To a better you
A love letter to anyone in need. The mystical methods of improving how we perceive, what we believe, and who to share it with.
Maybe I'm a hopeless romantic, maybe believing in the courage of humanity is a lost cause that will inevitably lead me to crushing disappointment. That's a paradox, isn't it? Intense self defeating faith. Romanticism is the pinnacle of a trust in ignorant belief. It is the worldly application of faith. There is no evidence that those flowers will be received, that poem will be read, or that love will be returned. The world is an extension of our unrequited love. We never know what our efforts will produce, no matter how much evidence or data we have to show. The only tangible result is the person we become.
The worst punishment you can deliver is to allow someone to do something good, then punish them for it. The strongest humans don't let that stop them from continuing to hope and believe in each other, despite the record of our evil deeds and the results of our inadequacy.
In a way everything I write is a letter to someone I love. That may sound too special, dare I say... overly romantic, or even unbelievable. I sure do a lot of writing. It may sound impossible in the western conception of love. We've confused cherishing things for collecting them, as if this was something so sparse that the only solution is a covetous attachment.
If you've spent any significant amount of time talking to me you'll have heard me say: "people suck." That's either a massive contradiction and I'm slow pitching a chance for you to discredit everything I say; or... it might be something far more significant.
Maybe it's a testament to how foolishly I believe in the wonderful ability of people. Knowing how impossibly terrible we are I still hold out my hand believing that: even if it doesn't happen often, there's a chance that someone will reach back.
Doubt is that way. Doubt is the compilation of evidence that we will fail. Spoiler alert: Dad isn't going to like your new boyfriend (yeah... you have bad taste, but that's a different story). We forget that being right often isn't the final word of truth. Special occurrences wouldn't exist without a near insurmountable mound of failure to defy. I'm not a very good gambler, obviously. I'm not playing the odds. That alone will likely land me penniless and broken, but at least I bet on the better version of us all. I'll never be perfect, but I will have have alchemized troubled visions of an imperfect universe for soft tired smiling eyes that know a deeper truth: that I feel full in a foolish wish that you will be something.
Although our bodies decay and fade, belief will carry on. Without it, we would never have come this far.
Below is a letter I wrote to dear friend but never sent because I don't know how my words are received. Quite possibly, this letter needed to reach more than just one uncertain wanderer. It seems we write love letters in desperation with hope of a result. Sadly, we don't really get what we want. Beautifully, we get much more. Life has a way of disguising abundance.
Disclaimer - this is going to sound harsh.
I feel like I would be a shit friend if I just let you cowardly drift on hoping your business was just going to magically succeed. Is that a larger assumption about how I perceive a popular failure: that people are too afraid to live the way they want? Probably. Maybe I don’t have the whole picture, maybe I’m too critical, but have you asked yourself if you really are doing everything you can to make it happen? If not, what’s stopping you from asking the important questions?
I know I’m getting dangerously close to stomping all over your efforts. I know how it feels, I know the uncertainty and the lack of motivation that exists in efforts which have no guarantee of bearing fruit.
I know the excuses.
I know how confusing life is.
I know how it feels to be lost adrift.
I know what it is to wonder if this is worth any effort.
Most of all, I know the terror.
To question why we exist.
Maybe I’m projecting my own inadequacy and fears, maybe you’re happy this way. I have no claim to omniscience.
I do often fear of those closest to me that they are convincing themselves into happiness out of convenience instead of truth. Delusion is far more convenient; far less fulfilling.
I say all this because for some reason I don’t need evidence to believe in you. Often we feel that we need some validation to keep going. In risks such as these, we don’t get that luxury. In the middle it’s hard to see the end, but you’ve started something that I have faith in. I don’t really know why; instead of dismantling what I saw you doing (a method I am debilitated by too often), I sensed an overwhelming attraction to assist in your foolish vision.
What part and what place I have in that, I may never know for sure.
Maybe this is all I need to be: one voice, no matter how small, which doesn't rest when you fail. I don't find innate enjoyment in being that voice—the one which criticizes abruptly and ruthlessly—but for some reason I feel that those voices are too rare today. A soft call to tranquility won't motivate us to move towards what we don't know now is a better place. Later we find gratitude in the painful jarring shrieks that brought us there.
For that I hope this finds you unwell, so you may have the desperation to be a better you.
Because if I were to not feel so deeply troubled, I would have never become the man I am.
And I kinda like this guy, a self depiction that is better than it's ever been.
Finally, I wish for you to know that I'll still love you if you fail. The comic tragedy of goals is that reaching them is not the end. What we become is that end, it's just hard to see while we're drowning.
I guess... all this to say, a deep wisdom said by a distracted ill minded fish:
Just keep swimming...
Lee
It didn’t take that many reads for me to realize: maybe I wrote that letter to myself. We all need more brutally honest self love.
It's hard to wrap our minds around it all. We want to be the best we can at everything we do. Those that know, know probably too strongly that we are the best selves we can possibly be when we are in love. In a distracting way, we are also our most vulnerable. Vulnerability often allows exploit, and there is an immeasurable amount of selfishness that pervades the natural world.
The great limitation is: vulnerability is the prerequisite, or at least in the slimmest luckiest cases, a co-requisite. Often we don't even know that we found it until after it drifts away. If you haven't yet found love, openness may be a start. If you have decided you don't want it, don't deserve it, or that it is just too impossibly far; well... you may be out of luck, it's astoundingly infectious. Even if you don't believe, that son of a bitch will likely find you anyways. If you are reading this and still don't believe... tread lightly, the only thing separating us right now is a screen.
Maybe you're thinking: Lee falls in love with silly things, crazy people, and impossible dreams. How is he so sure that's love at all? He's just drunk on a wild experience, infatuated with the chemical reactions of an imbalanced life of intensity.
Maybe... but just maybe you have yet to see the best you are yet to be. The craziest part isn't how I see it, it's that we don't need sight to believe.
As my friend used to say, in the purity of silence: "Did you feel it?"
If you feel it can't be our best because of the pain of loss we must remember: the best still fail, fall short, and feel insufficient. Broken hearts don't mend. We don't forget. Time struggles on, but we don't have to let it embitter something sweet. In fact, sweetening bitter things creates our most cherished treats.
I'm convinced the secret to it all—is to fall for everything
To find each and every leaf
Every strand of tattered cloth
.
See beauty in disease
.
Smile with failure
Frown with success
Live with loss
.
Aiming higher—knowing we will miss
.
If a someone who most believes in nothing, can fall in love with everything...
Maybe it will inspire someone
A tiny shred of foolish belief
.
Till then I'll be waiting—for a goodbye kiss
After all, we never know which will be our last.