In an era that social media is how we keep up with people we sometimes forget that all we are seeing is what people want us to see. It is easy to look at someone’s life through the lens of Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, etc and think that everything is blissful. Here’s the thing, if you were there for that thoughtfully posed photo or well designed background you may find that everything that is happening before or after the click of that camera is something far from happy. Or maybe it’s the exact opposite, those that haven’t mastered the art of gratitude yet…the ones that only seem to see the bad. They are showing you all that is going wrong in their life and not realizing all the beauty that is around them.
This made me think about how relative this is to real life. There are people in your life that know every facet of your personality and then there are those that only know what is on the surface. We can be very quick to judge a person by what we see and experience in those short social interactions. We assume that we cannot possibly connect with a person because of impressions they have made on us. At the end of the day we all have 1 thing in common…we all want a true sense of love and belonging….we want to be loved for who we are.
Your view of a person can change greatly when you really know them. When you learn what lies beneath the surface….when you hear their stories. When they share what makes them happy, what makes them sad, what keeps them up at night, what their childhood was like, or what happens behind closed doors. We have to remember that when we are around people that we are not in a vulnerable relationship with….there is more to them than what is on the surface.
I consider myself very lucky, I’ve lived a distinct life in which I shared space with many people from different walks of life. Growing up, I split my time between a rural farm town and a large urban city. I have gotten to see behind the curtain of poor families, rich families, broken homes, happily functioning homes, drug addicted families, blessed beyond measure families, blue collar, white collar, or no collar at all. I’ve had sleep overs in multi-millions dollar homes and trailer homes. I’ve dined on caviar, $175 steaks, sipped on champagne and a $200 glass of Pappy Van Winkle. I’ve spent hours belly up at a dive bar drinking $2 Busch light cans and eating stale popcorn. I’ve been the girl who has drank too much, I’ve been the girl who drove the girl home that drank too much. I’ve been one of the have’s and one of the have not’s. Not only have I met many different kinds…I have been many different kinds.
I am well dressed, well poised, well taught, wildly intelligent, fashion forward, provocative, and put together. I am fierce, independent, strong, intense, relentless, untamed, assertive. I am grounded, intentional, systematic, and calculated. I am fortuitous, guided by the divine, and intuitive. I wear pearls or leather, heels or sneakers. I wear curls and French twists, I wear messy buns, and sometimes disheveled bedhead. I am a little bit Marilyn Monroe, a little bit Ellie May Clampett, a little bit Oprah Winfrey, a little bit Dolly Parton, a little bit June Clever, a little bit Rosanne Barr. To define me is to rob me of my spirit. I belong in no one category…I belong in all of them.
I shamefully admit that I have judged my fair share of people based on something they may have said or done. I have judged some based on a non-sense notion formed by my personal opinion…that’s generally me just projecting my insecurities onto someone. A mentor once told me “if you spot it, you got it”. You can only see in others what you have in yourself. If you see beauty, you have beauty. If you see hate, you have hate. God has used some pretty tragic events in my life to teach me about judgment. I am so thankful for those lessons because it has allowed me to experience love in ways I never would have without them. This lens of life has really helped me see all the brokenhearted-ness that lives in every corner of the world.
In my time with God I have asked Him to help give me the tools I need to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem, to portray love…even when it’s hard…ESPECIALLY when it’s hard.
“Our prime purpose in this life is to help others. And if you can’t help them, at least don’t hurt them”.
Dalai Lama
Be kind, gentle, forgiving, patient, non-judgmental, be exactly what you would want when you were at your worst. On your worst day ever, what did you need??? Most likely compassion, grace, mercy, and an understanding smile… Spread love like wildflowers.
Xoxo, Gina
