I've been pretty quet since the move, and not just in the blog realm. I really haven't been saying much. At all.
I think that's par for how I tend to cope with big changes. I shut down. I get silent (or nearly so). 'Cause I'd rather sort everything out in my own mind before I go running my mouth.
In theory this is a fine plan. 'Cause in theory this process of "sorting things out" takes a few hours or days of being lost in La La Land (that space in your head containing thoughts you dare not vocalize - from the absurd to the downright awful). Then I return, better adjusted and able to clearly communicate all the thoughts I was wrestling, and maybe even with a brief synopsis of how I overcame them... in theory!
But in reality, it takes me a lot longer to unpack emotional baggage than it takes to physically unload boxes, and I still have a LOT of those to sort through.
The last few weeks have been filled with a lot of awkward (or painful) silences, while I have been utterly trapped in my own head.
And in case these scattered sentences haven't already made it clear, I'm still not through (or even close) to "sorting things out."
But I decided to take a hiatus from my solitary prison, and open up, even if it's in the lamest form possible, on the internet.
I told my husband recently, through a waterfall of tears I might add, that I don't feel like I know my place yet. At home. At work. As a wife.
I don't really have these roles down. And that's frustrating to me.
I feel like I don't have a clue what I'm doing. I feel a little lost. And very alone sometimes.
And, it's scary to feel like I'm losing my mind in the mess of life, and uncertainty, and stress, and...
The next day I called a friend to talk about this very thing.
"Why's everything so... hard?" I asked her.
She said she couldn't give me an answer to why, but she told me she suspects it's hard for everyone.
"We just don't tell each other," she confided in me.
And at that...
I breathed!!!
I took a deep inhale.
The kind I'd been grasping for without success.
The kind I'd been dying for.
I took a good, deep, slow breath.
I think now, more than ever, we all face the temptation to pretend. To pretend that we've got it all together. To pretend that things are simple. And easy.
(Or to sit in silence until we have not only something nice but something really spectacular to say.)
What required sci-fi technology to create in the movie Stepford Wives, takes only Photoshop and careful editing in today's world of the web.
With the click of a healing brush tool, or the closing out of a screen before posting a particularly revealing status update, we can do a pretty darn good job of controlling how others percieve us.
And in a lot of ways it's smart, to protect our private lives from prying strangers' eyes. To keep from saying something we'll regret, particularly since the web is written in ink not pencil (I heard that somewhere) shows wisdom.
In so many ways, we can carefully craft who we are to the world, and that's not all bad.
But, what happens when we step out from behind the screen... and have to face real life? The real world?
(The one I heard horror stories about all through high school.)
What happens when we look in the mirror and don't recognize the unedited face we see before us?
What happens when our gut reaction isn't at all like the carefully curated things we're used to typing?
I've always loved the idea of focusing on the postive. It seems like the happiest way to live. To be optimistic. To be grateful.
But life isn't always good. And I think when we continually gloss over the problems, the struggles, the biggest lie is the one we're trying to sell ourselves...
Social media is like a dream-come-true for those of us who like to put up a front to protect ourselves.
But it's also really dangerous. In part because of the ways we can hurt one another - slander, backstabbing, those aren't new to seventh grade classrooms or cyberspace.
I think the bigger danger, though, is fooling ourselves.
Into thinking our life is meant to be perfect. And simple.
And believing that everyone else's life already is.
The truth is we all struggle. We all have battles to win, and scars from the ones we've lost.
We all have times we feel alone. And times we don't know what to say.
Times we need a break. Times we need a hand...
Life is hard. And we're human.
Which means, we're bound to slip up, to shut down, and to struggle at times.
What a relief to know we're not alone in that. And, to rest assured, that we don't have to be something we're not.
Why, though, is it so hard to admit our humanity?
It seems like that would be the easisest thing in the world, considering we're surrounded by other humans.
But... I think sometimes I need to remind myself that it is okay.
To be a mess. To be frazzled. To be flawed.
To simply be, myself. As is. Imperfections and all.
Isn't it enough to be honest?
Maybe if I believed that I wouldn't feel the need to sit back and be silent so much of the time.
Maybe I'd share my thoughts, my feelings, my heart, more readily.
Maybe I'd post silly pictures, and sad news, laughs and life lessons... instead of only relaying the good stuff.
And maybe, I'd have a lot more grace to share with others, if I allowed myself to experience it first.
Just some thoughts, from the quiet girl, still trying to find her way.
"If each man or woman could understand that every other human life is as full of sorrows, or joys,
or base temptations, of heartaches and of remorse as his own...
how much kinder, how much gentler he would be."
- William Allen White
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