Wrestling The Demon of Perception

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You don't get to know if you're right about it.


You just have to plunge in.





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I think a large part of growing older is learning to make more and more room for uncertainty and doubt. Maybe some folks get increasingly sure of themselves, who they are, what they believe, how the world really is, but for me it's just the opposite.

Everything has become decidedly provisional.


Faced with the mounting evidence of my many errors- of thought, of perception, of action, of inaction, I have a deep appreciation for the fact that I am mostly full of shit. Why keep trying to hide it?

It's not like I'm fooling anybody.


Just myself.


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So, let it go. Make peace with my faulty apprehension of the world, my gift for getting people wrong, for  saying the wrong things at the wrong time to the wrong people. Not like making peace with it will prevent further mistakes, but maybe I could manage the aftermath with more grace.


Probably not.


Maybe I'm also wrong in my belief that I am basically a good person. That my motives are pure, or at least not malevolent.


In any case, making room for doubt about these things is probably good. After all, I am already convinced that 100 percent of other people can be, and frequently are, wrong about themselves and much of what they hold to be true about the world.

So, I am probably included in that group, rather than being a remarkable exception.


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Like I said, full of shit.





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I do wish I was a better person.




I can't help it.



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later, gator.


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