your dog thinks you are.”

We have a society where many people are caught up in physical appearance and oddly, eyebrows seem to have center stage in the beauty and cosmetic world. When you think about it, our dogs don’t care about our physical appearance. They are only concerned with us showing up and being nearby. As long as we are present, that’s all they really require. We are IT for them.

Their lives revolve around their beloved owners.

While some may lament about whether it’s a good hair day or if they are fat or thin, dogs love their humans as they are and express great joy at our arrival whether we’ve been gone five minutes or a week. Our home team should be made up of individuals who feel about us as our dogs do.

In baseball, the home team bats in the bottom half of each inning and has an advantage of being able to end the game immediately if it has the lead in the ninth inning. There’s something to having the home-court and home field advantage in basketball and football. Having a personal home team gives people an advantage when life is tumultuous, and we must pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.

Love and respect help people to flourish. I’ve seen it happen.

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Pam Lowe is the editor of the Clay County Courier. She may be contacted at pamlowe@claycountycourier. com