It's relatively early in the morning for me to be sitting here typing, but my mind is busy despite being a bit tired. I met someone a few months ago, a series of unrelated events culminating into this crossing of paths. Over time I realized I'd found a kindred spirit and someone I appreciated. We have since parted ways but I will always think about him fondly.
We go through our lives, especially as adults in a kind of daze. We do what needs to be done and the playfulness gets lost a little. I, at the time of my meeting him, was unclear about my direction except that I wanted a new one. I had spent several years just doing what needed to be done. Meeting someone who resonated with me at a soul level and where I was able to allow myself to be the person I am without as many filters as I give to others, it helped me to suss out at least the next few steps in the direction I want and need to take. Knowing him and getting my emails every day brought in a kind of vividness and hope I hadn't wanted, allowed, or had in a long time. I recognized myself again, portions of me I'd hidden away from prying eyes or out of fear of pain. I realized that being who I am, while it may not bring up the same feelings of appreciation from everyone, is going to be essential if I am ever going to settle fully into the life I really want to experience. It is also essential to my being able to allow someone into my life. How can I possibly trust myself and my life to someone else if I know they don't really know who I am because I have been guarded or only showing them the bits I think they will like? It can't happen. There would always be some part of me which would be aware I was hiding something or afraid to show them something and fear doesn't mix well with Love and Trust.
As human beings we think so often that we are such broken or flawed creatures we could never show up exactly the way we are. We think about how our messy pasts are too much for someone else to love, our imperfect bodies are not beautiful enough to embrace, the struggles of our minds so abnormal it makes us unable to be understood, or our addictions (whatever they may be) such an embarrassment are a character flaw that no one should have to deal with it in their lives - none of it something we want in ours. But we all feel that way I think. We all worry our imperfections make love, real "I embrace everything about you!" LOVE, is some how impossible for us to have the way we are right now. We think if I lost twenty more pounds, or had a past fraught with less pain, had a better career or more money, if we had our "sh*t" together then it would be fine for someone to love us. I think our having our "sh*t" together just means we think it would be a lot less likely that person we want in our lives is going to run the other way when they find out who we are.
But here's the thing... All of that "sh*t" we need to get together is still just surface. It is still just transitioning events, changeable, mutable and inconsistent. It has no foundation in real truth, a truth that is consistent about us and who we are in all the transitional "sh*t" that happened to us. The things like our imperfect bodies they change, even if you are model beautiful one day you will get old, if you are buff and fit one day you could get paralyzed. Under that body who are you? Under that career who are you? When your painful past happened who were you and who are you now because of it? What I am talking about here is truths like are you kind even if you don't have to be? Do you try to do the right thing ever? Who do you trust and why? What do you see that is beautiful in life that every time you notice it you have to pause? What is your favorite childhood memory and what was it you felt? I am talking about the foundations of your thinking and behavior here... And most importantly, the thread that feeds all of these other truths about you... How do you love? Do you ache and long? Do you want so badly to help the other person heal and realize how unbelievably beautiful they are? Do you move mountains? Do you hide or shrink away because you fear those waves of emotions could swallow you up or unleash all the things at the bottom of your oceans? Immutable truths about us as human beings are the necessary ingredient to relationships that will both last and bring you a sense that who you are (at least to this person) is exactly what they want and need.
We are fragile creatures with fragile egos. We are imperfect and messy. We are beautiful because of it, if only that our own fragility and imperfection allows others theirs as well.
We go through our lives, especially as adults in a kind of daze. We do what needs to be done and the playfulness gets lost a little. I, at the time of my meeting him, was unclear about my direction except that I wanted a new one. I had spent several years just doing what needed to be done. Meeting someone who resonated with me at a soul level and where I was able to allow myself to be the person I am without as many filters as I give to others, it helped me to suss out at least the next few steps in the direction I want and need to take. Knowing him and getting my emails every day brought in a kind of vividness and hope I hadn't wanted, allowed, or had in a long time. I recognized myself again, portions of me I'd hidden away from prying eyes or out of fear of pain. I realized that being who I am, while it may not bring up the same feelings of appreciation from everyone, is going to be essential if I am ever going to settle fully into the life I really want to experience. It is also essential to my being able to allow someone into my life. How can I possibly trust myself and my life to someone else if I know they don't really know who I am because I have been guarded or only showing them the bits I think they will like? It can't happen. There would always be some part of me which would be aware I was hiding something or afraid to show them something and fear doesn't mix well with Love and Trust.
As human beings we think so often that we are such broken or flawed creatures we could never show up exactly the way we are. We think about how our messy pasts are too much for someone else to love, our imperfect bodies are not beautiful enough to embrace, the struggles of our minds so abnormal it makes us unable to be understood, or our addictions (whatever they may be) such an embarrassment are a character flaw that no one should have to deal with it in their lives - none of it something we want in ours. But we all feel that way I think. We all worry our imperfections make love, real "I embrace everything about you!" LOVE, is some how impossible for us to have the way we are right now. We think if I lost twenty more pounds, or had a past fraught with less pain, had a better career or more money, if we had our "sh*t" together then it would be fine for someone to love us. I think our having our "sh*t" together just means we think it would be a lot less likely that person we want in our lives is going to run the other way when they find out who we are.
But here's the thing... All of that "sh*t" we need to get together is still just surface. It is still just transitioning events, changeable, mutable and inconsistent. It has no foundation in real truth, a truth that is consistent about us and who we are in all the transitional "sh*t" that happened to us. The things like our imperfect bodies they change, even if you are model beautiful one day you will get old, if you are buff and fit one day you could get paralyzed. Under that body who are you? Under that career who are you? When your painful past happened who were you and who are you now because of it? What I am talking about here is truths like are you kind even if you don't have to be? Do you try to do the right thing ever? Who do you trust and why? What do you see that is beautiful in life that every time you notice it you have to pause? What is your favorite childhood memory and what was it you felt? I am talking about the foundations of your thinking and behavior here... And most importantly, the thread that feeds all of these other truths about you... How do you love? Do you ache and long? Do you want so badly to help the other person heal and realize how unbelievably beautiful they are? Do you move mountains? Do you hide or shrink away because you fear those waves of emotions could swallow you up or unleash all the things at the bottom of your oceans? Immutable truths about us as human beings are the necessary ingredient to relationships that will both last and bring you a sense that who you are (at least to this person) is exactly what they want and need.
We are fragile creatures with fragile egos. We are imperfect and messy. We are beautiful because of it, if only that our own fragility and imperfection allows others theirs as well.
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