It's tricky. This post is itself just an off-the-cuff riff on a realization I had, after sending an email to someone where I wasn't holding back because it was a private correspondence with someone I trust, and I felt that I could say the kinds of things I often want to say in public but can't.
I've said before that "grief is an exorcism," and that's true, insofar as it goes, but for the exorcism to work, the grief has to be expressed. I find that being able to name it clearly matters in that regard.
But naming it clearly in public is dangerous, if it involves details about the things that really wounded you the most -- and who was responsible for causing those wounds.
Naming it in private, on the other hand, is unsatisfactory, especially when it deals with matters of justice, and self-worth, and the cruel things that have been said about you, to your face, that perhaps you have a tendency to believe.
For externalizers like me, the raw emotional data is only processed when it has been articulated, turned over, scrutinized -- and not just by me, but by others who can say if I'm experiencing parallax error or not.
So what happens instead is this kind of dance, where you say it but don't say it, you allude but don't define, and it all feels very frustratingly ephemeral.
I have thought often about what a grotesque man Bukowski is. I haven't read all of his stuff, just some, but he writes with total abandon. There's a kind of freedom in that, but it's a freedom that only comes when you have nothing else to lose.
I'm close to that in most respects, but there are still people I love, still people I don't want to hurt, still people who can't handle my honesty and react in ways that can complicate my life for the worse.
So I just...don't.
And it's not only unsatisfying, but it prolongs the feeling that the only place I have to write from the huge tank of liquefied despair, which can never be drained because it's only ever allowed to drip.
"Most people aren't here to listen. Precious few want to hear any voice that isn't their own."
I find what you say pretty interesting - if only because you are so different than I am. I only have to clam up about a few things in my life. My wife doesn't like it that I will share almost anything with strangers. I don't get that. But then I don't carry grief like you do, and I don't have anything heavy to unload on people, even if I wanted to.
FWIW, I don't mind if you're real. I have no other way to know the real pain people live with other than hearing from them. Without you being real, I'm essentially clueless.
I meant that I couldn't help seeing the parallels as I read your pieces. Only, grief turned you away from God. I think recovery from spiritual surgery is like cleaning a blackboard. This is major surgery, to turn us inside out, as if born again.
You are being repurposed, cast out, to serve the outcast.
I'd love to see you develop this theme of "real as the last taboo" further.
It's tricky. This post is itself just an off-the-cuff riff on a realization I had, after sending an email to someone where I wasn't holding back because it was a private correspondence with someone I trust, and I felt that I could say the kinds of things I often want to say in public but can't.
I've said before that "grief is an exorcism," and that's true, insofar as it goes, but for the exorcism to work, the grief has to be expressed. I find that being able to name it clearly matters in that regard.
But naming it clearly in public is dangerous, if it involves details about the things that really wounded you the most -- and who was responsible for causing those wounds.
Naming it in private, on the other hand, is unsatisfactory, especially when it deals with matters of justice, and self-worth, and the cruel things that have been said about you, to your face, that perhaps you have a tendency to believe.
For externalizers like me, the raw emotional data is only processed when it has been articulated, turned over, scrutinized -- and not just by me, but by others who can say if I'm experiencing parallax error or not.
So what happens instead is this kind of dance, where you say it but don't say it, you allude but don't define, and it all feels very frustratingly ephemeral.
I have thought often about what a grotesque man Bukowski is. I haven't read all of his stuff, just some, but he writes with total abandon. There's a kind of freedom in that, but it's a freedom that only comes when you have nothing else to lose.
I'm close to that in most respects, but there are still people I love, still people I don't want to hurt, still people who can't handle my honesty and react in ways that can complicate my life for the worse.
So I just...don't.
And it's not only unsatisfying, but it prolongs the feeling that the only place I have to write from the huge tank of liquefied despair, which can never be drained because it's only ever allowed to drip.
"Most people aren't here to listen. Precious few want to hear any voice that isn't their own."
I find what you say pretty interesting - if only because you are so different than I am. I only have to clam up about a few things in my life. My wife doesn't like it that I will share almost anything with strangers. I don't get that. But then I don't carry grief like you do, and I don't have anything heavy to unload on people, even if I wanted to.
FWIW, I don't mind if you're real. I have no other way to know the real pain people live with other than hearing from them. Without you being real, I'm essentially clueless.
The Living Word translation of the Book of Job
That book is the literal worst
I meant that I couldn't help seeing the parallels as I read your pieces. Only, grief turned you away from God. I think recovery from spiritual surgery is like cleaning a blackboard. This is major surgery, to turn us inside out, as if born again.
You are being repurposed, cast out, to serve the outcast.
Then we will know Truth.