My friend sat across from me in a crowded cafeteria. He’s already pretty soft spoken, and everything about him that day just felt tired. Not depressed, or irritated, or distracted. Just tired. I had to lean forward and pay close attention to hear him over the sounds of people chatting their way through a buffet of mini muffins and boxed coffee.
“It’s not that I’m ungrateful. I just need a break.”
He was five years into sobriety and had become a leader in the recovery space. His paid work touched three different programs, and his unpaid volunteer work spearheaded the largest addiction outreach effort in Las Vegas. His staff needed him, the recovery community looked up to him, and as his reputation grew, so did a following of civic leaders eager to help. Everyone wanted their piece. No wonder the guy needed a nap.
He was unsettled. Nothing was wrong, except that the demands on his time had long outgrown his capacity. Humbled in the face of his own success, he was struggling with two completely different feelings; he was grateful for his community, for his position, and even for his life. And, he was fucking tired.
It was hard for him to have both the feelings of endless gratitude, and deep exhaustion that meant he needed to pull back.
I am not an addict in recovery, but this feeling is a well-worn companion. While my friend possesses patience, humility, and grace, I think in black and white, have a low tolerance for ambiguity, and too often blurt out my exact in-the-moment feelings without examining them first. I strongly dislike “grey areas”, and think they are wussy cop outs for anything that lacks conviction; circumstances, people, experiences, or opinions.
This has been problematic for me.
Like any self-respecting perfectionist, rather than let go of any ideal that could give up my ground, I’ve found a thought that works around it. Fortunately for me, it’s accurate and effective:
All truths are true.
It can be true that my friend owes his life to the community he’s built and the organization he serves.
It can also be true that he’s burnt out and needs a break.
Neither of these things are mutually exclusive, yet, they are in such complete contradiction of each other that it looks like it.
When we feel like we have to give up one truth for another truth to be truer, something bad is going to happen. That’s how the truth works, it always finds a way. Gratitude can turn into resentment when the simultaneous truth of burnout is ignored. Or, maybe exhaustion turns into a nervous breakdown, and forces someone down whether they want to or not.
Maybe there’s a truth that being a boss is great and you know you were born to lead, but you’ve got a personal situation so urgent and distracting you aren’t watching where your leading your team. You can be a highly effective leader and still need to fall back and tend to your own wounds. All truths are true.
What if we looked at everything in our lives the way the working mother narrative has started talking about theirs? It’s true that a woman can want to be in the workplace Monday through Friday, absolutely crushing it. It’s also true that same woman isn’t going to work late on a Friday when her kid has a baseball game.
If all truth are true, it means that we can use it on the easy and obvious stuff, but also accept it when it doesn’t match up with what we think we are supposed to feel. This is the power of “AND”.
“I love my partner, but I need my me-time” becomes “I love my partner, AND I need my me time.”
“I am grateful for my life today, but I’m burnt out on it” becomes “I am grateful for my life today, AND I’m burnt out on it.”
“I am committed to my healing journey, but I need to talk shit about this person and drink too much wine tonight” becomes… me, three days ago, after almost four weeks of journaling, meditating, yoga-ing, and sleeping. A day later, having exorcised that demon, I was panting through another 5-breath count downward dog.
Because it’s all the truths are still true. It doesn’t matter if they are experienced concurrently, or seemingly out of order. Truths can change, too. A tree that starts out as a sapling with three leaves is as true as the tree it grows into, branched bowed heavy with fruit. The tree is still the tree. The truth is still the truth.
All truths are true.
