Confess Yo Mess

I was always fascinated by the idea of confession in the Catholic church when I was a kid. The idea of unburdening myself of all the bad things I said and did to someone who was required to keep my confidence, without getting in trouble with my parents, just made so much sense in my young,  impressionable mind.

As I got older, with my Baptist self, I obviously began to see the Catholic version of confession differently (and apparently so do many Catholics). While I don't feel the need to confess my sins to a priest, pastor or any other religious leader, there is something freeing about being honest with yourself and confessing your mess. 

I realized that I needed to make a confession when I did something that was totally selfish and inappropriate to a friend. Why was I being a jerk? Because I have issues. It shouldn't have happened, but it made me realize that I had some explaining to do.

So, that's what I did, not to justify my jerkiness, but to help my friend fill in the gaps and make sense of my senseless behavior.  I took a deep brief and just started typing, typing things that only a few people know, that I don't like saying out loud, and that I try to forget. The email ended up being the equivalent of three pages and took forever to write (I almost missed Smash!). Once I finished the email, I sat on it for a day, for a reason, and still hesitated before hitting the Send button the following morning. It's scary to reveal your mess, because when you do, you're opening yourself up for judgment and criticism. Will it bring a person closer, or will it make them go screaming for the hills? Well, I took the plunge because they say confession is good for the soul, and my soul was in bad place.


I won't get into details. Like Beyonce, I'm going to make you think I'm telling you something w/o telling you anything, but I essentially said the following: I'm sorry. This is me, and this is my mess. It's bad, and ish has got to change.

The reaction, thankfully, wasn't negative. However, even before I talked to my friend about my epic email, I felt better after it entered the interwebs. I finally got some icky stuff out and off of me. It also made me clearly see the path I was headed down if I didn't change course. It was humbling, helpful, and cathartic. 

Confessing my mess forced me to be honest myself and my friend. Self-honesty (that's a thing, right?) hasn't always been my strong suit, but if I want to be better, I've got to stop doing the same thing repeatedly and hoping for a different result (i.e., the definition of insanity, and not the Shaun T. kind). As Jennifer Hudson would sing, Look at me. I am changing :)

Stay random,

Jay