I’ve just completed an old episode of Vice Investigates where the founder of #metoo says, “Once you shine a light on something, you can’t unsee it.”
I work as a counselor. I habitually prompt people to, in their own words, start explicating things in their lives that are routinely under-illuminated. We might talk about how you constantly interrupt your spouse. What, precisely, any given person “sees” during or after that discussion is seemingly a large contributor as to why they can or can’t be bothered to change their behavior.
The boring, yet universal and infinitely impactful, truth about whatever it is you think is in the spotlight is that it is incomplete and perhaps wholly unknowable in a manner that will be emotionally salient. One person interviewed about her…4 years of discomfort…working for a restaurant owner had her explicitly state that it was unfortunate that he just couldn’t disappear and there was nothing in her imagination that would speak to forgiveness. Do you think she really sees the locus of her discomfort if it’s localized so viscerally in him?
It’s human nature to turn whatever we shine a light on into a fairy tale that helps us sleep at night. It’s just as much in our nature to turn the story into a nightmare. I’ve tried to spend less time bemoaning my experiences, negative as they register and perpetually uncomfortable, as though they’re only and forever my most damning indictments of how ambivalent and fucked life is. I invite layers of discomfort into my experience, be it in people who are miserable communicators, activities with endless questions I never quite find great answers to, or jumps into roles and responsibilities that no one beyond my ambition is asking me to take - if you don’t count the imploring screams of negligence.
Part of me is incredibly angry at people who allow themselves to be victimized by themselves. I’m not criticizing mental health or where you might be on your journey through trauma. But I’m incredibly put-off and almost insulted on behalf of every…child whose died via something preventable? Victim of a genocide? Anyone who’s ceaselessly punished for their existence, yet manages to dictate for themselves why they stay alive? People experience all sorts of crazy traumatizing things, big and small, and with some regularity. Creepy managers or crude commentary are not the bar to hang yourself over. It feels gross, entitled, and pretentious.
I’m absolutely fascinated that it has seemed to take years for us to culturally digest the idea that masculinity is not “toxic” by default. We are still reckoning with “competitions” between some of the dumbest and craziest people on the planet getting the keys to power. And we haven’t quite connected just how aggressively we attacked the foundation of how humanity rose in evolution through it’s interplay and connected dynamic. We’ve threatened something wholly foundational so aggressively we’re literally willing to forgo all semblance of reason to destroy the prospect of solving problems in a democratic way.
It’s the attitude. It’s the lack of expectations or end game. It’s not the “best” or “smartest” people who beat the addiction to their own bullshit. It’s people who keep their light trained on the next logical step for them to improve how they feel. When you’re entitled to your feelings and aggressively asserting the impact of “harm,” there is no indication that you have anything to contribute or anything to change. You just chant until the trance takes hold and carries you past any checks or balances.
I suppose after enough attempts to succeed at difficult things, whilst simultaneously watching dozens of failures every week, I see two dramatically different habits and patterns that distinguish people. Do you know how many times I’ve been “too busy” to do anything I want? I haven’t been. It’s a shitty excuse. I read about people who are actually busy doing huge things who still cut out time for their mental health. You, resident of Bedford, have the time. Do you know who gets all caught up in their feelings to the point it threatens not only their life, but of the people they care most about? People who tell you, automatically, every time, “I’m fine.” They lie, often, always, until they die.
We should be asking ourselves how many lies does it take to create the story that allows me to live with myself? Do I have to say I’m prettier than I am? Do I have to say I love my family until I’m blue in the face? Do I have to overlook a list of red flags about my partner that’s longer than any I’ve written for groceries? Could I recognize how dumb I was even if I asked the question? Can I reckon with my lonliness? Are my daily affirmations not juicing me like they used to? Did I live up to even 2% of what I imagined for my future as I was growing up?
We are a violent, ignorant, incredibly lucky species, and we carry on as though we’re all just trading answer keys to different tests. We are all trash, sniffing farts, and looking for the next excuse to crack the facade, en masse, so we don’t have to personally feel responsible for our behavior. Is my culture sick? Who cares, it lets me get away with countless lies about the state of my country, town, or capacity to change anything. I don’t need to shine a light on the gratifying feeling, in fact, it makes me shine so bright, it’s curious how many people can’t seem to see me. Even as I smear shit on walls, attempt to instantiate fascism, or couch my existence in an endless stream of infotainment memes.
You know I want a lot of money so I can run, right? I want backup plans. I want secured locations. I want to make my feeble attempts to build a better culture from somewhere safe. I’m trying to pull out. I’m trying to manage. I don’t have a living memory of feeling like I’m surrounded by adults who are in charge. I was in 6th and 7th grade when Bush was elected and found myself utterly confused that such a fuckwit could be put in charge, then teabaggers and Sarah Palin happened and it’s felt like the proverbial death by a thousand cuts right up until today.
I’m a victim too. I can still access incredibly low and dark spaces when I reflect on the examples that were set, on me, as to how to deal with innocence, ignorance, and vulnerability. Except, every time I shine a light on what’s happened to me or remind myself what I’m capable of, I also acknowledge the choice. Do I repeat the story to myself and make the feelings get more intense? Do I find myself trying to justify a lack of remorse and moves to exploit? Do I choose what I feel to be the wrong thing because it will be briefly gratifying? That’s what happened during my blow-up fight with my ex. I chose to chuck garbage cans, and yell and scream, and fuck her up mentally because she did not expect me to throw her the fuck out, and I knew calling that bluff would hurt as bad or worse than she had been making me feel.
Should I stay smug and entitled to how I felt leading up to that? During? What if I noticed I started taking pride in it? I’d be fucking sick. I would need guidance. I would need someone to hold me accountable if I was unable to do so for myself. I don’t want my amplified feelings dictating the rules. I don’t want the story of our dynamic to be of the inoperable discomfort where I’d start wishing she disappeared and that I’d never bothered. But this is what we’re currently doing, like, wholly trying to burn everything down and pretend we don’t exist in a larger context with greater ideals or hopes and prospects to do better. We don’t expect anything, let alone something remotely positive, to come from the larger experiment. And the day-to-day civility feels fragile and insincere.
I get criticized routinely for what I would describe as having standards. I need you looking forward. I need you to recognize and state what you need and share it honestly. I need you to incorporate perspectives that don’t agree with yours. I need you paying attention and trying. I need these things selfishly. I need to exist around people who are demonstrating and practicing the things that I must in order to remain oriented and healthy. I can’t be engulfed in your universe if it swirls with shitty excuses and the infinite void is utilized to dodge ever landing on a planet worth terraforming. I need you to say, “Yes, that thing is bad, and here’s what I’m doing about it, or deliberately not doing what would make it worse.”
I have a lot of ideas on how to personally survive in my own little bubble or chosen trajectory. I don’t know what “we” have going for us as wholly dependent on each other as we are. I feel empty and angry when I think about relying on you to speak, vote, work, or do anything but abuse your substance of choice, the narrative that keeps you precisely where you are. I’m hostile to the idea of collaboration. The way the world has trended suggests in my bid for more control or influence, I will court a new disaster in nearly every mind I try to incorporate. The unyielding pulse of existence will press me to seek control over cultivation. Will I be smart enough to devise a way around this? Will I choose a dozen tiny points of corruption until the driving ethos and mission statement transcend mockery? Either way, I’m keeping the light on the choice. Where’s yours pointed?
