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Friday, May 11, 2018

how to be unliked

The great irony of life is as follows: where we fear, we will face it; where we are nervous, we will encounter it; where we are uncertain, we will be forced to decide. I spent much of my childhood convinced that people were only pretending to like me. I was so certain that everyone else was in on a big secret, laughing without me, playing without me, playing nice when I was there. The fear of being unliked was so deep seated, I came to recognize the way it anchored me as: normal.

Fast forward through adolescence, early adulthood, and the like. The fear subsides somewhat, because as it turns out, there are some people who seem to be legit. Friends have sought me out, and by nature we don't seek to be close to people we don't like. Someone chose to marry me, and that's pretty rad. My inlaws dote on me constantly; hurdle: done. My community grows. So I'm thinking, I'm all good. I still waver on the wind of it all, though, because seeking to be liked demands a certain kind of finesse. It's a finicky balancing system; oft susceptible to little blips and tiny cracks. When I find out someone doesn't like me, I am siderailed; when they like me, I'm ecstatic. And on it goes.

Hit that fast forward button one more time. Well into adulthood now. My life begets a story so tragic I can't help but tell it over, and over, and over. Not with anger, but certainly not in secret. Someone I loved deeply who professed that love for me changed the entire melody of our relationship with one final note: I've never really liked you, I was pretending the whole time. If you read that last sentence like I do, it comes out really, slowly. But then, logic and heartache never do go together. This confusion puts our words into molasses.

Recently, I told the detailed story of that pain for, I believe, the last time. It's a funny thing, really, how the pain can be unrelenting, the need to share it, overwhelming. Then, one day, you finish a sentence and the whole thing leaves you. I told the story of this pain and as I trailed off toward the end, I realized it now sounded like someone else's story. I looked at my friend. I said, "I think I just told that story for the last time." I felt calm.

How to be unliked? It doesn't matter. Who I am and where I'll go in life have only to do with truth, and self-confidence, and a whole bunch of other things that have nothing to do with whether or not someone likes you. While distortion campaigns are certainly a hurdle, they are only that. Campaigns, especially those based on hate or discord, are passable, and rather meaningless in the long run.

How to be unliked? Be yourself. The quality of a friendship is based on many things: mainly, what you put into it, and what the other person accepts. If you put something down and someone else decides they don't want it, what choice is that? There are involuntary moments that decide for us what will happen, and what someone else will do is never within our control. So let it go. If you change to match the situation, you will always be changing. This reactive way of being in relationship has a dizzying effect. How to be unliked? Be okay with it.

The drive to being liked or unliked, or the fear that drives us to one thing or another in order to try and facilitate a certain end...gosh, it's as breath-reducing as that sentence. It's a traffic jam for the emotions; lifetimes stuck in an endless battle to move forward in the middle of a stand-still. My advice is to take the scenic route instead. Deviate from the norm, and let go of those who wish to be dead to you. It begins with intention and encounters exceptional scapes like: personal responsibility, purposeful generosity, action, and time spent on things other than yourself.

The scenic route allows you to travel with joy and with others because you are looking outward. You can carry and share because you noticed something needed carrying, or sharing; you can move because there is freedom to do so, you can pause or go forward because out here, that is what we do. We seek to be loving, we seek to invite, to build up and not destroy.

Our family has chosen this route, though we sat at the intersection of our pain for some time. My husband has journeyed this with me and has stood fast as a beautiful human, showing me often what it is to be gracious, kind-hearted, and active in love. There was a time for grief, but now that time is done. So we open on up and let the fresh air cascade over us, tumbling our hair around, sun-squint in our eyes, music playing, singing out loud because we belong with each other. We remember now our melody, and it is beautiful.


“There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.”


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