Being True to Yourself...

Seems so very simple.  To just be honest with yourself, and then be honest with others.  But it isn’t.  The biggest lies we ever tell are to ourselves, about ourselves, about others, about what we want, what we need.  It is amazing any of us get any satisfaction in this life with the amount of deceit we peddle internally.

I have a friend that is sorting through her relationship.  The love is there.  The commitment is there. But she wants out.  There are lots of reasons.  But the main reason is that she cannot be seen or heard.  She says things, they talk, communication happens, but her needs and wants are ignored.  The guy is not a jerk and loves her.  So much.  But his skills in the relationshiping department are stunted and default to condescension, ignoring things that need his attention and a general redirection of the relationship towards his goals and ideas.

And she has allowed this. It is easier to just let him run with things than to confront him, stand her ground and refuse to capitulate.  She gives in.  She isn’t honest about what she really wants and needs.  She is teaching him to treat her exactly the way she does NOT want to be treated.

How do we fuck this up so much?  It seems like it is all so simple:  you love them, they love you, you have things in common, you are committed and loyal to each other...how could this go so terribly wrong??

I maintain after 30+ years of watching love wither and die, it is a lack of honesty with ourselves that is the death knell of all those sweet relations...

When I fell in love in the past, I allowed this other person to define me in that relationship.  I was too afraid to be me, be honest because I was afraid they would leave, or get pissed or whatever.  Looking back now, I think how much time and energy I would have saved if I was just unapologetically myself and allowed them the grace to just love me or reject me.  Think of all the time and heartbreak I would have missed causing for all concerned if I just would have told the fucking truth.

NO, I do not like that.

NO, I do not want that.

NO, I am not going to do that.

NO, I am going to do this instead.

At least if I would have been honest about those kinds of things then I would have either sowed the seeds of annihilation much earlier, or given us both a forum for honest, intimate discussions.  I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.  And I still not sure which one, couldn’t or wouldn’t, was really operational.

I broke myself down to fit in whatever man shaped box I was trying to live in.  I would cut off and shut down large pieces of myself in order to survive that relationship.  I am not sure the men even asked me to do this (I mean, some of them did, for sure) but most of them just were who they were and I was the one that decided to keep things to myself, hold shit back, not say the thing.  I was the one who was dishonest.  Not about what I was doing. More about what I thought, felt, wanted, desired, and what I wasn’t doing.  

I look at my former self and just marvel at the level of fuckedupness.  I mean, seriously???  

My behavior was akin to training for a marathon when I hated running.  Or working so hard to get a degree for a career that I didn’t want.  It was such a futile endeavor for all concerned.  I wasn’t real, I was what I thought they wanted me to be.  Peddling some fancied up version of me that I thought would be more to their liking.  All the while swallowing all the shit I didn’t say or own that I felt, which then turned into bile that I could no longer hold within.  Spewing relational fodder and vomit everywhere after years of attempting to be something and someone I wasn’t.

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?

I didn’t know I was doing it though.  Or perhaps, more honestly, I didn’t know how not to do what I was doing.  I just wanted the relationship to work out and was overly invested in it working out to the detriment of the relationship’s survival.  Sure if I was all me from the get go, maybe it would have never gotten off the ground.  But maybe, we would have been able to have a shorter, more real, authentic and honest relationship in the end.

Today, I do not feel able to not be me.  I cannot want what he wants.  I am not willing to say the right thing to keep the whole thing going.  My only job in relationship is to be honest and get out of the way of the results of that honesty.  This does not mean being brutal or cruel, but to be unapologetically me.  If they like it, great! If they don’t, that is equally great!  I can no longer allow my desire to be in relation with someone else to tamp my spirit, life and will down.  We are going to evolve together, moving and inspiring each other forward, honestly, openly and with the understanding that we may, quite unexpectedly, be there just being ourselves and one of us may just decide we don’t love that, we don’t want that and we aren’t going to live with that.  Ok, alrighty then!

I can no longer live with the idea that losing you is more important than losing me.  I may just have to lose you.  Sucks, but that is just reality.  My relationship with myself is the most important one I have.  That and with the God and spirit that live inside me.  You don’t have to love me or even like me, but I absolutely must behave in a way and manner that is congruent with me liking and loving me. And sometimes that is going to mean that I have to do things for myself, without you, against what you need and want.  And that is never being done to you, it is just the way it is going to go. And I hope that you are over there doing the same thing!  Please, do not stay with me because you don’t want to be alone or are afraid that if you are who you are I am going to leave.  Let’s face it, we are middle aged and we are single. The chances of it not working out are far greater than the chances of it working out.  So let’s have fun and be real while we get the chance.

I think the hardest thing in this life is being true to yourself.  So fucking hard.  So many pulls to be this other person that is more socially acceptable, more loved, liked, desired or what the fuck ever.  Today, I just want to be me, honestly, openly and without apology.  And you aren’t going to love that a lot of the time.  And that is ok, the door is always open, you can leave whenever you like.  I am no longer afraid of that and I absolutely do not want you to stay if your staying means I have to become the person you want me to be.  There is the door...it was fun while it lasted.

It is hard when we want someone but want to be alone at the same time. It is very hard in this life to find the right amount of commitment, togetherness, safety and affection with another person. Fuck, it is hard to do that within my own skin.  I am like seven different people up in here!  And they all want completely random and different things depending on the moment and situation...so marrying that all up with you, feels like an impossible ask and task a great deal of the time.

One of the great benefits of aging is that you give so many less fucks about things.  I have been through most of my life solo at this point.  I am not worried in the least bit about spending the rest of my life this way.  I’m also open to dating and seeing how I fit, or don’t, with someone else.  There is great fun in that.  And no pressure.  I don’t need to get married, I am really not sure I ever want to live with anyone again, and I have a great fucking life all by myself.  Dating is like trying on clothes, something looks amazing and eye catching on the rack but then you put it on and it pinches or binds or is just some other version of ick.  And that is ok, we don’t have to wear that shirt forever, we don’t even have to buy it.  We can just return it to the rack and keep on looking.  We will find.  Every time.  And maybe we just might find that person we can be ourselves with and live with forever. Or maybe we will just love that person to the best of our ability for a little while and then it will end.  Either way, it’s ok, you wake up with yourself  (Billy Joel).

It is hard to be true to yourself when you have so many competing interests and demands.  So much riding on the love you profess and enjoy.  But I think the only way it can ever last is if both people have the ability to commit to being real, being honest and allowing the other person to do the same.  And understanding that this formula is likely to spell the end of things, but is the only path that will ever lead to something lasting that doesn’t feel like a prison of our own making.

So here’s to loving you best, here’s to you living your best self and life.  And here is to never allowing your commitment to yourself to be overshadowed and hollowed out because you love another person more, or you are afraid to be alone, or you don’t know what you want, or you are too chicken shit to be honest about the amount of time you need to be alone, or the vacations you want to take solo or the kind of sex you want to have.  All lies start within, and from there, they only proliferate!

Again, still...