Trust, Truth and Spinach
You may in fact, ask: what does one have to do with the other and the answer is not much actually. However, it does sum up my eclectic mind and this was the order the notes on my iPhone were written one day after I’d obviously jotted something down to remind me to revisit it later, and then remembered I needed some spinach for my morning smoothies – I absolutely love starting my day with vitamins and goodness, at least I know I’ve had a good start! When I saw this list later, it struck me as a bit of a metaphor for my life. Trust your judgement, do the right thing, eat healthily and all will be well with the world! I don’t know about you, but if I eat healthily, I generally feel better, more energised and able to take on everything that’s thrown at me; that doesn’t mean I don’t indulge, but I do try to keep everything in moderation – yes I’m that annoying person who can keep a chocolate bar in my desk drawer and eat just one square of chocolate a day! Except for Christmas when the Quality Street come out, I find them hard to resist, except for the toffees, no self respecting person over 50 should expect to eat the toffees. (Note to @nestleuki – please change the tubs for those of us with synthetically enhanced pearly whites!)
So what prompted me to make a note about Truth and Trust? TBH, it was after a situation where I had caught someone out in a bare faced lie for when they really had no need to deceive. The honest truth would have yielded a much better result and it would have increased my respect for them. I have what I consider to be a strong moral compass, I always seek to tell the truth, I hate to see injustices, I will always come out in support of the underdog, I can’t ‘fake it till I make it’ and I generally trust people until I personally have reason to do otherwise. However, if someone betrays my trust, then I’m done with them. To me, trust and truth go hand in hand.
If I say I will do something I will. I seek to always be honest and that sometimes gets me into trouble although I am capable of candour and try to practice candour more often than not. However, I also wrestle with the moral dilemma of whether it is sometimes better to tell a white lie to save someone’s feelings or come straight out with it. Are white lies immoral? And yes, I’m definitely guilty of having uttered those immortal words, ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ (sorry Steve, it was definitely you!) However, on the whole, even if I’m trying not to come straight out with a hard truth because I don’t think the person I’m speaking with can handle it, or the situation is not appropriate for the cold hard facts, I will try to be kind or, as the song goes, ‘you say it best when you say nothing at all’.
Ronan Keating https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IobNcpiwpSc
or Alison Krauss https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SCOimBo5tg)
However, silence can be a killer weapon or worse, the one word answers such as ‘fine’, ‘ok’, ‘whatever’! Who hasn’t used these weapons, or been targeted with these destructive missiles at some point? They aren’t ever helpful and won’t ever close down a situation unless the other person involved has a very thick skin, in which case, the author is left to stew in their own frustrations which ultimately lead to even more tensions…. There must surely be a middle way? What about offering up alternatives, just like Paloma Faith did in ‘Do you want the Truth or Something Beautiful? Just close your eyes and make believe?’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjWcF1QJx1Y.
So next time you ask for an honest opinion be prepared for the cold hard truth unless you’d rather hear something beautiful. However, if it’s me you are asking, don’t watch my face. I’m sure I’m not the only one whose face really gives the game away and what I’m thinking is there for the world to see. Note to self, invest in more Botox!
In a world full of fake news, Instagram doctored images, a society in need of constant reassurances and ‘I love you’ at the end of every call or interaction, isn’t it better to deal in truth? I do understand that to be able to speak your truth, you need to be able to trust your audience, but if you have truth and trust, surely that’s a better way to live and we all know where we stand?
Those that know me may well say this is why I’m single, because I just can’t help sharing my truth. And perhaps they are right. A 2-year marriage and a whirlwind courtship obviously didn’t gift me sufficient time to learn the subtleties required to live the symbiotic co-existence required to keep harmony over a lifetime with someone. Perhaps faking it (not in the obvious sense) is the secret of a long and happy marriage, both people mask any harsh truth in order to make life more harmonious. I’m just back from a lovely group holiday with a bunch of strangers, some of whom will be friends forever, and I witnessed some loved up couples who’ve been together for many, many years. I felt a bit wistful at their harmony, and whilst it wasn’t all bouquets and sugary sweet affirmations, it was uplifting to see genuine happiness at the heart of their relationship. Are the occasional white lies, candour and a bit of botox the secret to their success?
Now let me just caveat that I would never, ever, ever, knowingly upset someone. I’m not the mean girl. Sometimes I get a bit excited (I’m a Gemini afterall) or can get carried away when either I forget to whom I’m talking, or the words come out faster than the brain can process my ramblings and the proverbial foot in mouth does happen. Sometimes it’s an enormous great wellie boot right in the kisser and I’m mortified afterwards (sorry Richard). But the latter episodes are mercifully quite rare, and I swear it’s never, ever done out of malice. I just think life is too short to fabricate, to tell lies, or dance around the edges of truthfulness when someone asks for an ‘honest opinion’? Whichever lane you choose on the truthfulness highway, above all else I do believe in doing the right thing and try to live up to my own high expectations.
I’m not sure quite when I realised that I have this innate need to do the right thing, but thanks to our hard working mum and dad, my brother and I were brought up with a strict moral code and it wasn’t long before we were selling ‘jumble’ to the neighbours to raise money for Blue Peter or the old folks in Lincoln. Mum still has a scrap book of us both featuring in the Lincoln Echo, with a couple of local pals, having raised around £5 for the local Senior Citizens’ tea party – £5 was a lot of money in those days and the local councillor invited us along to present the cheque and have our photo taken. I do remember the feel good feeling it gave me and I’ve continued to do charity work of one way or another ever since.
Giving back to society, or using one’s skills to help others, is a positive fillip in today’s ‘me first’ world. In the Rotary family (www.rotary.org; www.rotarygbi.org) we talk about Service Above Self, where we meet to support both local and international communities as well as have fun and meet other like-minded people. Rotary is a truly great international organisation, because you can contribute your time as much or as little as circumstances dictate – for me it’s sometimes more and sometimes less but it’s always for the greater good.
However, I digress…. Would you swap a truthful relationship for a fake one, just because it was easier? I certainly wouldn’t and haven’t. Yes, I do believe in working at relationships and have attended relationship counselling when another relationship hit a roadblock, but I don’t believe in flogging a dead horse. At the end of our counselling course, even the counsellor could see that we fundamentally wanted different things. We eventually broke up, but salvaged a friendship which I cherish dearly to this day. I’d hate to think that we would have lost this friendship if we’d gone on and on in a broken relationship just because we were too scared to leave and be single. Facing up to the truth can be hard, but it can also be freeing.
Facing up to the truth can also be an everyday moment. Take me at the moment, I have at last accepted the fact that I’m never going to fit back into those 1990s jeans or that bodycon dress and you know what? As well as having more wardrobe space, it’s tremendously freeing to accept who I am now and coming to terms with my middle aged body which, I actually quite like!
So there we have it friends, why trust and truth are so important to me and if that means that I have inadvertently unsettled a few people along the way, forgive me. I will keep going, keep learning, keep improving and I will rely on my spinach to keep me strong and give me the energy I need.
What’s your red line in the relationship truthfulness stakes?
With love
Julia, AKA Just Me.
