I am excited about striking out on my own, but I’m also a bit scared. Just now, the thought occurred to me that I was sort of hiding in that relationship, hiding from the world, from getting out there and being myself, of living life without fear.
What was it about S, or the way I was when I was with her, that made me feel that way? I think it was the way that she didn’t really love me, never really supported me, was always concerned with herself, with the way me living my life the ways that are right for me would affect her, that it was that she never really had faith in me and never committed to me and us (how can you have love without commitment? In my opinion, if you do not love with commitment then it’s not really love, it’s something else).
It was the effect of having that kind of thing in my life. And it is very hard, if not impossible, for a person to be true to himself (or herself), to feel safe and confident enough to do that, when the person you are with is so unsupportive in the ways that S always was.
And so, I have been scared to live life, to be myself, to really express myself. In fact, I was expressly discouraged from being true to myself (and not only by her). She made me feel like I was a bad person for doing the things that were actually all about my liberation from the Matrix. Over time, I suppose I got used to being scared of being myself, of expressing myself to her, or others.
The reasons for this are many. I know that I have lived my life as myself in many ways, but I still sort of feel that it has been half-assed, that I haven’t really put myself out there. I am happy that I no longer have this illusory, constructed security to hide behind, or in. It is hard to try to live life honestly, to put the real you out there. Most people act like they are being real, but they are not, or at least they are holding back, hiding behind a mask, a constructed façade, or illusions. I know this because I have done it myself, and I am pretty good at recognizing it in others.
I feel very fortunate to have been able to recognize it in—and admit it to—myself, because I feel that now I have an opportunity to fulfill who it is I can be, who I really am. This is what my life is about, this is who I am—freedom, liberation from the self-enforced ego prison of the Matrix.
That—being and expressing who you really are—is happiness, what is right; not “morally” right, but right, as in what is. We hide behind, and snuggle within, our illusions, within the comfort and false security of our constructed and conditioned lives, of our fears of things, like putting the real us out there, for fear of rejection, of being alone.
But life is a gamble; we spend so much of our lives trying to control so many things that are not ours to control, and not enough time controlling what we can control—that being what we allow to control us. I feel, strongly, that this is a key to freedom, to happiness, and I am so happy to (finally) be doing it, as opposed to just thinking about it, writing about it, or talking about it.
People hide behind so many things, and one of the hardest things about it is that we often do the wrong things for the right reasons, or at least what we think are the right reasons. There is a big difference between honesty, and true, complete, brave honesty. There is a big difference between self-awareness, and true, honest, brave self-awareness. The line is very difficult to tread, and most people never even see it. I can say this from my own experience: it certainly is harder than anything else one can do in his or her life.
Fortunately, I no longer have anything to hide behind, and it is of utmost importance that I keep making honest efforts to not hide behind anything else, that I am honest and true to—and of—myself.
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From my personal notes 6/6/00
