I am concerned about people, specifically me since I am the one I’m most in charge of. How do we allow ourselves to comfortably see our flaws? By nature I am defensive. It’s possible it’s an inherited trait like my cheeks and my wild eyebrows since I do remember my mother and her high pitched voice, trying to find the most articulate way of saying “Sue me! I was wrong!”

If that phrase rings true to you, you may be suffering from defensiv-ism too. Since I lived almost 18 years of hearing the high pitch screech of “Jesus God! If I’m wrong then the world will come to an end”, it is very difficult for me to admit that I am wrong because, duh, the world will come to an end. This disease has been the source of many verbal altercations, crying episode, swollen tears of unfairness when I walk away from somebody who put me in the WRONG corner, and probably a few bad relationships (ex-boys, don’t get it twisted though…y’all were faulty too).

At 33, the year Jesus was when he died (so we think and so I roll with), I have decided to face this evil disease with the force of one who is fighting for their lives. Why? Because the shit is too heavy and life is too short. Finally, I have decided that all the stuff they tell you in writing school (it’s not technically called that but call meat some meat and not filet) is probably more applicable to life than any degree you could pay for: take the criticism silently and use what you can, chuck the rest.

Just because someone says something about or to you doesn’t mean that it’s true. Cliche and found in most self help books, yes! But there is a reason for that. This is the simple part. The hard part is not wanting to correct them. Why do you need for others to get the right impression about you? What do you get in the end? So many other things go haywire in most peoples’ brains that you are not responsible for. This is one of them. This logic makes sense because if you believed the opposite then you could, for example, talk a serial killer out of the need to kill. Tell pedophiles that doing it to children is wrong. Tell people who think they are above reproach that they are above reproach and have them believe it. Caped crusaders are in the comics. Do not try to give yourself a super power that doesn’t exist. The art of persuasion is not a forced craft. It’s just a miracle.

In a fit of truth and possible crazyness, I’ve decided to call myself on my own bullshit. Here are some flaws I have:

-know-it-all
-stubborn
-mircomanaging
-gossip (sigh and not for a living!)
-procrastinator
-fear of my own intelligence (if I truly believed that I was smart, I would not have to peacock it around)
-short of patience
-would stab someone for french fries (this is a problem)

Now that stuff sucked to type but if writing was truly a pleasure all the time then you’d see people calling themselves writing addicts. Yeah right.

In the future I want kids and I don’t want them blogging about how difficult I was to talk to. There are a lot of people in this world who don’t believe that they are but until you put your shield down and take a hard look at yourself, you have no idea. There are tons of reasons why people pick the defensive route for themselves. Maybe they feel like they have a lot to accomplish and can’t be bothered with how they react to others. Maybe they are terrified that they will crumble into a pile of dust if they accept truth in their hearts without it meanign the world is coming to an end.

Think about it though. What do you have to lose if you are able to drop one less self imposed burden? What do you have to lose?

This post was inspired by journalist Andreson Jones, not because he was defensive, but because he died at the age of 38 of a major coronary during a screening of “A Mighty Heart.” The irony cannot escape me. Andy was super fun, super mysterious and drowning in his own reality about his health. He is missed.

Andy, for you, I shed a burden so I can delay the next time I see you…even if it’s just a little bit of time or none at all, I’m doing what I can.

Thanks to all of you who enjoyed the Owen Meany post. The movie that was based on the book was called “Simon Burch” and it doesn’t hold a candle to the book because John Irving thought no one would EVER be able to make his book into a movie effectively and he was right. I’m diving into “The Hotel New Hampshire” now and will post if inspires me the same one the first one did.

Yaze and I are off to Europe for ten days for the marriage of two awesome people: Shembi Nagel and Vince Buckles.

Mantra for the day: Show this to yourself rather than telling it: What’s the goal?