the length of waves

For as long as I can remember, and I remember most things, honesty has always been the best policy. My mom taught the rule to me long ago, and though sometimes I kicked dirt in the line in the sand, I always knew that honesty was best. That if you truly told the truth, you’d never have to worry about what you said. Except for what you first said, if the truth hurt, but you’d never have to navigate out of any self created web of lies that stuck you places you’d never hope to be. And for the longest time even the difficult was easy. I believed in my actions, my words, things in general so much so that I could stand by them. Look someone right in the eye. Tell the truth. Be honest. But somewhere, sometime, instead of just kicking dirt in the line in the sand, I started brushing it under the rug. Started believing that would make things easier. Started creating some kind of false truth. An honesty built on the absence of vulnerability. Essentially, a foundation of lies.

 

To be human is to be vulnerable. We are all just trying to navigate our lives somewhere on a scale of expectation versus reality. Of what we wanted to be when we grew up versus “where are they now?” Of “am I doing this right?” of “do you like me?” of “ do I like me?” Of all these questions that may never, in truth, ever have answers. And that’s scary. Remember the statistics that public speaking and death were both in the top fears of Americans? I do (again, remembering most things). A study last year showed that in the top ten fears of Americans, among “personal failure”, “personal anxieties”, and “daily life” (yes, this was in the top ten), was also “judgment of others.” How did we become so fearful? Why does it matter? How do we fix it?

 

the sky is the color blue.

 

That is a fact. And so is my love for my mom, my best friend, the man I sat side by side with on a bench in New York while he took off his glasses and looked me in the eye and told me he couldn’t see anything but me. Blood is red and that is a fact and so is the feeling I get sometimes when I feel under appreciated and over worked and exhausted. Flowers have petals and that is a fact and so is that I just want to be loved and held for more than just a catalyst of something else and a temporary escape from some kind of permanent. We all take breaths and that is a fact and so is that there are moments where I feel unlovable and insatiable and a little bit broken. There are seconds in minutes and that is a fact and so is that there never seems to be enough time for yourself when you constantly operate as selfless and you can’t stomach the fact of asking for more.

And why is this difficult? And why if these things are all facts can we not speak them equally and as such? If blue is blue and love is love, why is stating the latter so hard? Why do emotion, feeling, the most beautiful parts of life feel so challenging to discuss? Why do we consistently live our lives in earthquake mode? Deciding that if we stand in the doorway, put our hands up in indecision, that we will certainly receive the best reward? Is that even the kind of life we want to live? Where we don’t reach for anything else, but just surrender to what we believe is the expectation? The safest? Where we kind of, just, well, give up?

 

carrots are good for your eyes.

 

I had forgotten (pushed aside) honesty for many a year. And not even that I pushed it away, not that I was ever lying, I was just withholding the truth; not voicing my thoughts. Afraid that what I really felt, what I really wanted, would be rejected. I, again, rooted myself in resiliency. In being everyone’s confidant, security, all around “cool girl” who was inspired by much and not bothered by many, floated through hours, days, years, in indifference. In arms distance. In hearts distance. It never felt close enough nor far enough. A level of comfort in discomfort. A walking contradiction.

It took a boy sitting on a counter-top, cooking us dinner while we shared bites of carrots to remind me how easy honesty could be. He sat on the island, cross legged, barefoot, while we ate off ceramic plates his mother had thrown. He told me things most people would bury in diaries, in prayers, in thoughts that would be forever silenced. But he spoke them effortlessly. Openly. He looked me in the eye. We spent hours of back and forth speaking our fears, our regrets, the things that cracked our hearts in ways we still haven’t been able to fix. We fell asleep holding hands and I told him how much he had changed me. And it was easy. Normally it wouldn’t be. How sad that we’re even afraid of even telling people how wonderful they are.

Maybe we’ve stopped trusting people. Maybe, now, our hearts have been broken and pieced back together so many times that it feels like too much effort to trust that it won’t happen again. That we’d rather just keep our hearts protected and moving in a straight line.

Here is where I remind you of this: flat lining of a heart is bad. It means death.

Here, only symbolically, but think of it. When we stop following our heart, it’s beliefs, it’s wants, the things that make it beat faster and slower, we let part of us die. We stop being honest to even ourselves. And I’ve been there. I’ve stood in a shower for too many minutes while hot water poured over my skin, thinking if I could even care enough about someone in any form of relationship anymore. If it was even worth it. If when it came time to a hiccup in the bubble of love if I would even take time to address my own feelings or if I would just rather shake it off and move on to something else. Like saying nothing about the things that bothered me was better than “bothering” someone with it. This, my friends, is a form of lying. It breaks the integrity with yourself and with others. Also in the top desires of American’s (and probably around the world) in companions both friend and lover? Honesty. Let’s try that again.

 

sticks and stones.

 

“Honesty is the best policy” and “ do unto others as you would have them do unto you” were both phrases that rang one million times over in my head and my home throughout all of my youth (and well, even now to be honest). “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” was another one of those phrases. Maybe because my brother was a complete jerk and called me the most terrible of names all while pinning me down on the trampoline and writing letters to grandma on my chest (which, you know, actually did hurt) that my mom was seeking some kind of rhyme to help me recover. Plus, telling someone that you’re rubber and they’re glue and whatever they say bounces of you and sticks to them only gets you so far. “Sticks and stones” focused more on diminishing the power of words, not throwing them back on someone else. To receiving the words, but not giving them any power. And you want to know what? Sticks and stones kind of knows what’s up.

The more we speak the things we feel, the less power we give to those words; the less scary they are. A word is just a word until we define it, in our own way, to be anything else. A string of words is just that until we put fear into a fragment of a sentence that we then cover in shame. The more we speak openly about our thoughts, our feelings, our contradictions to the accepted, the more we eliminate the stigma attached to it. We spend a decent amount of time in social protest to give people the freedom of expression, but we are too often oppressing ourselves of the same basic right. And all because of a little self formulated fear.

There is also this. I know that behind words are feelings. And in feelings is vulnerability. And in vulnerability there is fear. But what are we really afraid of? That someone won’t like us? Good riddance. That our ideas are different and out of the norm? You’re lucky. That the love we feel for someone won’t be returned? That’s okay. You love. You loved. That makes you love. In freeing yourself from fear you create an environment for others to do the same. An environment where people are encouraged in personal growth, recognition, and reflection. More importantly, they crave it. Suddenly you are surrounded by people who are in actuality living their truth, instead of just hashtagging it. You are part of something beautiful; maybe you started it.

 

Tell that person you love them. Tell yourself it’s okay to feel sad. Tell someone why you do. Honor your feelings because they are beautiful and we are all flawed and why don’t we just try to start connecting on that as a foundation instead of the pretense that we’re all perfect. Ya, let’s start there. You know, with honesty.