Cold-unsympathetic, Insensitive and
inconsiderate, Hostile-angry, Cruel-sarcastic, Unforgiving, Self-sufficient, Domineering, Opinionated and prejudiced, Proud, Crafty, Undisciplined, Weak-willed Restless, Disorganised, Unproductive, Undependable, Obnoxious-loud, Egocentric, Exaggerates, Fearful and insecure.
These are all words that have been used to describe
me. I shall deny them or defend them. I am a little tired. Instead I shall
embrace them. I shall embrace them because I believe that that is the only way
that one can really make strides forward.
I shall not apologise for them either. That is
who I am and until I am someone else I shall remain so. Don’t get me wrong this
is not an acceptance of poorly character but a stand, a plea if you wish, a
statement that those that seek for me to be better, because let’s face it, this
affects you more than it affects me, show more of that which you want me to see and perhaps I shall be
convinced by YOUR good works.
A little unrepentant? Maybe.
This onslaught has had one good side effect. It
has set me on a path of self-discovery. Even though I do not admit it, I too
yearn for the approval of men and women and I am bothered by anything that
shakes and so I have sought and still seek to amend my ‘wicked’ ways so that we
could all just get along.
This journey has sent me deep within, both my
heart and my head and both places are terrifying even for me.:) But into the
darkness and deep I ventured for I wanted to become a ‘better man’ , a ‘nicer’
man and all those other clichés.
My first port of call was denial. I did not
believe that all this was true. I was amazed at how childish and myopic people
could be. “Couldn’t they see that all my intentions were pure”. I wondered, “Couldn’t
they see that semantics and words were unimportant?” Apparently not because I was
berated again and again and tactless was my middle name.
My second port of call was doubt. Maybe all
this was true. Maybe they had a point. All these people could not possibly be
wrong. I had to do something.
My third port was resignation. It must be true.
I embraced my image and call. I thrived in it and run with it. But that did not
go well with many people and I guess I earned the reputation for being brutally
honest as many of my friends called it.
They said it with their mouths but I guess this
was ok as long as the guns were not directed in their direction. When it was
their turn, well the love was not there.
This led me to the next port which was full of
so many things, Confusion, hurt, betrayal and more. But I skip a head. This was much later after I
had taken the detour to acceptance.
This phase saw me go to all lengths to get rid
of my bad boy persona. I read all I could about each and every one of the above
traits and how I could get rid of them, replacing them with all the good and
nice replacements. I removed all my armour and looked into the abyss. It was
not pretty.
Not only did I dredge up so much stuff that I
had to deal with but all the guys I thought would be cheering me on where nowhere
to be seen. In fact it seemed that I had removed all my armour to wade into
this river yet I needed that armour to deal with the monsters of the soul and
the arrows that now pierce my flesh.
I was too occupied to protect myself now. Too exposed.
Too open. Too naked. That is all I was
now. Less of what I was with more of stuff I did not need to deal with it. Think
of it as having a task and not having the tools because you had to leave them
behind because you were told that you could only progress if you left them
behind. So there I was down the river without a paddle.
This brings me to where I am now and what I am
only now realising and hope to put down in the next couple of pages.
other random thoughts
Cool read. Check out the website.
http://readerscafe.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=272:my-soul-is-lost&catid=25:inspirational&Itemid=50
humility...much harder than pride.
