What if we just said it?

Have we ever told people what we exactly feel? Like ok there’s this plan you probably want to skip, the reason probably could be like you’re just not in the mood. Or you may just want to do house chores. Or you may want to kick back at home with a tea and some good food.

After whole week of work, sometimes you may just want to be. But how many of us can truly tell this to someone without having to offend them?

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. About how much of ourselves we are actually allowed to be around other people. With friends. With family. With partners. Even with the people we barely know.

How honest are we really allowed to be?

Imagine saying the below, rather than saying

“Hey, I’m so sorry something’s come up”.
“I’ve to pick my brother up.”
“I’ve to take my mom to the doctor”.
“Oh lord, my call just got extended”.

And replace it with,

“I’m so sorry, I am too tired to make it this time”.
“I just don’t feel like meeting up today”.
“Hey, I had a terrible day, rain check on today?”

And just imagine if someone on the receiving end would appreciate this honesty. At the same time, we shouldn’t make up excuses for everything because remember, people are making plans with you and this cannot be an everyday occurrence.

And then comes awkward conversations, sometimes you don’t want to align with someone. Their plans, or whatever it could be. The way they have communicated something to you, or probably something that was done without your consent. And you say,

“This hurt me.”
“I don’t like this.”
“This isn’t what I want.”

We disagree.
We draw a boundary.
We choose something differently.

And suddenly, honesty feels like confrontation.

I’ve often wondered why.

We grow up believing that the people closest to us know us. They know our little habits, our moods, our quirks, the things that make us happy, the things that hurt us, the things we can tolerate and the things we simply cannot.

But is that reality? Or do we live in a constructed reality and letting people believe in this side of us that we want them to think? Oh she’s so busy with work, in reality you are probably in your pjs just curling up and reading something.

Why is it so difficult to accept that someone we love can feel something that makes us uncomfortable?
Why do we sometimes hear someone’s feelings as criticism rather than simply hearing them as feelings?
Why do we judge people for the way they choose to live when their choices don’t hurt us? What if someone wants to do their chore over spending time with you because they probably don’t want to piled up work?
And why do we expect people to accept things from us that we ourselves might not be willing to accept from them?

Perhaps, somewhere along the way, we’ve forgotten how to mind our own lives.

Not in the cold, “I don’t care about anyone” kind of way.

But in the softer, kinder sense of it. The sense of allowing people to be people. Allowing a friend to make a decision we wouldn’t make. Allowing a partner to have an opinion we don’t share. Allowing a family member to build a life that looks nothing like the one we imagined for them.

Because perhaps that is what acceptance really is.

It isn’t agreement.
It isn’t approval.
It isn’t pretending that we don’t have our own opinions.
It is being able to sit with another person’s truth without immediately trying to change it, or try to undermine it.

And I think we are not very good at that.

We say we want honesty, but often, what we really want is honesty that doesn’t inconvenience us.

We say, “You can tell me anything.”

But sometimes what we mean is,

“Tell me anything, as long as it doesn’t make me question myself.”

There is something a little heartbreaking about that.
Because if I tell you how I feel, it doesn’t automatically mean I’m blaming you.
If I set a boundary, it doesn’t mean I love you any less.
If I disagree with you, it doesn’t mean I don’t respect you.
If I choose a different life, it doesn’t mean I think your life is wrong.

Sometimes a feeling is just a feeling.
It doesn’t need to be defended like a case in court.
It just needs to be heard.

Maybe this is why relationships can be so complicated.

We want to be accepted in our entirety, but sometimes struggle to accept the parts of other people that make us uncomfortable. We want our friends to understand our choices, while questioning theirs. We want our partners to respect our boundaries, while taking theirs personally. We want our families to let us live our lives, while quietly believing we know what would be better for theirs.

And somewhere in all of this, we forget something very simple:

The people we love do not belong to us. They are not extensions of us. They are whole people, with whole lives that existed before we arrived and will continue to exist outside of us.

They have their own histories. Their own fears. Their own definitions of happiness. Their own boundaries. Their own mistakes to make. Their own lessons to learn.

And perhaps loving someone means leaving a little room for all of that.

Maybe the question isn’t always, “How do I make this person understand me?”

Maybe it’s simply, “Can I allow them to be different from me?”

Because someone choosing differently isn’t rejecting us. A boundary isn’t an attack. Disagreement doesn’t have to become a conflict.

We don’t have to understand every choice people make. We just have to know when their choices are theirs to make.

There’s a difference between protecting ourselves from something that hurts us and trying to control someone because their choices make us uncomfortable.

Perhaps we need to get better at that distinction.

At letting people say they’re tired, say no, disagree, set a boundary, or choose a life we wouldn’t choose, without making them feel like they need an excuse for it.

Because the people we love are not here to fit into the lives we imagined for them.
They get to be themselves.
And so do we.
Maybe that’s the kind of freedom we owe each other.

But the real question is,

How much of ourselves are we allowed to be?