Dear Internauts,
When I was a child of around 10 or 11 years, I was tasked with holding an offering bucket as churchgoers disembarked from a small cruise ship. The ship had taken a loop or two around Boston Harbor, while I imagine the adults talked about boring stuff and us kids drank too much soda. Being the kind of church kid I was, I volunteered to stand on the dock, beside the ramp, and receive donations for the church. Excited as ever to be useful, nigh important, I stood up straight and smiled and caught change as the congregation regained their land-legs. At some point, the mass of those walking down the ramp increased to the point that I decided it best to give them a bit more room to move. A polite little rascal with such undeveloped proprioception. Of course, I backed up right into empty air. The bucket shot up. The money scattered. My confused little 10 year old self hit the frigid autumn bay. And in the finest turn of the century luck, my zipped up windbreaker jacket blew up like a balloon. There I was, just a little boy bubble bobbing in the Boston bay between the big boat and the dock. I'd failed in my position as bucket holder, donation acceptor, and dry human being. However, I'd succeeded extravagantly at giving the people on the dock plenty of room, and this certainly would not be the last time I'd be surprised to find myself in a position of both aquatic and arctic peril.
Anyway, we accept the love we think we're worth.
I read that somewhere, and it's only proven more true since.
Growing up with the dual teachings, 'I am inherently broken, incomplete, imperfect, sinful, etc...' and 'God loves me' had the (hopefully) unintended effect of keeping me in a steady state of feeling unworthy of love. Combine this with an exponentially steroidal boost of society's already false-meritocracy-con to commoditize my worth based on my usefulness to my peers, my teachers, my role-models...and you get a kid who feels always just shy of good enough.
Q: If we can't love ourselves, can we truly accept the love of others?
A: In the wise words of Jedi Master Yoda, "You must unlearn what you have learned."
Perhaps this is a warning.
Perhaps you can relate.
Try to live up to impossible standards long enough, and it can become more than a little autodidactical. Basically, I'd spent so much time trying to be what people expected me to be, I began to infer expectations, presume standards, and even preemptively punish myself for failing. The limits I placed upon myself were encouraged by those who loved me, because they only saw a portion of them and it was what I wanted. I assumed what they wanted from me, and got wicked good at essentially making every relationship about being who I believed they wanted me to be.
The beauty is that it's always my fault. If I succeed in being who I ought to be, then the chance of failure as well as the stakes increase each passing moment. And if I fail—as I always will—I can distance myself from the other person before they ever get to see what a loser I am. As you may well imagine, this way of playing the game of life is a fast-track to being alone as $#!%.
Q: If we can't be honest with ourselves, can we be honest with others?
A: I'm gonna say no, but then I don't really trust myself.
The bitterness, regret, heartache, debilitating anxiety, and depressive frustration that such a solipsistic outlook will inevitably lead to only serve to feed the beast of imperfection, incompleteness, unworthiness, and self-hate thereof. While I'm caught up in all this, guess what happens to my relationship with someone outside my own head. (Hint: It's similar to what happened to those church folks' nickles and dimes.)
Loving oneself is a process, especially as we keep changing. So far, growing up seems to be comprised of both getting to know myself and getting over myself more than much else. To all the friends I've won and lost throughout the years, I'm sorry I treated you like a prize I had to earn instead of like an actual, yknow...person. You deserved better and so did I.
So here's to the future, but mostly the present, because really—the past is no longer worth our full attention.
Yours as always,
Odist
p.s. - I've got a Free, All Ages Show coming up on Saturday, June 27th at 6pm at Steel City Cafe in Phoenixville, PA. I would LOVE to see you there. Bring everybody!
p.p.s. - If you haven't already, feel free to mosey over to YOUTUBE and check out my new series, NEW SONG A WEEK ACOUSTIC CHALLENGE PARTY YEAH!!! where I've been writing and sharing a brand new acoustic song every Monday.
p.p.p.s. - Met up with some high school friends last Sunday and went to my first LGBT Pride Festival in Philly. It was wicked hot out, but we were by the river and under a tent, so I just kinda chilled and people-watched all afternoon. I miss the city so much, and everyone there was wicked nice. All this to say please support LGBT Pride in your community, and let's stand in solidarity with all those who are faced with oppression in daily life.
