I used to feel like I knew so much more than what I feel I know now. Now, I know pieces. I know my instinct, my intuition, my gut. I know what I’ve heard. I know what I feel. I know what other people think and what they feel about what I think.
But what do I even know? I used to enjoy reporting on major events in my life – in my diary and daily writing prompts given in class. About Desert Storm, about the Oklahoma bombing, about what my peers were doing (I kept that in the diary). I used to write essays on my blog about current events that mattered to me with links to other articles where I got my information or where someone could read more about the topic.
I can barely get two sentences out now without questioning them. Are they true? Do I really think this? Am I willing to defend this? Debate this? Do I have it in me to fight to the death about this? That’s how it feels. Everything is a wrong or right argument. No one wants to allow nuance, shades of gray, discussion. It’s exhausting to try to exist like a real person. Everyone wants you to cosplay a character. Everyone is just parroting the hot take they heard someone else give. Everyone is pretending life is not gritty and real but instead it’s part of some game, some show, some movie. Like there aren’t real consequences for ways we are failing one another.
The information available on a daily basis is more than I can consume and process. I start to try and then I stall out because I know what so many people think and feel about any given hot topic, about what label I will get slapped with and what box I will get shoved into the minute I develop and share any thought, any opinion, any idea. “Oh, you’re one of them.” And I know I will be immediately defensive and short-sighted and say “Well at least I’m not one of you.” And none of that will go well and everyone will feel a little more irritated and separated and vindicated in their own defense and no one will listen or grow or solve any problem or make anything better. And it will all be a waste.
But, I have been quiet for so long now. I have been not writing anything very share-able. I have been just shrugging and saying “well….” and just trying to smooth things over and keep the conversation non-explosive and just bite my tongue and squash my spirit within myself so that no one else will get the chance to touch it or even see it or even know it exists. I’ve been so protective of my spirit that I’ve almost killed it. I don’t exist in these years it feels. I am a placeholder, waiting for myself to show up again and take the reigns, take the keys, take the words.
It’s not been honorable or even particularly helpful. Keeping the peace is not the same as making peace. I’ve been tired. I’ve been scared. I’ve been hoarding my own personal comfort and it hasn’t even been that comfortable. In fact, it’s pretty damn crowded in here and I can barely breathe.
I don’t like being misjudged, misunderstood, or having words taken from my mouth or page and twisted. I don’t like having tension between myself and those I love. I don’t like how alone I can feel, saying things that people don’t want to hear, don’t like to hear, or just don’t intend to hear. People listen all the time without the intent of actually hearing. People read words they don’t intend to even try to understand. They look for a quick quip to highlight, extract without context, and sharpen into a weapon. But I’ve done that too, haven’t I? I’ve done all the things I hate having done to me. I want to be the exception to the rule, but we’ve all got to do right by one another to actually do right by ourselves.
I know I was gifted words and writing. It’s plainly true and it’s actually stupid and annoying of me to not just admit that out loud at this point. It’s a false humility to pretend that’s not my gifting. It is my gifting and it has been since the beginning. Since 1st grade. Since I could spell and hold a pencil, I’ve been writing. It’s always been my gift, but gifts like this don’t always feel like Christmas.
Often, they feel like more like the week after Palm Sunday leading up to Good Friday. They feel frenzied. They feel dangerous and powerful and necessary and messy and desperate and true and destined to both do good and be misconstrued. They feel like deep grief and like the veil is ripped and the earth is quaking and then nothing but darkness and uncertainty. They feel reckless but faithful. They feel like prophecy and make-believe. They feel like they have to happen even if I don’t want them to happen or don’t have time for them to happen or don’t even really like them at all. They are not always palatable, they just can’t be. They are mine and also, I can’t claim them.
And sometimes I know I use them poorly. I manipulate with them, I spin them just the way I want. I push myself past the muse and it’s the wrong kind of reckless. I’m no different than any other vessel. We all do that. I just want to do it as little as possible and I want to see it happening and stop myself. I want to master my pride and be able to apologize and make right my wrongs.
Life and death ride the words we use all day, every day. Words are a powerful gift. I get in my head about it, I think myself out of it. There are enough words already, what are mine? Why would anyone need mine?
But maybe it’s just that I need mine. I need my words. I need the act of surrendering to the words and of surrendering the words. I need the act of faith that is releasing the words to the world. I need the process of reflecting and creating. I need to do what is within me to do. I need to stop waiting to be. I can stop holding a place for myself. I am here now.
