Blue like Jazz

So I just got done watching the movie Blue like Jazz. For those of you haven’t seen it I’m not going to tell you much about it in an attempt to have you just go watch it. In the movie there is an overlying theme of hypocrisy and how to deal with it.

Now many of us have fallen victim to someone telling us to do something one way only to find out they are not even doing it themselves. What is our response? Anger? We get frustrated at all the hypocrisy in the world; Christians saying to love one another only to see them chanting at funerals that God hates them. Or maybe its Politician who promises us a better life and better country only to find out that he is embezzling money. Or the Catholic Father who is someone we are supposed to trust with everything even to the point of confessing our sins to him only to find out he has rapped children. What is wrong with the world? People should be better than this. Society should be better than this. Or maybe you even think that civilization has progressed to far for us to be dealing with such primitive problems.

We are let down when we find out someone isn’t really what we thought they were. We find out all the time people are worse than we thought and that can lead us to be lost and confused. Take me for instance. I am a normal guy who seems to have his stuff together. I seem to be doing pretty well, I am well traveled, a bit of a humanitarian helping people in need all over the world. I am a pretty nice guy who gets along with just about everyone and tries pretty hard to do things right. I have my stuff together… at least that is what I put off. If you get to know me more and more you find out I am a bit conceited and can also be a bit heartless. Oh also, I struggle with an addiction to pornography! I have since I was in middle school. Things like that can ruin reputations in certain circles of people. I have historically struggled sharing that last thing because I always thought I would let someone down or that people would realize my life isn’t all that together or maybe even worse… think I am a hypocrite!  I act one way despite that way only being a part of who I am (and we all know only telling part of the truth is just as good as a lie).

What is my point with all of this? Well I am here to have you ask the question “why do I pretend to have my life together?” I want you to ask yourself why you have secrets. Why not be open to sharing the deepest darkest thing in your life. The more you share, I promise, the more you will find that many people also have similar secrets. It may not be apparent at first and at first there may be some shock and some people pulling away from you but continue on. Don’t let yourself put those secrets back in a trunk for no one ever to see again. Allow yourself the freedom of living with who you are; all of who you are blemishes and all.

When I firs told someone I struggled with pornography they didn’t talk to me for several days. It was heartbreaking and I remember thinking “This is why I don’t tell people these things. They just hurt people and make them not want to talk to me.” I myself buried it back up for a while. After a while it got easier to tell more and more people but there was still a certain couple of people I was most afraid of telling and I ran away from it for a while. When I finally did tell them it was like a giant burden was lifted from my shoulders and I could really claim that struggle as part of who I was… am.

Confess a secret to someone today. Start to allow yourself to live in the freedom of the knowledge that your messed up. Know that even though you may feel alone and messed up, everyone is right there with you. We are all messed up, every single human is messed up. You may say that your the only one as messed up as you, or that your secrets are too deep to let up. I am here to tell you that quite honestly your not the most messed up human to ever walk the earth. Your not alone in your messed up-ness. Be free of that burden… let that secret be known.