Honesty & Your Ability To Love & Be Loved
In this age of “falsification” and “alternate facts,” the “Truth” remains as a characteristic of being human that is intrinsic to our natures, especially our ability to love and be loved. When truth is denied, people fall victim to deception and lies that weaken our ability to live and love.
There are people in the world who are actively manipulating knowledge in order to control the minds and hearts of others. If falsehood ever became our “norm,” the greatest danger would be the deterioration of our relationship to love.
Think of it this way, truth and its vehicle of expression, honesty, are essential when locating the true presence of any particular human being. Put simply, if you don’t know the truth about someone, then your love for him or her will be limited by its absence. I could love the image you project, your persona, or the fabrication of you. However, the love I give and get would naturally be limited by the absence of your felt presence, vulnerable, and real.
It is sometimes fashionable these days to believe that there are many “versions” of the truth. That each and every individual has their own particular version of the truth I am talking about. No doubt, we all have our own subjective viewpoints. However, this inherent creativity does not invalidate the reality of pre-existing “facts” we would all rationally acknowledge if we had to. Somethings are truth regardless of whether or not you like it.
Returning to love, we all know whether or not love exists. As human beings, we are born with that precious inherent ability to acknowledge the presence of love. Even and especially in infancy, before the internalized distortions of adulthood, we can witness this ability in its rawest form. That’s not to say there are far too many instances when “hope” and “ignorance” obscure and limit this natural detection, and a person assumes love is present when his or her instincts say it is not. Or say love isn’t when in reality love is.
Nevertheless, I have had the bitter sweet experience of witnessing a person, in a moment of vulnerable honesty, after years of lying to themselves and others, tell the truth, known all along, and revealed for the very first time.
Comments welcome, Dr. T. Jordan