The thing about being someone who promotes truth telling – on the page and off – is that when you’re not walking your talk you know it immediately and it’s hard not to feel like a big ol’ liar.
Of course I’m being a little hard on myself; I’m human, I make choices, and the bottom line is that I don’t always tell the truth about how I feel or what I think. That’s why I teach it – because it is hard for me – and so I practice it.
A few weeks ago I was invited to the monthly salon my friend Megan holds in her home, and to which she invites artists and creatives to speak about their work to a group of her friends.
“Laurie Wagner is the most honest person I’ve ever met,” Megan said with a big smile, as she introduced me to her friends. My eyes went big. I gulped. It felt like a challenge. If she’d said, “Laurie Wagner is the strongest woman on earth,” I’d have to lift something really heavy. Being the most honest person would mean I’d have to tell the truth – and the truth was – that was the last thing I wanted to do.
I’d been feeling crappy for months. The reality of life without my husband of 22-years had begun sinking in. The first few months were pure candy – like being a teenager when your parent’s leave for the weekend and you can do whatever you want. I went on dates, turned our bedroom into my bedroom, I didn’t have to haggle with anyone around house and kid decisions, and I brought work to bed – something he always hated. But the last couple of months had been harder. The responsibility of being a single parent and householder had sunk in. Between earning the money, managing the house, the kids and the tsunami of work on my plate, I was overwhelmed. Plus I missed my husband – a sweet, upbeat guy who, while driving me nuts in some ways, had also brought a lot of kindness and companionship to my life.
Recently I had even begun doubting my decision to separate, and a new kind of loneliness had settled in right alongside the fresh lines around my eyes, which seemed darker and deeper than before. Also new was the jiggly skin around my knees which was beginning to pucker, the new gray in my hair, and the bulge around my hips which made my jeans feel tight all over. The changes didn’t stop there; my oldest baby daughter was leaving for college in a few weeks.
When I got to Megan’s salon that night I felt a sad, vulnerable desperation, a feeling of things slipping through my hands; my marriage, my family and my youth.
Minutes before the event started I held two short stacks of stories in each hand. One stack held the funny writing I’d done a million years ago; images of me on my back making snow angles in a field of daisy’s while my kids viciously cut down a tree in the background, and the other, a stack of the harder, more sobered writing from the last few months that spoke to my loneliness and self doubt. In an act of total self-protection, I went with the funny stuff. I wanted to entertain people. I wanted them to laugh, to think I was smart and funny. I didn’t want them to see my sadness because I didn’t want to see my sadness.
I get that I was protecting myself. I agree that it’s not necessary to out yourself 100 % of the time. Plus, these people were strangers to me. But what I realized afterwards, after I found myself reading “funny” lines that landed like dirt clods and which didn’t bring me half the laughs that I had hoped for – wasn’t just that I had chosen incorrectly, but something even more important for me to notice:
While it’s not always comfortable being honest, it’s even more uncomfortable not being honest.
And it’s not so much about outing myself as it is about aligning myself with where I am in an authentic way – however I can do that. Maybe it’s about holding my sadness with some grace – when I can.
I can’t tell you how things might have been different that night at Megan’s house if I’d chosen the other stack of stories. I still may have left feeling sad, but at least I would have left honest – and that – for me – is walking my talk.
that kooky but wise brad blanton talks a lot about this. about the lies we tell first to ourselves and then to the rest of the world. the courage to be honest (for me) feels like holding my hand in a fire. i avoid it like crazy. it hurts like hell. but then it is galvanizing and cleansing. as close to enlightened and alive as it gets. so i approach the flame again. reluctantly. bravely. seeking that soaring release. thanks laurie for being one of the teachers who modeled that for me. for being a truth teller despite the burn, the ashes, the scars. from it comes rejuvenation.
Cynthia – thank you. I think we’ve modeled that for each other or we wouldn’t still be standing given our friendship and it’s wiggly path. Good on ya sister! I love what you write:
“the courage to be honest (for me) feels like holding my hand in a fire. i avoid it like crazy. it hurts like hell. but then it is galvanizing and cleansing. as close to enlightened and alive as it gets. so i approach the flame again. reluctantly. bravely. seeking that soaring release.”
Totally inspiring! Thank you! xxx
beautiful piece Laurie, it made me think about the fact that there’s truth and there’s truth. one truth is the re-telling of facts in a truthful way, and the other, kind of a harder one, where we have to tell the truth to ourselves about any number of things, mostly about ourselves. love you Laurie for speaking even when you’d rather not, and for outing yourself when you’d rather not. xoxo
Lizzie – thank you for reading and replying – that means so much to me. I also know how to re-tell facts in a truthful way, and you’re right, this is different. For myself, there is so much more truth to tell – everyday. thank you! xxxx
You inspire me to keep putting one true word in front of the other across the page, or true colors across the canvas and turning my camera toward the real landscape of my life rather than a make believe world. Thank you.
Kimberley, thank you for reading and replying. I think we need each other. I need inspiration from others – I need to watch them take risks and then pull up my bootstraps and take my own. We don’t work alone. xxx
Telling the truth about a truth teller who’s not telling the truth feels as real and vivid as it gets… it’s like an Escher drawing that turns a stairway into a Moibus Strip… and I have to say, I think it takes a really great writer to tell difficult truths in ways that make readers feel freer than we felt before. Having been through some of what you’re experiencing, your words rang true for me. Tig Notaro is a truth telling comedian whose career launched into the stratosphere when she opened her show talking about the cancer diagnosis she’d received that day. So I think people actually crave and appreciate well-told truths. You inspire me to conquer my fear by stepping right into it. This has been a life saver for me. Thank you and bless you!
Mary – that’s beautiful – what you said about Tig. That’s so inspiring. And what you wrote, “people crave and appreciate well-told truths…” which is to say, people crave realness because it makes it possible for them to step in as well. Thank you so much for this note. xx
love….it is showing up and maybe not being the funny one, or the cute one, or the wise one..but about being the honest one, the one who shows up even when it’s hard and not so pretty or comfortable. the nuggets you share help us all. love you xoxo
Stef – I’m with you – just showing up is enough. xxx
Hannah Marcotti recommended that I seek you out after I told her how resistant I’ve been to SEO and search terms and all the other little puttering things I’m told I should do after I write a story for my blog. Maybe I should do those things, but they feel deceptive and tricky somehow. If I write about how the two little old ladies made me feel beautiful when I was having a bad day – do I distill that down to the search term “beauty”? Are enough people Googling “wise, old lady magic” to make it a search term? I found you today (without using any search terms, just linking over from a friend through FB) and your post here feels like the antidote to SEO. Truth, connection and vulnerability – these are the things I want to focus on in my writing, even if no one finds me in their Google search. Thank you.
Goodness gracious – I’m with you. Skip the search terms, stick with something true and real for you. The people who are looking for that will find you. We just want to make real connections, don’t we? We don’t want to have to lure people into finding us. Let’s keep tuning into our own vibrant channel – focus on that – the rest will come. Now we’ve found each other! Thanks for showing up!
Oh Keri, I saw this reply and I just had to respond to it. I recently completed a new website and the web person I was working with was VERY MUCH committed to all that SEO stuff (ha, ha, “stuff). I wrestled and wrestled with his advice. At one point he went in and changed some of the copy I had written (my words!) to give it more SEO. I almost died. I spent hours coming through the site looking for places he had done that. I still worry those “tweaks” are lurking there somewhere. That I haven’t located them all. I can so relate to what you said here. We’re drawn to words and the heart with which they’re written. “The antidote to SEO.” Thank you for that. Somehow I just know the people looking for us will find us without “Google.”
To me, honesty isn’t necessarily shedding our clothes in public. We all walk out our front doors dressed…some of us in baggy clothes, some in tight. When we stand in front of our own mirrors, though…well, that’s when the truth comes out, no? I get why you felt you needed to show up that night in a big ol’ honest way…that was a hard place to find yourself in. I honor you for sharing your journey with us. It’s not easy and the road ahead isn’t clear. But, there’s no time limit on honesty. Reminds me of meditating…when you find yourself not focusing on your breath, you just start again, from the beginning.
true – i love that – begin again – no time limit on honesty. And we learn from each encounter we have – with ourselves – right? Naked in the mirror. How long can I look at myself? 5 minutes? Okay. Next time maybe 7 minutes. Can I make air time to be with myself as I am – and even – good god – when I’m with others. I love this discussion. Thanks so much for weighing in. xxx
with ourselves first…
with others…*known* and *trusted* others…
with strangers…
your post has stayed with me. much to think about!
xox <3
thank you sweetie – thank you! xxx
Word, honey. Word.
Bo….xxooo
Just wanted to thank you, Laurie, for all these monthly gems! Always insightful, illuminating and wonderfully honest. 🙂
Best to you!
Traci Moore
Traci – thank you!
Reading your words helped give me a greater sense of permission to be exactly-how-I-am this morning. I did look at your workshop calendar and think, “Holy cow, she’s working her buns off this fall.”(And…I’m grateful I’ll get to be a recipient of some of your activity.) Thank you for sharing this post. Sending a hands-clasped-in-front bow.
Sam
sam – thank you for reading and commenting – it means a lot to me – and it encourages me greatly. So glad we’ll get to work together this fall. See you soon! xx
Laurie, you have given us the opportunity to be truthful and honest. You help us feel safe. You have a safe place with all the people in your life who support you with love and faith. You let me cry through my writing and let me feel, body shaking with tears, the emotional burden I chose to carry and you did it with open arms. All these arms are open for you my friend. My arms are open to you. Be your truth.
Much love, Alice
alice, what a beautiful surprise to hear from you. I remember your shaking shoulders and those big fat tears. You really trusted us that day – and subsequent days. I remember the cookies you brought the first time I met you – perfect, gorgeous cookies from a fancy bakery in L.A. It was a trade “I will give you these cookies if you accept my tears.” And we did. Love you so. xxx Thank you.
Laurie, this posting of yours was done with your usual grace and verve and forthright honest style and I admire it so. I appreciated the ‘thunk’ i heard when I read about your funny lines landing ” like dirt clods”.. I appreciated the push and pull of all your emotions right now as you are moving through such an important transition. I also was caught by the line about your understanding that you don’t think that we all need to ‘out’ ourselves 100 % of the time…that brought to mind for me the fine line between, for example, the elegance of a well written memoir as opposed to the torture of watching too many Oprah or Jerry Springer shows…..one designed to honestly examine one’s human condition and one designed to manipulate an audience.
What I love about your honesty in writing is that it touches me deeply and I recognize parts of myself in it and I learn from it. I learn more about a mentor I value, you, and more about myself. And I always learn from you about the enormous value of authenticity in writing and what happens on the page if one tries to fake it….it feels and sounds inauthentic and then one has ruined the whole batch of words and thoughts in one fell swoop. This is another of those examples of how our writing is so interwoven with our lives….if we are inauthentic on one side of the equation, then we are inauthentic on the other side too.
suzanne, YES! Who we are on the page is who we are off the page. One in the same. Encouraging people to write from an authentic place is encouraging them to live from that same place. In that way writing changes our lives. It’s powerful. I appreciate and I love your support here – you inspire me to keep going. So much love!
Laurie, this post stuck with me, even tapped me on the shoulder asking “what I wasn’t doing?” Spoiler alert…”taking risks.” Yep that’s what I preach and try to practice. Writing about your body changing tugged on me, too. Lord, I don’t know who hands out these bodies but I feel like I get a new one every decade. Things sprout where they never grew before. But fear not, you’ll get a new one in ten years or so. All the changes and the “settling in of a new kind of loneliness” such PROFOUND honesty. Thank you for trusting and tell true stories and so much more. Hugs and gratitude, Caren
Caren,
thank you so much for letting me know that you read this and got it. Trying to say something authentic in a public platform is so interesting. There’s always that tendency to want to shine or look better than you are. And then there’s just honesty in all of it’s clunky, beautiful ways. Can’t really shine that up. Hearing from you is so helpful – thank you. It totally encourages me.
xxx
Hi Laurie,
It strikes me that the truth of our lives is found in moments of awareness that are much shorter than the time it takes to later write about them, there’s another truth that emerges in the remembering and the crafting of those moments and our lives into art and still another truth that determines whether, when, how, where and with whom we choose to share our stories, in whatever form. You bolstered your shaken confidence by reading funny stories of happier times in front of the group. Later in a stronger moment you opened yourself and wrote the truth of that moment and what you’ve been living these last few months and shared it with a wider audience.
Lesla,
You’re right – that’s what I did. I bolstered my shaky confidence.
I love what you write here, that we have these experiences, and then as we reflect we understand them deeper and differently. More truth arises as we do this. That’s why I like to walk with friends – as we share we reflect and there’s always more understanding. I’m so happy to hear from you and I appreciate that you’re out there in the world. Our paths are connected!
xxx
L
You strive to be authentic in your art, your teaching and your life outside of that, telling the largest and clearest truth that you can when the opportunity arises. There’s nothing be ashamed of if sometimes it’s a more limited and less clear truth, to yourself or whoever you’re talking with or teaching.