This is not written for everyone. No, I suppose this is an effort to reach you. This is not going to be simple. I admit that. I also know this is not going to be emotionless either. I admit this too and of course, this is where people stray. This is where people exit the stage.
I am writing this as an offer to you.
I am hoping that in fact, this reaches you and opens the door that you have decided to slam shut for reasons, which in fairness, I completely understand.
It’s amazing though. The beauty inside. I swear that it’s there. I know it is. Then again, I also know that this is hard to see sometimes. I know this is hard to understand. I also know there is this notion we all have. I call this notion “Home,” in which we are always taking either one step towards or another step further away. I know there are times when the weight is too heavy and the uncertainties can mount up to be impossible. And you ask yourself, “How can I see past any of this?”
I know . . .
Trust me though. It’s in there. It’s in deep, and I get that. I get that the clouds haze the sky. I get that when rain falls, we forget the sun is still up there because, after all, we can’t see it or feel its warmth.
And people? Well, they seem more complex than they really are. This is more smoke and mirrors, yet, in fairness, I admit that people can say kind things or pay me compliments and the compliments are kind, yet, somehow the compliments are insults to the soul. (Do you know what I mean?) They somehow defy the way I feel or see myself. And how I wish their words were true (at least to me). But this isn’t about me, now, is it? No, this is about us.
At least, for now.
There are people that know about this. There are people that understand. No really, this is the truth. There are people that hear the unsaid screams or get what it feels like to hear the echoed words of something we said with regret.
There are people that get this. What I mean is to say something and have the words leave our mouth and hit the trigger of an insecure switch. Sometimes we say something, only to sound so awkward and stupid that words repeat in your mind; so you try to say something to stop the echo but the next thing you say only sounds worse.
Or, maybe this is me.
Maybe this is just a view inside.
Would you like to see?
Because I don’t mind showing you.
I think it’s good to know, in fact. I think it’s good to show this because there are people that paint their happy lives and meanwhile, people like me or you start to wonder where we fit. Plus, I’ve learned a trick. I learned to challenge my whispers and my fears. I’ve learned to be a voice for myself because put simply, no one else would ever know how to speak for me. At least, not really. Besides, how could they?
There is a thing inside of us. And there is no explanation really, other than it is what it is. It’s a thing. It’s another person. It’s a voice, an idea, or maybe this is just a scared kid that lives in us all and hoping for some direction and protection. There is a kid in us, just wishing that all of this would go away. There is a part of us that is wishing that someone would turn on the lights because like most kids, deep within, we’re scared of the dark (or of the unknown inside).
I was thinking about Don Mclean and his song Starry, Starry Night about Vincent van Gogh.
And Vince, man, I get it.
He had this thing inside of him too. No one knew about or understood. And he tried to show them. He tried to tell them. He painted a world in the way that he saw it.
There is this challenge we face (you and me) that somehow the ideas and thoughts, feeling, and otherwise are somehow dull and muted. The colors we see are dull or unlike the vibrant world, which it appears that other people live with.
I could write nothing more fitting or poignant than the following lyrics:
Now I understand
What you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you you tried to set them free
They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they’ll listen now.
There are some that will get this. There are only some that understand the earth beneath this or how it is to be stuck in an idea that somehow, no matter how we try, nothing could ever stop the drowning we feel in our emotional quicksand.
But me, I know you’re in there.
Deep, maybe.
But you’re in there.
And you’re beautiful too.
“How you suffered for your sanity”
To live, to laugh, to love, and to learn; to be free from, rid of, and to be able to breathe without the weight, like breathing through a thick wet blanket on a hot summer’s day.
To be okay, to be safe, to be unworried, unburdened, and unstuck. To be able to move freely without the restrictions. To be me or you or “Us” without the concerns that someone else might know; or fear someone else might see or judge.
To be us without the strains of difficulty; to not be the odd one, to not be the one on the outside looking in, or more to the point, to not be alone in the crowd. And I don’t just mean alone; I means painfully alone, which is why we hide, which is why we stay inside or never dare to step outside of ourselves because why bother?
We just have to come back in, right?
It’s in there though. The beauty inside. Believe me it is.
I know. There is a light.
There is a source and believe me (I can feel it, by the way) and the source of you is so pure and so amazing, and yet to me, this is so raw to the touch that in fact – it is painful too, no?
It hurts:
To know there is hope when otherwise, we think we are hopeless
To know there is love when otherwise, we believe we are loveless
To want to live, love, laugh and learn
To want to laugh and smile and not wonder or worry what will happen when the smiles end
To not be a prisoner and trapped in our own self
There are so many amazing things. Truly, there is. You have so much beauty but the colors don’t seem bright enough for you to see. The sunrise and the sunset and the realities between them have tricked you into believing a set of lies that no one else can disprove. (At least, not to you or me either, by the way.)
Here is my offer.
I do not pretend to know how you feel or understand everything. I do not pretend to say that I can fix it. I am not saying that everything will be fine because you and I both know that no one can ever promise this.
As a matter of fact, to us, the only people that do promise this are people that do not struggle the same as we do.
I don’t want to take anything from you.
See what I mean?
We have this “Thing.”
And this thing has become us. This is our identity, which is all we know and all we understand so anything else would only seem unbelievable. Therefore, anyone that comes to take this away or tells us how they can help is somehow a threat.
I mean, who would we be if this was not us?
There are ways that we can see differently without wondering or struggling for our identity. There are views that we can see from our window (so to speak) and there are ways that we can breathe. There are things we can learn and things we can teach ourselves to quiet whispers, which tend to scream so loud.
I suppose after all of this, I just want you to know that I care and that it’s in there. The beauty, I mean.
In fact, I have never seen anyone or anything so beautiful as you.
I used to try and tell people. I tried to talk. I tried to set myself free, though no one seemed to listen.
They did not know how but like the song says, “Perhaps they’ll listen now.”
By the way:
I’m here if you need bennyk1972@gmail.com
And don’t worry. I don’t sleep much either.
So you can reach out in the middle of the night if you want.
I’ll be around.
The Written Addiction 