Welcome Back
Hello, I’d like to welcome myself back to the weekly email!
As I’m sure none of you noticed, I haven’t sent an email out in a couple of weeks. That’s because I needed some time. Time to process. Time to evaluate. Time to grieve.
Now, before you go sending me flowers with “LOL” in the card thinking it means “Lots Of Love”, I am fine. I’m not grieving a death of anyone close to me, but I am grieving a death within myself.
A past version of me. What he wanted. How he wanted to live. What he wanted out of life. And all the things he thought he needed to do to make that happen. It was grieving process that was complex, because there was no casket, no wake, no telling humorous stories about the time I emptied the dishwasher, farted so loud I broke a plate, and then yelled at the dog about not startling an old man before pooping myself and making the finest banana bread this side of the Mississippi. There was none of that.
It was a death of expectation. And a realization that I was once again a blank canvas.
As a human, we are a startling amalgamation of influences. A hodgepodge of poached ideas all coalescing into something startlingly original. But made up of ideas not of our own.
We steal from friends, family, mentors, celebrities, influencers, and countless others throughout our lives. We assimilate the ideas and concepts of those around us.
Sometimes those ideas jive with our inner sense of self, and others are born from needing a sense of belonging. We want to be liked. So we take on ideas and try on identities that will make us more likeable. That will make us more worthy. Because if everyone likes us, we’re valuable, right?
But there’s a tipping point. A time where we’ve absorbed more “pleasing” and “like me” ideas than those that really are at peace with our sense of self. That was where I was. I realized it was triage time.
The more I learn, the less I know. Or at least, I realize how much more there is to learn, and how small a fraction I have actually absorbed. This is even true of the person I’ve known the longest.
Me.
I am once again a blank canvas. I get to decide what matters to me, and what doesn’t. And whether someone likes me or not isn’t up to me. I can show up, be fully and comfortably myself. That’s it. Beyond that, I am not in control.
It’s refreshing and beautiful to base decisions on what I want and believe is right, versus taking a census to get the median answer. Henry Ford once said about the automobile “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses”.
A good scrub is necessary on the regular. Question. Scrutinize. Gather information. Question everything, including yourself. ESPECIALLY yourself. Challenge your thoughts and opinions. They’ll either crumble or take deeper root.
Growth is often painful, and the amount of personal growth is often equal to amount of pain & difficulty involved. It’s hard. But as Glennon Doyle reminds us, “we can do hard things”.
(that’s what she said)
