"Duhh Dad!"

GUESS WHAT?! My birthday's tomorrow! Besides my absolute excitement toward that, my life has somewhat seemed normal for once. That was until last night. Ever have an enormous amount of feelings all at once. This lead to either a) screaming at people who did nothing to you, b) punching unnecessary holes in your walls, or c) crying your eyes out all night. I wanted to do d) all of the above, last night. Why you might ask? To make a long long story short, basically I have an insane amount of trust issues. This is a result of getting my heart broken way too many times. Not just from men. From friends, from family, etc. I'm not going to get into the gory details of what brought on the delusional behavior because frankly it's long and I highly doubt anyone could keep up.
This brings me to my topic today: trust. When I was 16, I got into a nasty car accident. Basically I wasn't suppose to have friends in my car because I had a juniors operating license. Once my parents got that dreaded phone call that every parent has nightmares about, they were furious to find out that I had lied to them earlier that night, telling them that I had no one in my car. This lead to a horrible grounding and the loss of my parents trust.
My father dragged me into the living room one night and had a heart to heart with me. He said to me, if you never lie to me ever again, you will always have my trust. At the time, I was thinking.. well duh dad! It didn't really hit me until about two years later when I was having a discussion with a girl at school, she was going on about how she had to hide everything from her parents. It dawned on me that despite the little arguments I had with my parents every so often, that I had an awesome relationship with my parents. I thought about it and said to myself.. oh my god.. my father was right! I never hide anything from my parents, because that's what growing up is all about. Everyone makes mistakes, everyone makes stupid decisions, but if you're always honest about it, there's always room forgiveness and growth.
I know this may seem completely obvious to most of you, but tonight I'm completely hooked on the idea that honesty and trust are the two biggest foundations of not only relationships (duh) but growing up. If you can't be honest to yourself, how can you be honest to other people? And if you can't be honest with other people, how can you expect trust? Makes you think.
I was raised to believe in the good in people. I was brought up expecting back exactly what I give. Treat others the way you want to be treat.. isn't that what we're all told from day one. Knowing who you are and being comfortable with it allows room for growth, for change. You should never have to change who you are as a person for someone else, but does that mean you can't change your actions?
When did not changing the core of you become an excuse to not care? When did being unemotional solve problems? It's one thing not to care what people think about you, it's another to not care how your loved ones feel about you. When did society start caring more about the external and less about the internal? Everyone wants to improve themselves, but what about their hearts, their values, their morals? Growing up is a funny thing, but if you can't be honest, you can't be truthful, and if you can't be truthful you have no trust.
So I want everyone to do me a favor right now, think about the last time someone did something for you out of the goodness of their heart... something they did just to show they loved you or cared about you or just wanted to put a smile on your face. Remember those people because they're the ones that matter, they are what make friendship and relationships and family mean something more. Don't ever take those people for granted because they're the ones who will pick you up off the ground when you can't get up. They are the ones that make the ride of your life worth living. Until next time, Over N' Out!

MW