Who Are You?
[The song for this post is i’m so tired… by Lauv & Troye Sivan]
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much or how well we know anyone.
Actually, if I’m being honest, I’ve been thinking about this concept on and off my entire life but probably more frequently in the last two years.
I’m finally putting my thoughts to paper now, so to speak.
Trust isn’t an easy concept for many of us, myself included. I’m always ready for the other shoe to drop. I know, how very cynical of me this sounds, but I’m being honest. I know this is not the best way to look at things, but sometimes it is hard not to operate from that space. Experience brought me to that place.
I think we all start at a place of pure trust. The experiences we have in life take us sometimes in a different direction.
We lose that trust, most often in people, based on our life experiences.
These different experiences make me question how much we really know anyone.
What we know about someone is what they chose to tell us and show us. This could be verbally to our face, written in a text, email, etc., or via phone into the sound waves.
These days I find it can also be portrayed in who they chose to be in the social media world.
Too often these days I am left feeling as though I don’t really know anyone that well, outside a small circle of trust, which includes my family.
The persona I feel I get from many fades over time due to their inability to keep up the appearance that they’ve sold to you at the start.
It leaves me to wonder, why we feel we can’t just authentically be ourselves?
What narrative are others hearing that they feel they cannot just be themselves and sell the world on who they are and will always be. Why don’t we feel like that is enough?
When trying to keep up appearances at some point the illusion will fail as it is hard to maintain and others may be left wondering, did I ever really know you at all? That trust in the relationship broken. This can be true for any type of relationship.
In my experience, once that trust is broken it is hard to get back. Most often it can never come back. You can either chose to move forward from it together or chose to move forward from it alone; but if choosing to move forward together you have to let go of the past experience and move forward completely and believe who this person claims to be now is the person they’ve always been. Obviously, this is easier said than done. I’m still working on that part.
Most often, I’m left wondering if I knew the person at all. I’m unable to begin again and trust that this time will be different. To be fair, in these specific circumstances the issues are too big to move past and forward from. Try as I may to not let these experiences follow me into all my future relationships, whether they be friendships or partnerships, they do. It is hard to not let them. They provide a defense mechanism like no other, but also, what at times feels like an impenetrable wall.
I’m still working on this as well. I think I’ll always be working on this because it’s hard to quiet the question, do we really ever know anyone, including ourselves, completely.
In the end, all I can do is be the truest version of myself. At least then me, myself, and I are always one in the same through it all.
[Image is from Pexels.]
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