Response to Comments on "Facebook and the Facade"

In an attempt to respond to comments on the blog, comments on Facebook, verbal comments, and emails, I hope to occasionally break up my lengthy posts with a short reply to a few of you.



@Gilbert_Sundevil
“This post was a bit jarring (sp?) for me and has happened one or two other times with my friends from my youth. My understanding or appreciation of their worth is so completely different than their own vision of their self-worth that it seems as if we would describe two completely different people.”

First, jarring is spelled correctly. Good job! A+

Second, we have been friends for a very long time, perhaps since Kindergarten. I still remember Ben’s birthday party, where I was the only girl and I towered a head taller than all of you. Now, all of you are at least the same height, if not a head-plus taller than I. And just as we all have grown and changed over the years, my perception of myself has also grown and changed. Perhaps the vision of my self-worth has become clouded over the years. Perhaps the self-assuredness I exhibited previously (and currently) was merely an over-compensation for my lack of self esteem. Pretending to not care what others thought about me was a way to numb myself during the painful teen years of a developing identity. For example, I can with confidence say you were my best friend during our senior year. However, I struggled the entire year with the belief that your family did not like me. I hurt because you were in love with a girl who barely spoke to you. I guarded my insecurity from you, because I did not feel worth-y of your unconditional friendship. That is not to say I didn’t or don’t believe I am of worth, I just believe that if others really knew me (and not the pretend me) they wouldn’t think I am of worth. More directly, I don’t believe the people I want to think I am of worth do. I am working on focusing on those people whose opinions should carry the most weight: My God, my children, my self.

Even as I sat typing this, a colleague and close friend delivered a box to me. Inside the tin were letters, notes, and cards from various friends, family, former and current students, and colleagues. I just spent the last half hour crying, as I read and re-read these kind messages of love, hope, friendship, support, and faith. I am humbled and so very blessed.


@Anonymous
“Love the writing and reading into some of your thoughts. Facebook is fun, but it's not everything. ... Go back to your YW's Theme. All of the value's apply to you now as an adult married woman and mother, just as they did when you were a teenager. (Just a couple of years ago, right)”

Thank you for reading. Facebook definitely is not everything … rather I use Facebook to illustrate a microcosm of my life and way of thinking.

Funny you should mention the Young Women’s Theme. I am currently working on a post that will address this concept. Actually, it was just a year ago (not two) that I was in the YW’s … serving, that is. During the 18 years (yep, folks, do the math) of being “graduated” from the YW’s, I have served in some capacity in the program as a leader for a total of 13 years! It seems I am meant to work with teens in all aspects of my life. It is my “density.”


@Ben
“You say you seek the ‘Holy Grail’ of who you are or who you want to be, but that is a goal that is unrealistic and unattainable.”

I couldn’t agree more! Which is why the term “Holy Grail” seems especially fitting to me. For centuries, many have sought the Holy Grail, the cup which held Christ’s blood from the crucifixion, never to actually find the relic. Likewise, many (including myself) have journeyed in search of self-discovery, never to fully reach a final destination, but rather to realize it is through the voyage in which we are formed.

I don’t expect to wake up one day, look myself in the mirror, and say, “There she is!” This continuous process of defining and refining will undoubtedly last until death (which, based on my genetics and lifestyle is likely to be around 90). I hope it is at that point, as well as throughout the journey, I can look at the road I have traveled, and the direction I am headed, and feel confident that I am on the “right” path for me, even a path of peace and joy.