Courage

Sometimes I have very deep thoughts, but mostly I don't.

I think about life and friendship and family and God, and so many other things. I always think that I have some deep insight, but really, all I have are my emotions.

I had a conversation with a friend and she made me realize how shallow I am. I have a dear friend that suffers from all sorts of depression and anxieties and fears. The normal stuff everyone else has, but amplified to a painful degree. I thought about this friend and how much I love her. And I truly do. My heart broke to learn of some of the pain that my friend lives with every day and here I sit. I tell her things that everyone tells their friends; "I love you" "I'm here for you" "Just let me know if you need anything" "You can always come to me" or the worst "I know how you feel"

All are well intentioned, and heart-felt but they have one thing in common. They don't require anything from me. The ownership goes to the friend - you come to me and I'll help you. You make the first move. You tell me what I can do.

Looking back, I say this a lot; 'you just let me know what you want and I'll make it happen.'

But, that's no help at all. Although I truly mean what I say...I want to be there for my friends. I want to be the go-to person when they are in need, I want to be trusted and loved and confided in. I want my friends to know that I love them and would walk through fire for them.

I look at my normal, everyday life and realize that if someone said those things to me (and they have) I would never call on them. Not because I don't want them to be there, but because I wouldn't know what to ask for. I could never say, "I just need a hug" even if I needed that more than anything. I could never say, "can you just come over and sit?" "just tell me that you love me" "just tell me that it's all worth it"

Those are things that we all want at one time or another, but at the risk of sounding needy, vulnerable, weak, out of control, lonely or whatever, we leave them unsaid and wish, hope, pray, that someone would just do them for us. Sometimes, they do, but more often than not, no one does. Not because they don't want to, but because they don't know there's a need. We don’t want people to know we're broken anymore than they want us to know they are, but what's totally wrong about this situation is that we all really want someone to know that we're broken. We want to hide behind our strength and have people see through it at the same time. We don't want to admit anything, but we long for our friends to just somehow know.

I want to be one of the people that sees past. I want to stop saying "You tell me what you need" and instead I want to say "Here, I’m doing this for you"

I don't know if I'm brave enough to do it. It's scary to put myself out there. To become open to your rejection. To allow myself to feel all of those sticky emotions that I've hid from for 40 plus years. To touch you, to hug you, to love you openly and honestly. But, I want to be a friend, not just someone you know.

P.S. This posting was inspired by one very important friend (I hope you know who you are) but I want to apply it to my life - to all of my friends. How much better would life be if instead of wishing we could do the right thing, we just did it without thinking. Maybe we get rejected, or hurt, or embarrassed, but isn't that better than looking back and wondering what would have happened?