People like reading advice. They like hearing about how someone got through a tough time, and similarly, about how they might get themselves through.
Absolutely.
But over the course of writing posts, and reading blogs, and tuning into myself, and thinking about the texts and emails and messages I’ve gotten following different things I’ve written, I’ve come to realize that there’s something people like to read even more than advice:
They like to read about a person experiencing it. Being in it.
Which isn’t to say that we like to know someone is struggling. But there’s something so powerful about hearing about someone who is in it – someone who is living it, someone who Gets It.
It’s why people like Jenny Lawson and Glennon Doyle Melton have such a following. Because they don’t just write about recovery or having overcome x, y, z. They also write candidly in the middle of hard times, real times. And that’s usually the piece we are drawn to – we love the inspiration of victory, and the hope that it could be ours. But the part of the book, or speech, or post, where they write honestly about what the Hard Times were like – that’s the part we most connect to. Ah. Yes. Someone understands.
I strive for that on this blog, and I’d like to keep moving towards it even more.
Because sometimes, in the hardest moments, it’s not helpful to hear “this will pass” and “you will feel better” and “here’s what you can do to help yourself”. Because sometimes in the moment, you just can’t believe that you’ll ever feel better. That you’ll ever stop hating your body, that you ever won’t feel traumatized or triggered, that you ever won’t feel a pull toward alcohol, that you ever won’t go back to a bad relationship, that you ever won’t feel hopeless.
Whatever it is for you.
In those moments, when someone cheerleads, (well-meaning, of course. This is not at all about malicious intent) sometimes you want to retort back, “Prove it! You can’t, can you? You can’t prove to me that I’ll feel better, that it’ll get better, that the outcome will be the one I desire. You can’t promise me it. So stop. Just stop. Because I can’t trust it.”
So I thought about what helps me in those moments, because I sure have them, I think we all do, when I don’t want a cheerleader. What helps me, what people have done for me and said to me, and what I will say to you, whoever you are, now, is:
I know. I know it hurts and I know you’re afraid and I know it feels like it won’t ever go away. I’m not here to tell you it will. But I’m here to hold you – literally or figuratively. I’m here so that you can tell me everything, all that you feel and fear and think. And I’m not here to tell you it’ll go away but I’m here to embrace it because this is where you are right now and I love you and I will love you through this. Tell me, say what you need to say, and I will hold your gaze and I will hug you and I will be right here. I know this feeling. I know this place you are living in. And maybe that will bring you comfort that I get it. But this, right now, is about you. I will understand even if I don’t understand. I am right here, meeting you on this path that you’re on, and I will walk it with you.
That’s all any of us need.
