Speaking Plainly About What I Have Lived
I speak the truth of what I have lived through, in plain words, without inflation and without apology.
Notice the pull to dramatize the truth so it would land harder. There is a discipline in telling a hard thing simply — without softening it past the point of recognition, without performing either the wound or the strength. Just saying the plain thing, in plain words, as steadily as you can.
The plain telling is harder than the dramatic telling. The dramatic version carries you, almost. The plain version asks you to sit inside the truth without the cushion of performance. This happened. Then this happened. I noticed this. I felt this. I did this in response. No flourishes. No interpretations. Only the unembellished record.
The plain telling is also the most credible telling. The voice that does not strain for effect — quietly, plainly — is the voice that lands. The body that does not perform distress communicates more about what it has lived than any louder presentation could.
You do not have to prove what happened with the volume of your telling. You do not have to convince anyone by being more wounded than you are. You only have to say the true thing in the true way. The people who can hear it will hear it. The people who cannot are limited by their own inability, not by your honesty.
It is also fair to choose what you tell, and to whom, and when. Plain speaking does not mean speaking everything to everyone. It means that what you do say is unembellished and true. There is wisdom in choosing which rooms deserve which stories — the unsaid is also part of the truth.
Today, practice saying one true thing plainly. Notice the steadiness in your body when you do. That steadiness is yours. It is what you have built across this long season.