The Lion, The Witch, and the Really Bad Effing Sunburn
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The Lion, The Witch, and the Really Bad Effing Sunburn
Happy Tuesday, F-Worders!
Today, on THE F WORD: birthright! cognitive dissonance! and WHAT TO DO WITH TOXIC PEOPLE!
It’s a light one!
Onwards!
What is our generational trauma? What is our birthright?
What do we inherit in this world? What do we inherit when we are given life? If we are born into loving households, does that love become our birthright? What of us who are born into abuse? Into narcissism? Into unresolved conflict and trauma?
When we are born into families we do not choose; luck sometimes serves us well. Other times, it does not. Birth is a random happenstance, a coincidence, a small-scale Big Bang whose energy holds enough power to shift the course of a life and all the other lives that one life will touch. In this sense, predestination exists, even if it’s only in the fact that this one life will, concretely, shift all other lives that are born in proximity to it. There is no case on the face of this earth in which someone was born and they have no interaction with or effect on another person.
You were born, and it affected my life because you are a presence in it. I was born, and I affect yours. This has nothing to do with any sort of moral alteration, but simply by the fact that I am writing this newsletter and you are reading it, we are sharing an exchange because both of us exist.
We, you and I, and all the other people on this earth, were born into different families and into different situations. So what is our inheritance?
What were we born into that becomes fertile soil for opportunity? What were we born into that becomes our burden to bear?
One thing that will never be our birthright is innocence, although some people try to claim it as such. It can be said that we all just want to “do good” or to “do a good job” on this earth with our one wild and precious life (Mary Oliver reference, WHADDUP), but what does “do good” or “do a good job” actually mean?
I WANT TO DO GOOD
OK, Mother Theresa. You want to help people. If you’re going to help people, this means that you need to constantly evaluate and reevaluate the impact your actions and lifestyle has on others and on the world around you. You cannot volunteer at a soup kitchen once a month and say that your entire life aim is to help others, and that “doing good” will be your benchmark for a life well lived when you’re old and wrinkled and on your death bed. What about the ways that you live? What about the businesses you buy from? What about the food that you eat, and the way that you treat your coworkers and your children? How do you treat strangers? How do you treat people who have less than you? How do you treat people fleeing to this country from violence? All of these elements come into play when you want to “do good.” To leave a positive impression upon this earth when we eventually are flung from this mortal coil is a multifaceted reality, and one that needs to be acknowledged for good to actually be done.
I WANT TO DO A GOOD JOB
In some ways, and for the purposes of this newsletter, this means that you want to live well, be in partnership well, have a good job and own your house and get promoted before you retire early and have the respect of your peers and all the other western capitalist ideology. The “I WANT TO DO A GOOD JOB” thing inherently means that you are abiding by a system of rules and expectations and you want to live up to those said rules and expectations.
The little brother to the above life methodology, closely related to but not the exact same thing, is this little tricky motherf*cker:
“I want to do better than……”
XYZ:
“…than I had.”
“…than I was given.”
Or the kicker:
“I want to do better than my parents did.”
Class, how many of us have heard this before? How many of us have said this?
While on the outset this may seem to be an innocent and well-meaning thing to say, there is a false magnanimity in this statement.
People think it means:
I don’t want to inflict the trauma that my parents did on my own children and partner! I recognize the unfairness I went through and I don’t want to perpetuate that!
And, if you don’t inflict that trauma and if you don’t treat your partner/kids/the family dog like you witnessed growing up, then CONGRATULATIONS! YOU MADE IT! YOU DID IT! YOU SUCCEEDED AT LIFE! YOU GET A GOLD STAR!
BUT:
To want to do “better than” is to imply the existence of a subjective bench mark.
à la:
I don’t hit my kids, so I’m doing a good job.
I don’t call the secretary stupid, so I’m doing a good job.
I don’t cheat on my wife, so I’m doing a good job.
If the above italics aren’t enough of a clue, here’s the problem with the “do better than” mentality:
You can still be a complete asshole.
And, if you are an asshole, the “better than” mentality can be used to excuse away all the pain and trauma you ARE inflicting on other people, because at least I’m not as bad as THAT lady who birthed me.
Either way, it’s a crutch. If you’re inherently a good person, and you honestly just want to do better, this means that however good you do is limited by how good or bad your parents are, because THEY are the benchmark.
If you’re a jerk, or even if you THINK you’re a good person but are ACTUALLY a jerk, it’s a statement you can hide behind to excuse away all the not-so-good things you are saying or doing.
It’s too simplistic: this business of “being good” or “doing better than” or “doing a good job.” People are complex.
But that, dear friends, is where the majority of people FAIL: when they are faced with this complexity.
To deny this complexity of human existence is to deny the truth of who we are in the first place. We are complicated beings having complicated relationships living in a complicated world.
YOU ARE NOT ALL GOOD.
YOU ARE NOT ALL BAD.
When the truth paints you in a bad light—THAT’S where the magic can happen.
THE MAGIC, AND THE ULTIMATE POINT, HERE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD HOW MUCH LONGER IS THIS NEWSLETTER:
When we cling too tightly to the concept of “goodness”, we ignore the “bad”, which means we actually perpetuate the bad. If you’re so concerned with DOING A GOOD JOB ™ , then you are going to ignore/deny/gaslight/feel threatened when evidence to the contrary arises. And, instead of recognizing the mistakes you’ve made, instead of being honest and open and authentic and accepting, you push the truth away and go down with the sinking ship of I DID A GOOD JOB, DAMMIT even though it means causing more destruction and pain than if you had recognized the leak in the first place and just FIXED THE FUCKING LEAK.
You will, inevitably, be sitting here having some sort of experience with someone leaving you at some point because they, themselves, couldn’t handle complexity or authenticity or honesty. You will have someone in your life who turned their back on you because they would rather go down with the ship than DO THE WORK of recognizing the truth. The safer narrative is “It’s not me. I did better than!”
The difficult job, the hard thing, is learning how to handle falling short of the mark instead of blowing the whole thing up to cover up the dents.
Sometimes, making things better for our kids and our partners and our friends means admitting that you aren’t doing a good job.
Some people can’t handle making things better for others if it means having to admit they aren’t doing a good job.
But doing a “good job” is fixing what is broken. It isn’t the impossible task of making sure things don’t break in the first place. Oftentimes, this is where we get stuck.
In trying to DO GOOD our entire lives, we ignore the bad. But in ignoring the bad, we do not maintain goodness- we actually become worse.
So you are sitting here, dear Reader, with this experience under your belt. But no matter the choices of others, WE, too, always have choices.
People who do the work to handle realness, authenticity, honesty in imperfection: you are not broken. You are, in fact, whole, because you can recognize that wholeness lies in complexity.
Those that are broken are those who cling tightly to perfection. This is cognitive dissonance. Those people grow bitter, and resentful, and angry, and are so invested in their own false narrative that they would sever relationships to protect it. It’s an addiction to toxic positivity. It’s an addiction to needing to be the hero. It’s addition to fear: fearing the truth of who they really are.
But the truest, most beautiful part about life: the wholeness that is complexity, the wholeness in the complexity of you. That is the only birthright we must own.
If anyone thinks the problem is in your complexity, peel those people away from your life like skin after a sunburn.
They couldn’t handle the heat.
Until next week.
Love, light, and lifejackets,
Steph x