When we curb our behavior for another, when we conceal a part of ourselves, or when we reshape an honest expression because we make the presumption that a person could not handle the truth, we are expressing our hatred toward them.

— We are not only communicating that we believe them incapable, but we are further rendering them so. —

To be clear: We are not doing it to protect them. We are doing it to protect ourselves from the repercussions that would come about were we to tell the truth.

Misconceptions of Truth

This is not to say that much of what passes as the truth is in fact the truth. Mere facts are not truth. “Brutality” is not the truth. “Telling it like it is” is not the truth. Speaking “my truth” is not the truth.

The truth means sharing the vulnerable heart of experience in the face of someone who may protest or disapprove. The truth means that you are in some way on the line as deeply as the person receiving it in a palpably shared and challenging experience for both. 

— The truth is almost invariably something we must internally seek. —

It is the thing we can sense but has a slight repulsion to being spoken.

Change and Resistance

This is because were we to speak it, something would have to change: us, our circumstances, our relationships. The status-quo “heart” of the tumescent mind will always push back when we get close to it. That’s how we know.

— We know, then we trust that another person is capable of receiving it, then we trust that we are capable of speaking it. —

When we know, there is no other option, because to not do so would be the first step into disconnection from the truth.