WYSIWYG

This is one of my favorite acronyms. What you see is what you get. So true when it comes to me. If I'm sad, I cry, usually a lot and loudly. If I'm happy, there's probably even more tears and loudness. I don't have best friends because my life is whatever's more transparent than an open book, and I'm much better at disclosing the darkest parts of my life than the not.

And the biggest threat to my own happiness is myself. Get on a roll, things are lookin' good, start to look around at what other people are up to, feel like I'm not quite the stud I thought I was, lose steam...surrender and slunk away. I'll never be like anyone else (repeat 42 times a day while smiling, forced or not); my successes and my failures will not look like anyone else's. Alanis has a song about not realizing one's greatest potential for fear of being ostracized from the masses -- yes. Beth Moore said two weeks ago that she's dealt with fear her whole life and felt God tell her one night, "Fine! You're scared. DO IT SCARED THEN!"

With painstaking slowness, I'm learning that my path is not yours, nor yours, mine. Neither is one timeline better than another, and your tastes/opinions don't nullify my tastes/opinions. My mistep begins when I take my eyes off my one great Love and buy into all these lesser loves. It makes me itchy and restless, which I believe causes this rush into "safe" emotions like bitterness, jealousy and gossip. Yuck. No more please.