Of Stones and Onions

Ok so I was thinking last night of a way to describe the brain in my book and I though I would share with you my thoughts. Naturally and I think more common is to describe it like an onion. Its multi layered and you pull back layer after layer. Thats so boring though! After all each layer is almost exactly like the previous. Where does that leave you on the road to self discovery. It leads to a pretty dull person.

After all was it not Buddha who said "What you are is what you have been, and what you will be is what you do now." I don't know to many boring people. Everyone has there own story and sometime that story is not pretty. I don't think many people really understand how things that have happened years ago can affect you today. So to that point I have decided the brain is like a stone in the woods. Sometimes smooth, often bumpy, and the bigger they are the more interesting it makes them. You want to know whats beneath the surface? Move the rock. EEWWWWW I am sure you all have turned over large rocks in your lifetime. What's there? Bugs and stuff. They scurry around and avoid the light. Thats your brain. On the surface its normal and otherwise common, but the second you see whats beneath the surface you find the real story. What little pieces of your psyche are scurrying around in there avoiding the light?

I'll tell you what one of mine is. While having an otherwise normal childhood I was always socially just outside the mainstream. Not that I wanted to be the cool kid. I was just being me. Apparently being yourself doesn't score to many friends in school. While I did have good friends I can't remember being accepted by large group of peers. Egad! How sad you say. Its no big deal, after all what good is acceptance if it comes at the cost of your identity. However being 31 now, I apparently still let this factor into my daily routine. It has less to do with some strive for acceptance and everything to do with why I have the friends I do.

I have been holding myself to some archaic double standard. Why do I have the friends I do? Well I try to surround myself with genuine good poeple. That doesn't mean they are saints, but it does mean they are honest and interesting people. I very much believe you can learn something from everyone by just knowing them. Some lessons are harder learned though. The thing is I love my friends for who they are, not what they "bring to the table". A fact that I somehow forget about when I think about why people like me. Often times I find myself needing to justify my presence or needing to provide a reason why someone would want to hang out with me; other than just accepting the fact that they like me for who I am. Its something that I am working on and I think its key to rebuilding a little bit of my confidence. Of course blogging about it is my way of getting it out there into the open. Lifting that proverbial stone so to speak and seeing whats there.