The truth feels like pain before it feels like freedom. Often the exact advice that makes you mad, the person who offends you, the lesson you don't want, is the path forward — your ego will fight the truth that would save you. We often need the very things we're pushing away to become what we want to be.
When everyone offended me
In my active alcoholism a little over 12 years ago, people constantly told me to stop drinking and change my life — someone I was dating, my father, my then-wife — and at the time it all just made me angry. Then it finally sank in: maybe they were right, maybe my life would be better. I got sober. Today I'm often the one delivering that kind of unwelcome truth. A personal trainer I had told me he got fit because kids bullied him for being overweight; it motivated him to change. I'm not in favor of bullying — repeatedly bludgeoning someone isn't love — but we do need honesty, and our culture trains us to tell people what they want to hear.
Honesty changed my life
Getting sober forced me to face that I was still overweight (250 pounds at five-eleven), and that truth led me to whole-food plant-based eating and taking real care of my body. Being rigorously honest also reshaped my marriage and my dating. Here's the key distinction: when someone criticizes my videos, it doesn't faze me, because I know how good I am at making them — but criticism that does offend me reveals something I haven't been looking at. What offends us is usually pointing at our own insecurity.
Lead with the truth
I now lead with the truth and let it repel the wrong people — when a date says she doesn't want to be on my public channel, good; when honesty offends someone, good, because I want to be surrounded by people who value what I offer. At a recent AA talk my directness and energy had the room laughing, and a couple of people were offended and told me to change — and I realized that when you're comfortable in yourself, what others say bounces off. The takeaway: next time something offends you, ask what you're insecure about instead of blaming the messenger, because if you can be offended on a subject, there's something there to learn. A more honest world starts with leading by example. If you want to talk, you can reach me through my life playlist here.