Inspiration

There are certain people who inspire me. Oftentimes, they are people I’ve never met: writers/bloggers, activists, politicians (rarely, but still). I’m also inspired by people I know: coworkers, family, and friends. Very recently, inspiration came from a blogger/writer who I also consider a friend.

Duchess Jane is that person.

She’s also known as Beth but she is and always will be royalty, in my opinion, so I love the “Duchess” moniker. I’d like to tell you why.

Jane writes about what is real. She writes about what is hard. She digs down deep into her soul, her heart, and her pain. She describes what she discovers in ways that evoke emotion – strong, life-changing emotion – and in ways that inspire those of us who don’t/can’t find that truthfulness in our writing.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I don’t live truth. I do. I try really hard to always be honest with myself and my feelings. I try to not be false or dishonest in anything I do. Unfortunately, I sometimes find that I don’t write about my truth. The reasons for that vary but, usually, it’s associated with not wanting to hurt people. I worry that sharing my experience puts other peoples’ experiences out there for others to examine. I worry, even if I don’t name names, that people will assume they know who I’m discussing. That’s one of the dangers of non-anonymous writing. People who know me in real life read what I write. They will see themselves whether or not I’m writing about them.

I have been a coward.

Jane is not. (I tried, but can not find, the link to Jane's post about how people should not assume but should ask if a certain post is about them.)

Yesterday, Jane wrote about how Empires Weren't Built Here, Part 1. I read it today and, once again, I was in awe of her ability to yank feeling out of words. She talked about dying and what would be left. What would her last words be… out there in the ether on the Internet. Would it be something meaningful? Would people look at her last status update? Her last blog post? Her last Tweet? What if something tragic happened and she survived? Would people look at that and what she wrote?

She wrote about writing of experiences and whether she should chronicle those encounters. She wrote about her anxiousness concerning that. She wrote, “…would I succumb to this fear of being viewed as a pillager of my own tragedies and betrayer of my family, peddling their pain for pennies on the internet?”

I understood this all too well.

It seems so lame to say, “Me, too!” “I know!” “I feel that!” “Yes, yes, YES!”

I waited until my blog reader updated; thankfully, it was quickly. Empires Weren’t Built Here, Part 2 showed up soon after. This one was harder for me. I’m going to change the way I describe this. Writing is good but it felt like Jane was talking, confessing, exposing and confiding. So, I’ll now say that she spoke to me. She talked about love. She talked about hopes and dreams and joining. She also talked about losing ourselves in relationships. She talked of dreams lost and compromises and stagnation.

I can’t blog from work. That’s probably a good thing.

I can read. Sometimes, I can comment on some blogs but not on others. I will check out my favorites when I take a break or eat lunch.

Today, after I read Jane’s blog, I did something very uncharacteristic. I am a workaholic. I keep my life very compartmentalized. I am all business when it comes to my job. Today was different. I closed my door and I put my “teleconference” note on the door.

I cried.

I.do.not.cry.at.work.

Well, okay, I did once at my last job and I’ll probably (thanks to Jane) write about that one day.

Why did I cry today?

I saw myself in her words. This is not to say that any other person is to blame for what happened to me. Actually, I blame only me for what I did to myself.

There is a very fine line between compromising for the sake of a relationship and sacrificing what is integral to our souls. I made sacrifices that were not asked of me.

I’ve known that I wanted needed to write since I was nine years old. I’ve wanted to write about fun. I’ve wanted to write about self-exploration. I’ve wanted to write to entertain. I’ve wanted to write to be understood.

I work in a job where my writing is technical. It doesn’t satisfy my heart and soul. I created this blog so I could write about what matters to me. I found myself shackled by frustration and compassion and fear and kindness. I lost a little a lot of myself in that.

I need to say this: MrWurdi always encouraged me to write. He encouraged exploration of my soul and my heart and my dreams. I’ll always love him for many reasons but, especially, because of that. The restrictions that were on me were those I placed all on my own.

I used to work on my car. I used to go to the range and shoot. I used to hunt. I used to build things. I used to be more social. I don’t know that I stopped these activities because of relationships. Did I get lazy? Did I get complacent? Did other things become more important? Those are questions that I will be asking myself for some time to come.

Do-it-yourself psychoanalysis is hard. It means that you have to revisit those experiences that are hard. It means digging down into your pain, wallowing just a little bit, and understanding it. It means overcoming the pain – again – and growing because of your understanding.

There is something important that I learned today. I learned that I need to be like Jane. I need to write about what is real. I need to write about what is hard and painful and meaningful. That means that I might write about things that are uncomfortable. It means that I may write about things that make other people uncomfortable. That is really hard for me.

I want and need to be honest. It is part of who I am.

Stay tuned. There will still be ridiculous posts and random thoughts but I think this blog may change a little bit.

Thank you, Jane.