A Time For Honesty: Sharing is Caring

Yesterday we had a 90% chance of a tornado hitting here, and somehow, the weathermen still managed to be wrong. It barely sprinkled!

It's Wednesday, which doesn't mean much to me, but might mean a lot to you. It's affectionately named "Hump Day" by many, as we fight to get over the hump of another week. It's also the least phonetic of any day of the week, which just makes it ridiculous. Ultimately, though, Wednesday has very little relevance to this blog... until now.

I have written a few posts in the past where I've spent time reflecting - check them out here, here, or here. Maybe I haven't elicited as many chuckles when I do that, but it's important to me that I remain transparent for you. How can I ever expect you to believe my words and listen to me if you can't trust me? And a huge part of trust is transparency. Therefore, I want to begin a weekly series here on Life Before the Bucket called "A Time for Honesty."

You don't wanna end up like this guy.

Honesty is important when it comes to achieving your dreams and living your life to the fullest. If you're not being honest with yourself and with others, you're lying. And if you're lying, you're not achieving your dreams (unless you dream of being a con artist). Therefore, it's important to spend some time each week reflecting. It's important to spend some time each week being real with yourself.

This week's Time for Honesty is definitely inspired by this post from Single Dad Laughing. In that post (which you should definitely read), Dan talked about deciding whether you truly believe what you believe, or whether you just believe certain things because you were raised that way or because you want to fit in with a certain group of someones, whether that's family or friends. Ultimately, his point was that if you aren't willing to give up everything for what you believe in, including the your own life, then you may need to reevaluate, because you may not be holding on to your own beliefs, but the beliefs of others.



Now this idea of "true" belief is not something new to me. We discuss owning our faith at school all the time. We're taught from day one as freshmen that our faith cannot be the faith of our parents or the faith of our pastor. Instead, we must believe what we believe because we believe it - if that makes any sense. And I would agree with Dan when he says that if we claim to believe in something, but wouldn't die for it, then we need to do some serious soul-searching and figure out why we claim to hold certain beliefs.

Personally, I'm not scared to tell you on here that I hold beliefs that would be considered "Christian" by most. And maybe I won't attract certain followers and I'll turn some people off to my blog from time to time, but I'm not ashamed of what I believe. As I read through Dan's post (did you read it?), I was reassured and came away believing more firmly that what I hold to be true is truly what I believe.

Why am I so sure that I'm not holding onto someone else's beliefs? Because I'd give up everything for what I believe in. I'd give up my life, my family, my wealth, and my intelligence. It's all meaningless compared to the significance of what I believe. However, after I read Dan's post (which you've definitely read by now), I thought about something else.

I would die for my beliefs. I would give up everything. I have no doubt in my mind about that. But a conundrum that I face on a daily basis is the fact that I struggle to share what I believe with others.

Now I will never use Life Before the Bucket as a direct platform to share my beliefs. Those beliefs may show through my writing (because that's inevitable for all of us), but I will never post something saying "This is what I believe and you should believe it too." This isn't the place for it.

The funny thing is, though, is that I know I'm supposed to share what I believe with others, especially because it means so much to me. However, I'm paralyzed by the fear that my words won't align with my actions and that I will turn someone away from what I believe, pushing them further away than they previously were. I'm scared to share, and not because I don't care and not because I don't believe, but because I'm scared I may not have all of the answers.

And the truth is, I don't. I don't have all of the answers. In fact, no one does.

I had a teacher the past year who told our class something very interesting. He boldly proclaimed this: "Something that claims to be everything is really nothing at all."

Now I don't remember the context of this moment, but I do know that this applies. If someone claims to have a set of beliefs that answers every question, then what they're really selling you is nothing. Because no set of beliefs has every answer. There will always be questions. And I realize that I will never have all of the answers, either. But that doesn't make sharing any easier.

So what about you? What do you believe? What gives you your passion for living? What gets you through the roughest days of your life?

Take a moment and reflect.

After you've done that, leave me a comment with your thoughts.

I'm not looking for arguments or religious dialogue. This is a time for honesty.

Feel free to e-mail me if you're more comfortable with that.

And while you're at it, share this post with your friends.

Why? Because we all need to spend a little more time being honest with ourselves.