Honesty

What a week! I threw the Professor a surprise party for his birthday Thursday (he's 25!). This has been in the works for two months, and he had no clue! I'm a terrible liar and this was my first time planning something of this scope, so I do feel entitled to a little pat on the back. Add to that the excitement of a small car accident and a trip to the doctor, and I'm about ready for a vacation - only two weeks left to wait!

Surprise party night, Broncos scrimmage, Effie napping

So my last post was on humility, and I've been grinding away at it, but let me tell you, it is slow going. There are a lot of layers in my heart that need to be stripped away and dealt with before I can approach it full throttle.

Onions have layers, ogres have layers.

I've been musing on and researching concepts of honesty, religious and cultural views of truth, and honest speech. I'll start with the classic Merriam-Webster definition:

Honesty (n): fairness and straightforwardness of conduct

When I speak about honesty in the context of simplicity, I don't mean merely telling the truth - although of course that's a crucial facet of a simple life. It's difficult for me to come up with the language to really say what I mean here; honesty encompasses truth, integrity, and fairness, but it also implies a certain candidness, a genuineness that I struggle with daily. It is my goal to live truthfully, to live honestly and frankly. But this is one of those things that, for me, is much more easily said than done.

I've been toying around with the phrase "Ground Floor Living". This has nothing to do with architecture; rather, it's about ensuring you are living out the levels of yourself that are closest to your heart and your true being. (Forgive my wordiness and confusing language, I'm still struggling to develop it myself.) When people talk about "walls" they've built up to protect themselves emotionally from others, I picture them in their "heart house" walking upstairs to the next floor - keeping the ground floor, the most vulnerable part, hidden. I see four stories: the ground floor, second floor, top floor, and attic. I drew a picture of it in my notes:

I'm not much of an artist.

Emotional honesty is crucial to a simple life. There is no way around it - if I'm not living on the ground floor emotionally, I'm spending time and energy putting walls up and projecting a different self, which is not worth that time and energy. I should spend it actively bettering the parts of myself that I feel are not up to par, not covering them up with a different persona.

Another component of this, I think, is using simple language. It's easy to cover up unpleasant or even neutral feelings, events or ideas by sugarcoating or embellishing them, rather than stating them simply. It's possible to be simple and straightforward while still being tactful, and it's something relatively easy to change if you've fallen into the sugarcoating habit. There's also the matter of picking your battles and deciding what's worth mentioning. It's a skill I'm trying to hone.

So now for the paradox. I find myself living on the second floor a lot of the time - still willing to open up to certain people, but being careful to keep those walls up where I feel they need to be. The other part of the time, I'm living in a sort of "basement" where I'm totally over-sharing and can't seem to keep quiet when I need to. So I'm hitting around the target, I think, but I haven't quite gotten a bullseye. Maybe I never will, but I will certainly keep trying.

She was trying to help. I think.

- The Professor's Wife

"...the truth will set you free."

- John 8:32

"There is no greater mystery than that we keep seeking reality though, in fact, we are reality."

- Ramana Maharshi

"All you need to say is simply 'yes' or 'no'..."

- Matthew 5:37

"The real things haven't changed. It is still best to be honest and truthful; to make the most of what we have; to be happy with simple pleasures; and have courage when things go wrong."

- Laura Ingalls Wilder

"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion."

- Franz Kafka

"I am not bound to win, I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have."

- Abraham Lincoln