You know what frustrates me the most? I am good with words; I mean really good, and I know that. For example, give me five random words, and I’ll make up a story for you, using all of them, no problem. Or give me a topic, any topic, and given that I have at least a basic knowledge of whatever you wanna talk about, I have no problem talking for hours.
But as soon as I have to talk about myself and it’s going to be deeper than surface level, I shut down and exhibit the communicative abilities of a 3-year-old. But I just never learned how to do that.
I know it’s an odd thing to say, but that’s what it is. When we grow up, we learn how to communicate and express our emotions and learn how to deal with them. Same with thoughts. I never had that. There never was room for me to feel, let alone to express said feelings. And forget about thoughts, or, god forbid, ideas. There just was no one to talk to, no one who wanted to listen or cared to listen, no one who asked. Those that should have been there were too busy with their own misery.
Only since I have kids of my own did I realize how wrong it all was back then. How completely and utterly wrong. Only in dealing with my kids did I realise all the things I missed when I was a child. All those things that now just seem natural to me, like just being there for them, listening to them, holding them close, and letting them talk. And boy, oh boy, do they talk. Maybe sometimes they don’t know what to say or how to say it, but I’m giving them the time and space to figure it out.
And with me, it’s not like I don’t know what to say; most of the time I know exactly what to say; I just can’t. It’s like a wall goes up inside of me that prevents anyone from getting too deep, too close. And it feels like sharing anything that goes deeper is equivalent to handing someone a weapon; when I tell you this, then you can hurt me. And the deeper you go, the deadlier the weapon. I am simply afraid of handing someone, anyone really, the power to hurt me. So I don’t.
But I think, sometimes, I would really like to. Open up and let someone get close. And not be scared.
To be able to talk about all those fantastic worlds I created in my head, about all those ideas floating around up there, small and weird, big and powerful, and everything in between. To talk about what I feel, and how. To not be scared that what I am sharing is going to be used to hurt me. To be safe. Just once.
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