Honesty is a funny thing

I realized something really amazing today... I am willing to be honest .... to a degree.  I really thought I was getting down to the nitty gritty of what my truth is; and today I was shown how far from that I really am.  Here is what happened:

My son Nick, who is 15 years old decided it would be really fun to take a video of me this afternoon being a total dork.  He named it "My Mom off her Meds", and literally I was being so goofy and silly!  I was watching HGTV and commenting on how I would love to have them come crash my house, but then I was just being random and silly just like a kid who doesn't care about looking like a fool.  So he thought it would be so funny to post this video to facebook for everyone to see.  I was absolutely mortified when I found out he had posted the video, and demanded that he take it off or I would absolutely kill him!  When he showed me the video on his phone, I have never felt so humiliated in my life! All he said was, "what Mom... it got 8 likes so far." 

So as I was working in my yard, I was pondering about what happened and realized that I am so extremely uncomfortable in my own skin. Cause I am silly like that alot in front of my family, the ones I trust the most.  In fact its not unlike me to be goofy on a daily basis, but only in front of my kids and husband. So the part that was so hard to take was first I was still in my jammies and I was  not camera ready by any means.  Even when I am looking my best, I literally have to talk myself into being OK while getting my picture or video taken.  I have never liked being in front of a camera.  I am a photographer for a reason, I do not belong in front of one.  I really thought I was making progress, but clearly I have some trauma about being silly and getting made fun of.  I do remember being teased relentlessly in my childhood. 

If  I was being brutally honest... I would post that video on here and let you all see it, but I am SO not going to do that... which tells me that honesty comes in layers.  I am comfortable telling you all about how I'm silly and telling you what I want you to believe about me, and I will even open up a little and get emotional and express that emotion, but I'm much more comfortable sitting behind my words.  I can talk about my "story" all day long.  But I am not at all comfortable with my "real" self being exposed.  I talked to Nick about it, and he couldn't understand why I would be so embarrassed about it, because he considers me cool and fun and he really has no problem at all showing me in my element. I tried to tell him how horrible I look and sounded in the video, and he said "yea Mom, I know, everyone sounds funny and looks funny in videos that are posted on facebook."

So who am I fooling into believing that I am cool and suave and polished and refined every minute of every day? Why am I so scared of what people think of me?  I really am, that is clear.  I am a total goon sometimes and I look old! I don't feel that old, and I don't really believe I look bad, for my age, but I am very worried that everyone will see right through me. I really want to like what I see in front of me... but honestly... I don't.

So if I'm being completely honest about my blog being completely honest, I need to qualify that by saying that I am being as brutally honest as I can be in this very moment, and my level of honesty is going to be different than someone else's.  It is my hope that I will increase in my level of honesty every day I do this blog, that eventually I will be able to fully accept myself, every part of myself, even my goofiest, ugliest, least refined self...