My best friend and I were discussing trust this morning. She’d sent me a link to a video that exposed the you-know-what happening in the world right now, and a news place who purposely had more people stand in line to show how “crazy,” it was and “bad off,” things were for the story. A few were sick, but mostly it was folks being lined up for the story so it looked worse. The people who covered the story were discussing how they were setting the story up, as well as health workers.

Which led to me discussing a video I’d seen (many of you may too) of a weather story where they made it seem really bad, but then a group of folks entered the shot in the background, and they were just walking along like, “well it’s windy, but no big.” They showed that it was faked. I also mentioned how one lady I follow for interesting information (can look her up under Dana Ashlie) that she shares, had just had videos taken down because some folks were showing video of where hospitals were “so overrun” that they were ghost towns.

I told her (bestie) that it’s precisely why I don’t usually watch any of those shows (news). I mean, let’s face it – they’re scripted. No matter what we see on the TV, there is a power (producer, writer, etc.) that has to be the one to allow it. Jut like this website. Just like these blogs. If someone wanted to silence something I say? Delete. I could throw any temper tantrum I like. But at the end of the day we don’t live in a truly free society. We live in a perceived free society. I like the quote that George Carlin says, “It’s not a right if it can be taken away.”

The difference between me and another is that I shrug and say okay. I get it. I don’t need to freak out over it. I don’t set out to expose secrets that most of us already are iffy about anyway, so it’s not as if I have to fear that daily. Most of us are intelligent enough that me blasting things I’ve learned won’t do any good. I like my own little bubble and I know you’re smart enough to handle yours. You don’t need me to micro manage you and “teach,” you all about the horrors in the world. You don’t need me to scream how dumb you are (erm, cause nobody really is – I may know about cooking than you, whereas you know more about cars than I do). So why get up in arms about it? That’s not my thing. I enjoy writing about stuff, I enjoy writing these blogs as much as my books. I enjoy letting you into another point of view.

Sidenote – I had to pause while writing this to take out Chewbacca, throw in other dog stuff to the wash, and get some tea going for my mom (she’s been having a bad few days), and it hit me. The above statement about yelling at you to teach, and calling you “stupid,” and shoving information at you. Could you imagine if our teachers in school did that to us? Maybe some of us experienced a teacher here and there like that (rude), but could you imagine if every single student was faced with all teachers like that? My word nobody would learn anything. We would naturally rebel against being “forced,” anything. I know I can’t be forced into anything. Can you? Even as a child, I would obey . . . up to a point. Even now. I can come across as super accommodating and I will. I will be happy to. Up until a point. Push past that? Wall. Until either I am ready to move/give, or I refuse to ever do so.

But I can’t force anything upon you. No more than if I had my site taken down, or a blog, I could scream about the horrors. I rent this space. I rent this site. I don’t own it. I don’t own it if I were self-hosted because again I go through someone else. We all go through who owns the internet, electricity, on and on. It’s all rented space.

The job though as a writer for me is to provide you something to read. My responsibility is to make it pleasant, not make you wanna cringe and hide under the covers because I’m yet another blasting about your stupidity not to know this or that, or how can you be so naïve! lol It’s to tell my story, to tell what’s on my mind, to write about what comes to mind. That’s where I build your trust. Through every day small actions I show you (sometimes not literally every day) that you can trust me not to ruin your day on purpose. Through each post I am showing that this site isn’t going to be about screwing people over and lying to you. My word is that important to me anyway.

It’s like what I told Colin . . . uh, I’ll just say a week or two ago. If I give my word and agree to something? Don’t much care when it happens, I will honor it.

If I say to a man that in five years I will walk down the aisle with him, I will do it. If I say on this date I will buy this dog, and it’s ten years from now? That word is done. Ahem. Might have to mark a future calendar with that cause I’d probably forget here and there, lol. My word again, is that important to me. And the word I have tried to always give regarding this site [and newsletter] has been just that. Even books, really. It is that I will entertain you. It is that I will not go around shaming someone and outright speaking on how bad they are. Will I explain actions that I don’t like? Yes. Will I explain how actions affect me and how they make me feel? Yes. Will I read a book I despise and then come on here saying what a horrible person they are? No. I will try never to do those things.

Because it’s important for me to have trust. For me to give it, as much as be able to feel it for others. I was telling my best friend too that I don’t have very much to give to other people, especially in the beginning. I have had far too many with pretty promises and words in my life. Far too many pretty things that have been removed and I’m left in the mud. So my trust level is fairly non-existent for many things. I definitely don’t entirely trust anything I hear or see in the news. I rarely think people will honor their word, which is why it’s so hard for me to ever ask for anything. Or ask people for help in general.

It’s a product of a lot of lies, a lot of abuse. I can’t make people understand that level of hurt that someone can experience to make them get to that point. Or the level of loss that can affect them to the point that it takes a lot to rebuild. I’ve always rebuilt myself though just takes me a little more time than others. I don’t bounce back as fast because I go deep into whatever it is I feel. Used to think that was wrong as many made it seem so. That I was too much, but some of us just operate that way. Some are shallow, some are not. Some are eternal folk, some are “maybe just for today,” folk. All of it is okay. Period.

It’s important though that when we watch news stories, when we listen to what people say, we’re careful. Not of that though. Of what we are listening to day to day. Of what we’re focused on every minute of the day. If we’re constantly filling our heads with stories about don’t trust this, don’t trust that. If we’re constantly seeing the lies being spread and hyper focused, we become just that. Those seeds grow. We stop trusting. We become cold out of fear.

People often think if I say that, I mean to bury the head in the sand. I’d like to know how to do that. Because if we’re online? We’re gonna see stories. If we talk to people? We’re gonna hear stories. Maybe those who live off the grid and aren’t ever speaking to one human being on earth are capable of it? Dunno. But the majority of us are incapable of truly burying our heads in the sand and avoiding all those “things.”

If we want to get all deep and religious sounding, I could say it’s a battle of dark versus light. Negative versus positive. White wolf, black wolf. Really just depends on your beliefs. Easier to make it like that. We all have both inside of us. Which side do we want to feed more of? Which do we want to share more of? Which do we want to rule us more? Doesn’t mean we can’t be discerning with lies and truths. Doesn’t mean that we can’t have dark days or light days. I know no human on this planet who doesn’t have bad moments. I certainly do and I have been told plentifully that I am always happy and bubbly.

That’s just because I have learned how to allow the bad days, and then let them pass. I have allowed that space to rest and take a break. I’m not judging myself for the bad moments, I am not hating myself for not always being “high,” and “happy,” every minute of every day. So then it passes that much faster. I’m not a slave to the negative because I feel the positive more.

A lot of it comes from what I am consuming daily. Not just in food, but in news, in TV shows, in all of it. Everything we take in, even in learning (I am always constantly learning things), counts toward whether we will feel bad by the end of the week (read – I don’t mean tired) or good. If we give in to that hatred and negativity, or don’t. If we’re exhausted, yeah we’re probably gonna have our emotional space drop. I do. Did yesterday because I was worn down, having to do too much, and my emotions went downhill fast. Then by afternoon I felt better by allowing those feelings, allowing those thoughts, not fighting against that drop. I just felt that much lighter.

Still was exhausted though so I went to bed early, lol.

Trust is far more than just being about others. Trust is important for ourselves too I’d say. We have to trust ourselves to make the good decisions. I know that after I was raped, and even now, I still struggle a lot with that. Especially, as I just said to Jeanie, with relationships. I don’t have a normal healthy relationships to pull from. Female to female balanced? Yes, now thanks to her. Romantic? No. So even learning to trust ourselves can be difficult if everything has failed in the past. If everything has gone downhill when we’ve tried to become serious and started to deepen things.

I know there are many like me, who struggle to trust, even more so these days. We’ve been lied to for so long, we’ve been seeing nothing but fake fake fake so real might even seem fake. Or that it won’t last, won’t be truth, and we ask ourselves where’s the physical proof? We don’t know who to trust at times for the true story. We don’t know where to go to find the most authentic truth of whatever information we want. It becomes harder the more the trust is broken.

I know one thing I’ve been learning the past few years is to go slow with it. That’s one big thing. Don’t always trust the pretty words, the pretty images shown. It’s very easy to have someone promise all sorts of things, but then in front of their friends you don’t exist. In the public eye, you don’t exist. They don’t speak about you to friends, they don’t tell anyone about you, they show through actions – you’re my little secret because then when I’m tired of you, I can drop you with ease and nobody but you will know. Then it’s my word against yours. Part of why you’ll see me mention names, share discussion (as long as they aren’t private) and be open (to a point) about my life. I have nothing to hide. Hiding is what gets us into these places. Hiding the truth. Hiding the people in our lives. Hiding the real behind the news story to further a fear, a lie, a whatever. Who wants to be hidden?

As I’ve been saying for a long time, we need more authenticity. More raw real truth. More open stories. More sharing of our love, our friends, what makes us happy, what makes us proud. What is special to us, what we are learning, what we’re bad at and how we’re working to improve it. That is one thing that I like to see about people being at home and celebrities sharing their unmade selves.

We are finally seeing the real them. I think they’re absolutely beautiful. Being beautiful to me is exposing the raw, the faults, the naked soul. I think people who do that? Are way more beautiful and we can trust them more because there is no hiding of truth.

I laughed writing that because it hit me that tomorrow night (depends on where you live) is a Scorpio Full Moon and I’ve seen posts of that from folks I follow on Instagram and YouTube. It can be the “truth exposer” moon. I didn’t plan that at all. lol Just hit me they coincided. Truth isn’t negative. Maybe it’s someone telling you how they feel, maybe it’s someone telling you they’re promoting you. Doesn’t mean it’s a BAD truth. A lady I occasionally listen to talks about full moons being a release of the negative. So it could be a truth we realize for us. Like I just mentioned how hard it is for me to always trust. Which means it’d be the release of past energy that caused those issues, and coming to terms (as I am) that it is okay to go slow and build an authentic foundation for a future we want. If it doesn’t work out it’s not a fault in us. It doesn’t make us a bad person. Might just mean we no longer work with that future and need to go in another path.

I’ve certainly had that switch the past few years. I was shoved off the train track, got beat up and bruised (not literally), went through a dark night of the soul, and had my world turned upside down. Now I’m coming out of it, healing, and going forward into the new future presenting itself. Only time will tell if it comes true. Or, I’ll be corrected to a new path. We all have that. We all go through that.

That’s okay too.

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