LETTER FROM A WOMAN WHO ASKS ME FOR AN IMPOSSIBLE FAVOUR:
“Please listen…to what I’m not saying: Do not let me fool you”
Do not be fooled by my face. Because it’s just a mask. One of the masks that I’m afraid to take off, and none of them are me. Appearing a certain way is an art that I master, but do not let yourself be deceived. I give you the impression of being strong, that it is a sunny and peaceful day both inside and outside of me, that my name is “trust” and that “control” is my game.
That the sea is serene and I am calm at the helm. That I don’t need anyone. But don’t believe me. My exterior reflects serenity, but it is only a mask. Always changing, always hiding.
Behind it there is confusion, fear and loneliness. But I hide this. I don’t want anyone to know it. I panic that my weakness and fear will be exposed.
That is why I have created a mask behind which to hide. An indifferent and sophisticated facade that helps me to pretend. That serves as a shield before a knowing eye. But precisely that gaze is my salvation, my only hope, I know it.
As long as it always comes accompanied by acceptance and love. It is the only thing that can free me from myself, from the prison that only I have built. It is the only thing that can reveal to me what I myself have not been able to reveal. That I am someone, that I am worthy. But I don’t tell you that. I daren’t. I am afraid that your gaze will not be accompanied by acceptance and love.
I’m afraid to lower myself before you, that you will laugh. I’m afraid you’ll reject me. That’s why I play my game, my desperate game of pretending, with a security facade on the outside, and a fearful child inside.
Thus the parade of masks begins, and my life is placed in front, with flashing but empty masks. Uselessly I talk to you in the soft tones of a superficial chat. I tell you everything about nothing, and nothing about what everything is for me.
So when I speak to you, do not be fooled by what I say. Please listen carefully, try to hear what I would like to say, but that I can not manifest openly. I don’t like to hide. I don’t like playing the impostor. I want to stop pretending. I want to be authentic, spontaneous, but you have to help me. Extend your hand to me even when it seems to be the last thing I need. Every time you are kind, every time you try to understand me, my heart grows wings, small wings, fragile wings. But wings!
A deep-rooted conviction that I’m worth little has made me build a wall around me. The closer you get to me, the more impetuously I will reject you. It is irrational but, contrary to what books about people say, I am often irrational.
I have been told that love is stronger than any barrier, and in this lies my hope. Please try to tear down that wall with firm but gentle hands, as my inner child is very sensitive.
Who I am? you may ask…I’m someone you know very well.
I have received this letter from a woman who asks for help in this way. I am left with this request:
“Please try to tear down that wall with firm but gentle hands, since my inner child is very sensitive”
And to that request I will answer…
HOW TO TEAR DOWN THE WALLS THAT SEPARATE US FROM THE TRUTH AND FROM OTHERS?
HOW TO TREAT A MAN OR A WOMAN, WHO BEING A CHILD EMOTIONALLY SPEAKING, NEEDS A MATURE ANSWER?
My decision is to talk to you as a mature man myself, because I am one. And to treat you like a mature woman, because even if you are not yet, I can provoke a burning desire in you to be one. And although what I say may hurt you, I trust that you will know how to integrate and assimilate the truths that you recognise as yours.
“WE ARE IMMATURE WHEN WE GIVE OTHERS THE POWER TO DECIDE AND DO FOR US”.
One of the main characteristics that defines the communication of a mature person with a boy or girl is respect for immaturity. This means that you must be very careful not to harm them in what you say to them, because their innocence and vulnerability can inappropriately turn any word into trauma. On the other hand, things should be hidden because not every child is prepared to know the whole truth. A truth told directly can produce a wound in the soft heart of a child. Truths should be said in bit by bit because if not they will hurt. Children digest them little by little as they grow.
If a man or a woman asks a question that is clamouring for the truth, but in turn asks that the response be kind, respecting the sensitivity of the questioner, it is because the questioner wants to remain childish. They are showing the unhealthy duality in which they live. Affirming: “I want but I don’t want.” This is a person who recognises themself as they are but also recognises that they can not be like that outwardly, that they are forced to lie. But that idea in and of itself is a lie.
The person who writes this letter assumes the deception and takes responsibility for the reason why they lie. This is a sign that they are someone who is aware of themself.
On the other hand they recognise their lie, their self-deception and their strategies to conceal their depths and to hide. This proves that they are someone who has already started and advanced a lot on the path of Inner Evolution.
And they also takes responsibility for having created their own prison where they live, and they reveal the true value they have for themself. So they know what they are and what they are not. But they are so trapped in the comfort of the lie – which assures them the false acceptance of others – that they cry out that someone from outside their prison can demolish the wall of the self-deception prison in which they are located. This shows that they are ready to be confronted.
That’s why I can say to you directly: “I can not do anything for that wall to collapse”, “You choose not to live” “You have decided not to mature” “You are afraid to change” “You have become accustomed to feeling lonely and unhappy” “You are capable of sacrificing your flourishing in order to respect the lie of others” “You still have not been able to heal the wound of rejection” and I could tell you many more things that are summarised in a single question. Are you going to miss this opportunity that life is giving you to break with all the lies in one fell swoop?
With a stroke of consciousness you are freed forever.
Freedom is in your hands, not mine. The wall is yours and internal, others have nothing to do with your prison. It is yours. You live there; and the bad news is that it is a prison without bars, without chains or padlocks and without walls. So you can go out when you want to simply because you are already free but you have believed yourself to be a slave. Now you decide if you follow your path, believing the lie that you are not able to and that you yourself have believed, or respecting the truth that you now know, and that you yourself have sought.
By taking the leap of your life towards understanding the value of a decision, the miracle of liberation occurs by itself.
At the bottom of this situation, what is being discussed is inner authority, the meaning of life and the possibility of living it from the inner power that flows from the day we decide to put ourselves first, and from there not allow others to move us away from what we feel or to make us responsible for them and their issues.
The way we have of communicating with others are the secrets of the level of maturity we have and the level of maturity we believe that others have. We evolve when we work maturely with ourselves, then both the sender and the recipient turn towards maturity. But when we work on ourselves from the lie or the fear of being rejected, we are being conniving with the deceit and misfortune of not being able to be ourselves.
It is true that love is stronger than any barrier; When we open our hearts, self-love expands, and all limits collapse.
Obviously I can not help you, this is the basis of your maturity.
Alberto José Varela