What Do You Do?

Life is messy. And life with people is messier. Feelings get hurt and emotions get in the way. There is no simple black and white, only a vast expanse of grey in which family is lived. 

There is no nice way to put it, family is hard. 


I’ve been told, hurt people hurt people. Whether intentional or unintentional. I’ve come to know this as true. When you look at a person who has done you great wrong and all you can see is that they are hurting, what do you do? What do you do when that’s the only answer you have? That they’re hurting. It’s not an excuse just a reality. What do you do? 


The compassion I have makes me feel a little crazy. Even after all this time and all this pain I still want the best for those who have hurt me. It sounds crazy but maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it’s a strength to be able to still love and maybe its okay to be effected. 


Pain is a funny thing. You can let it rule you or you can give it space to breathe. Pain begets pain when not followed by healing. So why do we sit in our pain rather than let it go? Because it’s terrifying, it is simply terrifying to let go of the only thing that’s familiar. 


What do you do when it’s not your pain? When it’s not your mess to clean up? When there’s nothing you can do? When the only thing to do is try not to hate. What do you do? 


Family is hard. And people in pain create pain. I don’t even think they mean to. They just don’t know what else to do with it. And can you really blame people for not knowing where to put their pain? I don’t think I can. 


Once I was just like that. I didn’t know where to put my pain and it came out and in crazy ways. So I won’t blame people for the pain they have and I won’t blame them for what they do or don’t do with it. 


But where to go from there I do not know. I’m just a kid. Or I was when it all started. I guess all I can do is try and live and live well. I’ll try and do better than those who went before me. Not out of spite. But so that one day I’ll walk the path back to them. Walk back and help them where they haven’t helped themselves. 


Because what is this life if without hope? Without help from those that love you? 




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

september 1st

September 1st, its the beginning of things. It’s the beginning of the end of the year. At least in my head September has always felt like the beginning of the end. I’m happy to know that the sweltering heat is nearly past and its almost sweater time. I like the fall, mostly because it feels like the rest before the rest, it feels like the closest to what my heart looks like, but partly I like the fall because I like the word falling.   This week I did what I could, which doesn’t look like much but I ate well and washed my face often and I tried.  I got back into the studio yesterday and was immediately overwhelmed. To start with my work space was a mess, as it has been for months, and finally yesterday was the day I couldn’t take it anymore and tidied up the table that serves as my workstation. It was probably 20 minutes of finding homes for things and trying to remember how I had had it organized in the first place. But it was 20 minutes well spent, because at end not eve...
Read more

Learning

Over the years I’ve learned many things about myself and how I function. For example: if I need to force myself to wash my face I put on make up, because I figured out that the need to not sleep in my make up supersedes my laziness. I’ve discover lots of what I call hacks in my own functioning. As I’ve written about before I grew up struggling with depression, so one of my biggest challenges, even when I don’t feel depressed, is to get motivated. So I’ve found some of my own personal quirks that I can almost trick myself into doing the healthy things instead of relying completely on motivation. This is also true when it comes to my art.   I’ve learned that I can’t sit in my studio for hours on end, the most productive and best work is done in the first and second hour. Anything more and I start to get too into my head. I also need to have somewhat of a plan before I even walk down the stairs. Otherwise I get overwhelmed just looking at all that I could do, or I start random proje...
Read more

Almost There

Nowadays it is the norm to go to collage or university even when you don’t know what you want to do. It’s preached go to school and figure it out while you’re there. It’s taught that your job is your life and it is all you really ought to try to achieve. Even as young as 14 this didn't sit right with me, I always dodged the questions. What do you want to be, what school do you want to go to, what would you like to do with your life. Because I learned from a young age that artist wasn’t the answer that they were looking for.   I learned to fly under the radar because I knew my dream would be easily crushed, but I am stubborn. So I did my best in school and then I made my great escape. Now almost five years later I am about 3 steps away from achieving what I set out to do.  I have about three things felt to do and then I will not just be an artist who makes things frequently, I will be one who sells these things too. I have an 8 painting series ready to be sold, and that is...
Read more