Dear Diary, I hate people. The end. Oh wait, I also hate
that humidity makes my hair frizzy. The end…
It’s been a day. Like A DAY. Oh God, grant me the serenity
to abstain from bitch slapping the next person who decides to meet my honesty
or my vulnerability with a pseudo Hallmark Card greeting sentiment or even
worse, the ever so delightful, motivational posteresque one liner. Now that
person should really run. Seriously, like Forest Gump and just keep running…
When did honesty or vulnerability come with a max capacity?
It appears that I have reached my limit and I am now overdrawn, charges pending.
Over the last week, I’ve been on the receiving end of an endless parade of patronizing
one liners. And as well-intentioned as they might be, I wonder if anyone stepped
away from the firing squad long enough to consider the impact. I can tell you
that I have been left drowning in shame and guilt and frustration and this slow
burning anger at the casualness of it all. When did it become acceptable to
judge someone’s pain? You see me writing about X, Y, and Z and you make a vast
sweeping assumption that I am choosing to live a life flaunting a cart blanche
victim card. You see my words stripped to the core, raw, ugly, and yes,
admittedly negative at times. And you deem to tell me that I ought to be more
grateful for what I have, that there are other people facing other battles, so
I ought not be selfish in facing my own, that what is in the past, is in the
past so move along already, nothing to see here. But you send these sentiments
through veiled “words of wisdom” because you’ve achieved Zen master status and
unbeknownst to me, I apparently enrolled in your school… I’ve been thinking a
lot lately about the wisdom that was once handed down to me: “A wise woman
knows when to speak and when not to speak and the key to unlocking either
silence or sound is found in the intentional act of listening.”
I am always struck by that last bit. The intentional act of
listening. Intentional. Not reactionary. How I wish we would all be more
intentional. Because I am guilty of one liners. I am guilty of meeting pain
with Band-Aids that are not mine to give. I am guilty of reaction rather than
intention. In my own sensitivity, I have been pointedly reminded of that this
week. And so, it would seem to me that my anger is twofold: I am angry at your propensity
for reaction. And I am angry at my own.
Kendall Payne once wrote in a song that, “Everyone angry is
only just aching inside.” And sitting here, I feel it, that deep, gnawing ache.
An ache to be held. An ache to feel safe. An ache to not feel the need to
justify my words be they sad, or angry, or joyful, or positive, etc. An ache to
be seen. An ache to be accepted. An ache to be heard.
A few months back, I was on the precipice of collapse. And
if you know me at all then you know that I am not one who calls for help. My
calls are more of the morning after, walk of shame variety. But in attempting
to be in compliance with Team Sobriety, I called. Maybe because the “I’m going
to hell in a handbasket and no-longer-give- a- shit” Jillian was ready to make
a come back ala Brittany Spears circa 2007. And we all remember how that one
ended, a very confused barber and a tragic haircut. And so, because I am rather
opposed to rocking a buzz cut, I called a friend of mine. And I cried for the
first five minutes and when I was done, she simply and quite graciously asked
me to tell her about it. “Can you tell me about that Jillian?” Even now, it
soothes me to think of her intentional love. And in that moment, all of those
things that I ached for felt a little less threatening, felt a little less heavy
because in that moment, in that space, she stood with me, and she carried some
of the weight of my pain and my struggle.
I’m not quite sure where to end this, perhaps because it
still feels in flux. But maybe where I’m landing is that context matters. The
whole story matters. Intention matters. We all, each of us, carry different
burdens and while they may be similar and we might be able extend empathy, none
of us stand in a place that is not our own.
Good intentions lack better actions. Of that, I am sure. Don’t mistake me, I do appreciate the good
intentions. And when in a less tired place, I could be somewhat warmed by the
gesture, annoyed, but somewhat warmed just the same. Oh, that we see what we do
not see. That we would seek first to understand the whole story. That we would
have enough grace to invite context into our thoughts before we dare to speak.
And maybe better than to meet words with yet more words, that we might set
aside our own remedies and offer the healing of intentional listening. How
beautiful the song of the broken when met with listening ear of a friend. I’d
buy that Hallmark Card. But only if it was the value kind, you know the 99 cents
one…
-Jillian Nichole, future mid-life crisis Hallmark Card writer....
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