freedom for tears

I was talking to a newer friend of mine and we got into similarities between the two of us (many to say the least). One of the ones we got into were emotional expressions. I talked about a particular spot in my heart that few people ever get to. It is carefully guarded and so good is the job I have done so far of guarding it that most people don't even know it is there and should they discover it, it is so discouraging a process to get to that space that it is never given full effort.

That was the desired result, so I have no complaints there... until now.

What is different between now and then was being able to talk through the process of what I called "this space" in my heart. It is a space where who I am emotionally flows without reservation. That part of me has been damaged and battered and bruised so many times that I kind of just said, "Well fuck having people here. They obviously don't want to be here..."

It started in fifth grade: I took a piece of construction paper and 5-10 sheets of print paper and made a book out of it to write things that I didn't feel like telling people. I just wanted to remember things that happened at a particular moment in time. I was a lot more emotional then and on top of it I was a 10-year-old. When I would become upset about things involving my friends or other things about the world I didn't get, I was told that it was girly to be so emotional and I should stop doing it. Since I couldn't do that, at the age of 10, I decided I would just make a space for those feelings somewhere else. My mom found that first book and got upset with a lot of things I wrote, but I craved that freedom to express my feelings, so I made another one.

And another one....

And another one....

Fast forwarding a few years, I made friends and became a rather fun person to be around. The popularity continued to grow, but it was hard to know who I could or couldn't trust with my feelings. You never could be sure that the person you told something today wouldn't ridicule or harshly judge you tomorrow, so I continued to stick with what I could be sure of until about 2001.

In 2001, a semester or so into my college experience, I discovered livejournal. Creating an account there, I started posting things. My friends that also had accounts there could read, comment in supportive ways or just know what was going on, and things continued along. This was good for a while, but I started to ache in my heart for more; I wanted a person with whom I could share my good, my bad, and my in between and still be myself. No need to explain, preface, or water-down how I thought and felt.

Around that time, between starting college and livejournal, I met this Jesus guy. Praying was so freeing then because I could just talk and I felt understood and --- even above that --- accepted. This was everything I wanted... until I wanted something else. Let's be clear, Jesus is all that we could ever need -- God in the flesh and then some -- but there is more to be had. Even at the beginning of time, man had God to start with and God was like "Hmm... This isn't working. I'm going to make someone for him." Look:

18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

- Genesis 2:18-22

See what I mean? It wasn't enough for man to have God or even a purpose. He needs relationships with people like himself, too. No, I don't think this is just about a man and a woman in a romantic relationship, but about relationships in general. I was lacking the closeness in human interaction that I had with my journal. I wanted to be known and to be understood by people that cared about me and this was something I didn't have.

My attempts to find that were very hit and miss for a long time all the way throughout college. I was always honest with people and I was a relatively popular person; mind you, I won no contests, but I was pretty well-liked by everyone that knew about me. Years after I have left and even now, I am remembered fondly by many and I am usually introduced to others with glowing remarks.

At the same time, I felt that no one knew me. I swallowed up so many emotions just to shield others from them. I was honest about how I felt, but I didn't allow myself to feel what I felt. I was angry, but hid anger from everyone; I was hurt, but covered my wounds even though they were nearly fatal...

...maybe this is how a certain someone feels...

At one point, though, I was able to be all of my emotional self with a few people. It was during my early college years. They understood that I was emotional and intensely so and they understood. What they didn't understand, they accepted. This was so meaningful to me, that I can still clearly recall all of their names -- first and last -- with hardly a thought and for that time when I was able to just be myself without thought or consideration, I will be eternally thankful.

Unfortunately, that isn't the happy ending. I had to move on into a world where people were not that understanding. Back to the books and the blogs and the shielding people from myself. That persisted for many years with hit and miss attempts at being all of myself until about two years ago.

During that time, I met Morgan where I worked. He and I started to talk a bit and get to know each other and a very strong base for friendship came out of that. In time, we got together with Gary and moved into an apartment together. It was a good time where we all got to know each other pretty well. During that time, Morgan and I talked about varying things and one of those things was my emotional state. He said I kept too many things inside, so using most of what I wrote here, I explained myself. I explained that, in the end, when I allow my feelings to flow in full, people run away because it is just too much for them to deal with and that I would rather feel isolated than to have people run away from me all the time.

At that time, I was kind of wanting to shut myself off from the world as I do from time to time because of varying things. He told me at that time that I could tell him anything. I started to protest, but ended up asking if he was sure that he wanted this. He said he did and I believed him, so I started the next day with just talking through varying life events. Some of them were people I missed, lesson learned, and the like. Other things were a bit more painful and during those moments, I cried. No hesitation, no pre-thought. I honestly think that some of those tears were during out of sheer relief.

I cried almost everyday for the first week or two then every few days or so after that. It tapered off and while I wasn't constantly teary, I was a bit more... lively. Sun was warmer, grass was greener, that sort of thing. I shared a lot during that time. When I finally got through all of the pain, there was a lot of happiness to be found. A lot of love...

It felt like being back in that time in 2001.

That's what I thought. The truth came out a few months and several complications later. The truth was that I was more emotional than he was prepared for at that time and he didn't handle seeing me in tears well and in fact he would rather have had me not cry so much and my being so emotional was a bit more than he was used to. Add a girlfriend that didn't understand the closeness of the relationship to the mix and you have a fairly stressful situation. Everything up to this point I would have understood if he had been willing to tell me as I had told him so many times before to -- I always did say, if you want out of this, let me know. I can't keep you here and I won't if it makes you uncomfortable.

Instead, I found out from a mutual friend who took me on a drive of two hours through a nearby small town that all of these things were true. Everyone was too "scared" to tell me.

I've never understood that. I get that people don't want to hurt people, but don't you think it would be best that, if you are going to hurt someone anyway, that you do the least hurtful thing of the options you have? It seems people are more concerned with not feeling like a bad person than actually not being a bad person.

Anyway, I became hurt, then angry. I had given expression and access to things I hadn't let someone come near in years and my return on that was the same as the first things that had driven me to journal in the first place; in the end, people couldn't endure it and they ran away then shouted "TONE THAT DOWN!!!" from afar.

In the end, I had to pull myself together, but it was too hard for me at that time to just put everything back the way it was. I had given much and much had to be taken back in. In my usual fashion, I did the one thing I knew I could. I made a resolve and around that resolve I made rules for how my emotions would re-channel themselves and forced all of my current feelings into it. I decided that I would not feel pain from this and that I wouldn't allow myself to be open to pain from anyone again. Not for a while.

The first week was hard, but after that, there was a near-total implosion of my emotions. On the outside, I probably felt like ice to the touch. On the inside, I barely felt alive. Whenever Morgan showed up, there was something that IMO was a bit beyond hatred or even bitterness for what happened for a while. That subsided over time, too, but it didn't turn into apathy the way my other emotions toward things did. It became... something I don't have a word for. It was bad, though.

This continued for several months. It was like being another person. In some ways, I was. It took months -- several of them -- for he or anyone else to reach me. When he finally did, there was still residue from closing everything up before. At least he came to me in some effort to be reconciled. It was hard to open myself again for a while. Walls had to be deconstructed, but I wasn't sure about destroying them. I had to rebuild the person I was again; open myself to feeling varying emotions I had cut myself off from for several months. Every now and again, the reactions I had from that time would flare up and I had to find creative ways to squash them. It took a lot of prayer, good friends, introspection and some old fashioned "just dust yourself off" to get things going again.

Since then, things are close and such, but not quite the same. I'm a lot more contained as far as emotional expressions go and I may always be with him. I believe it is best since that is all he can handle and I couldn't bear to put myself out there like that again and have the same thing occur. Doing the same thing and expecting different results is retarded.

Why does this matter? Why have you been reading all of this? Well, it's a part of my process of introspection. I don't want to close myself off from everything, so occasionally I open up a window to my insides like this and I let you see what I'm not saying.

Aside from this it was something that talking to my friend sparked in me. I felt his pain as he had been through a similar experience. I understood where he was coming from. Namely, that feeling that he would never find someone to understand him and STAY once they finally did. I thought about him and others feeling that pain and it hurt something so deep inside that I had to cry.

He and I, emotionally, are very similar and have similar backgrounds, experiences, and reactions. It is uncanny and very cool. That said, as we talked about this, after much struggle, I told him about everything I just talked about. During that, time, I cried for the first time in a very long time. I cried because of good things and bad things and things I remembered and I felt no fear in doing so.

That last thing was the part that brought me to tears quickest. I wanted that for him, too. I had no reason to fear saying things. I didn't have to screen myself. No editing. No explanation. No apprehension that this person couldn't process or wouldn't understand. I gave him the same invitation into the same space and he accepted. He noted things right away. I didn't smile. I didn't laugh. I was a lot more somber. Lost in my own thoughts. He saw it and accepted it all even though he didn't completely understand. He jumped into it aware of everything.

I thought about the amount of people that I can be my full emotional self with sans thought. Few. Scarily few. I don't even have family members in this space. I mean, so many of you have said "you can tell me anything" and maybe I can, but that hasn't sunk in yet. Everyone around me expects strength from me -- my job, my family, my friends. It is part of the reason that my heart breaks for church leaders; I know how they feel. Sometimes I want to be around someone I can feel free to fall apart in front of and know that when I fall apart and I'm a mess of incoherent words and a runny nose and all kinds of incomprehensible emotions that they will still be there even more committed to the friendship than before.

I've always heard that I should be the friend I wish to have, so no matter what people say -- whether I agree or disagree -- if I sense a good person and worthwhile friendship there, I will endure anything (other than neglect and abuse) and answer the 3AM phone calls (most of the time. The 3PM or 7PM ones are a different matter lol) and all of those things. Sometimes I wonder if I will ever have that friend or friends that I don't have to screen myself to be around.

I am not always happy. I do not always smile. I am not always nice. Those are things that I do often and most of the time those things are easy to do and be, but some days I am mean and angry and want to tell people where they can go and how to get there if you take my meaning and this SHOCKS people. It's like Kercell says (paraphrase): I'm not an a*hole, but I can be an ass from time to time and I need that right to just tell people off instead of just swallowing up how I feel when it isn't happy and sunshine-y all the time.

I need to not have to be a superhero in order to have friends (and before you protest, think about the concept). I realize I'm unique on many levels, but that doesn't make me less human..

...and I'm not. I'm only a man that wants to be understood and accepted as he is without having to change drastically (or at all for that matter unless it is inherently unhealthy) in order to be unconditionally loved. However, because that is not yet the case, I have this spot inside where very few people are allowed to remain (altho a few of you do venture from time to time) where I keep all of my innermost feelings on lock. Everything I don't say, or can't say, or don't talk about because in spite of your words, I can just read you and see that you don't want to be bothered (some of you I read, but I decide to let you in just to show you that you don't mean what you say)... all of this becomes it's own heart space that I only let you guys even see a sliver of when I post things on FB that get like 27 comments or get like 20 text messages.

The fact is that while it is a moment for you, this is an awareness that I keep mostly secret every minute of every day.

However, maybe with that exchange and a few tears and maybe this post, my world in all of its facets will expand a little more. It's not for the faint of heart, but it is open to everyone that puts in the work to earn it...

Then again, it's probably safer and easier to just leave things the way they are and not complicate them.