Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Land-Locked Blues

Self-esteem is a funny thing; people do all kinds of crazy shit to get it, even worse to keep it. Money can’t buy it; it comes from inside your own head. And if one is particularly sensitive, or damaged in any way, it’s easily bruised and takes a lot of work to fix. This work is hard, and of course, it’s much easier to blame our wounds on others than to look inside ourselves. We see things we want to see, hear things we weren’t meant to hear, create scenarios in our own minds.

You know that cliché about how we always point out in others the things with which we fault our own selves? It helps to stop and think about that before one makes accusations about others. Judge not, baby, judge not. Yeah, I have a big mouth and strong opinions. But I know who I am and what I stand for, and passive aggression is something I particularly abhor, and something that I attempt to avoid at all costs. I’m half Italian – we’re all about being loud and direct and confrontational. It takes everything I have not to defend myself when accused; it’s so hard to turn the other cheek, to walk away. But it’s almost always the best thing to do.

If you walk away I’ll walk away.
--Conor Oberst

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