Placating You

In my hands, I hold the key to that which you seek. I hold the panacea to that which ails you. A cure for the sickness that you, and many people you know, suffer from.

I want to give you this key. I want to give you the solution, or at least, help you set off on whatever journey will result in you creating your own solution.

But there are two problems.

The first problem is the lesser of the two.

That problem is that you don’t believe you are sick. You don’t believe that anything ails you. Instead, you feel fine.

You don’t feel pain. You don’t feel any kind of hurt. What you feel and experience is your baseline, and your baseline is known to you. It’s the context  from which you evaluate how everything else feels. Like trying to bite your own teeth, or see the water you swim in, you simply cannot.

That problem makes it hard for you to see the potential in any preventative or curative ointment I could provide you. In actuality, it leads to defensiveness when I bring forward the suggestion that things may be different. It doesn’t matter what I say. Even the mere existence of something that may improve your life acts as an affront to the story that your life wouldn’t benefit from improving.

You only need outside support for that which is broken, and you ain’t broke — so scram.

That problem also makes it challenging for you to see how those around you suffer the same way you do. Since you’ve created blinders to keep yourself from seeing the way you suffer, it makes it really hard to see the same thing in your friends, family and peers. They’re doing the same things you are, and you aren’t suffering, so they aren’t either.

Neat. Clean. Easy.

All of this first problem is a challenge. But there’s a bigger problem — me.

That bigger problem is how I relate to this panacea I hold.

Because I created this panacea. It’s a solution of my own making.

And so I’m not just afraid of confronting your defensiveness — I’m afraid of being arrogant. To suggest that I’ve got something that could make a difference. To suggest that what I have may benefit those around you, and you yourself — that’s arrogance on my part.

And frankly, I’m too selfish to weather that storm in service of setting you free. I’d rather stay safe. I’d rather you continue to relate to me as kind, accepting and compassionate.

I am all of those things, but rather than trust that that is the case, I am attached to you feeling that way. Always.

I’m afraid of what you’ll say back to me, both from your potential defensiveness, and my potential arrogance. I’m afraid of how you might receive me if I provide you what I have, and ask you to share it with the world.

Rather than offer you a cure and risk you telling me to get lost, I dance around it with you.

I try to speak about the trials and tribulations I’ve walked to create this cure, and share stories that I think may resonate with you. I hope that if I can make myself relatable enough, you may be able to see yourself in me, and possibly open yourself up to the possibility of things being different.

Trying to manage your potential defensiveness and my arrogance, I create the ultimate in arrogant solutions. Manipulating you as subtly as I can, hoping that if I just arrange things the right way, you’ll come asking me about what I’ve got.

People are suffering, but I’m more interested in placating you than I am in making a difference.