On Honesty
23 November 2006 | Posted in Introspection, Personal, TrishWith all the aforementioned developments–saying goodbye to Genelle, getting together with Trish, and the ups & downs involved in this and any new relationship, I’ve been re-evaluating my various bad habits and behaviors and my values and the way I deal with my feelings a lot.
One of the foremost of those values is honesty–one of the most important factors in relationships. More to the point, DIShonesty is especially important, namely, to failed relationships. I never thought I’d have a problem with being honest, always thought that was one of my best qualities. And really, it’s not like I lie through my teeth every chance I get. But… I’m not particularly honest about my feelings. Often, not even with myself. This is probably either one of the causes, or a direct result, of my rather underwhelming dating history–or perhaps a combination of the two.
I always called myself an “open book”, but I guess that’s tended to be rather superficial if ever true. Sure, I’ll tell you about my past, about my friends & family, I’ve got no bones admitting to the fact that I’m still a virgin. All that stuff comes easy. But my feelings? Not so much. I’ve always been a loner about my feelings. I’ve always put them a distant second compared to friends and their feelings, or family, or whatever else seemed more important at the time. So, I’d just bury my feelings. And whenever my feelings came into conflict with other’s, well, I would just lie to myself about them. Genelle is the perfect example… I loved her, but she just wanted to be friends (if that), so with time I learned to pretend that’s all I wanted to, but it obviously wasn’t the case. Jeanette, I pretended to just be okay with friendship, too. I guess a lot of that behavior came naturally to me, in my tendency to try to put others first, and then a lot of it got piled up the more and more I got rejected by people. “Okay then,” I’d think to myself, “I’ll just be the friend.” Regardless of what I really felt.
Another component of it is, I dislike the way I am in an argument, so I tend to lie to avoid such arguments. I guess that’s what one might call “diplomacy” in a sense, but I don’t remember when diplomacy became more important than honesty. The latter is more important; if the former is to exist, it should only exist in the presence of the latter.
Without going into specifics, what has led me to think about such things is this: Trish asked me a question, I thought of an answer, but feared how she’d react to it, and pulled another answer–not necessarily untrue, but insincere–out of my ass. That answer actually went over *worse*, but instead of actually coming clean about my real answer, I spent a good day or so trying to cover up my mistake with more lies–well, “easy answers”, at least.
I don’t expect that to make much sense to anyone but myself and Trish, but the long and short of it was, she called me on my behavior, she made me realize the way I tell little lies like that, almost subconsciously, and I’m trying to wrap my head around the “how” and “why” of why I do it, so that I can stop doing it.
Trish and I both have had our fair share of bad relationships, or something to that effect. (I’ve had a fair share of bad non-relationships.) So we’re both coming into this with a lot of trust issues, and a number of insecurities as well. I think we connect in a great way, in that, not only do we trust each other (for the most part), but we’ve come a great way in easing each other’s insecurities. However, when one of us is dishonest, even just once, it undoes a lot of what we’ve worked for. So far I’ve done that in two major instances, first regarding my feelings and again with my aforementioned answer. And both times, I’ve happened to tap directly into a few of Trish’s deepest insecurities. Which is terrible, because she has no real reason to fear those things. In defrauding myself, I have given her fraudulent reasons to fear them.
That’s just not acceptable. I’m not going to jeopardize what I have and what I can have with Trish over a bunch of stupid habits I picked up defending and forfeiting myself to people who didn’t really deserve my affections in the first place. I’m not exactly sure *how* to change my behavior–I want to undergo further contemplation about it, it might make a swell journal entry, too–but I know step one is to just remember not to be afraid to tell Trish the truth about things. Twice in 24 hours, I lied about one thing and suppressed my feelings about another for fear of upsetting her, but she reacted better to the truth than to my deflections, and more to the point, she put me at ease about my own fears. So that’s the way to go.
And it’s the way I want to be. Even if it weren’t for Trish. Looking back on how idealistic I was, fresh out of high school, I never wanted to have to lie. (I was already beginning to lie about my own feelings, but never mind that.) “The truth shall set you free.” I believed that, still do, and I know that a lie won’t diminish pain, it’ll only defer it till later. I know this stuff, so why do I let myself do them? My first reaction is to say that I picked those habits up to survive in a painful relationship, but duh… I shouldn’t even want a relationship I have to worry about “surviving”. That’s not worth doing. I want a relationship that reinforces my sense of self, that makes me feel better as an individual and as part of a greater whole. Honesty is step one for keeping those things in balance.
And do you know what? I’ve got a relationship right here before me that can make all of those desires a reality. I’m not going to let that go to rot. I feel like there’s so much more I could say about this, given time, about my wonderful relationship AND about the many stupid things I do despite it. I guess the “further contemplation” will have to wait, as Thanksgiving dinner is about to be served, and honestly I am anxious to get these feelings off my chest, as the guilt of my behavior will continue to weigh on me until I do this. So for now, I’ll just say…
I’m sorry, Trish. I love you–I’m crazy about you, and you are so magnificently beautiful. Emma reminded me last night that “your girlfriend is *always* in your dream girl list”. Well of course you are, Trish… You’re the front cover, the back, the binding, and every page from front to back. Anyone else is just a footnote. I’m just a stupid boy sometimes, in many ways, and I’m sorry for that. I love you.
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