A Monologue of the Misunderstood
I have a terrible history of being repeatedly accused of violating beliefs and values I myself uphold, and these accusations have come from all kinds of sources — from complete strangers to the people closest to me. I probably share a good chunk of the blame for this situation. Apparently, the way I talk, work, act and react don’t reflect the person I claim myself to be.
But if I’ve stopped explaining myself to you, if I’ve started acting like I don’t care about the questions your throw at me — believe me it’s not because I am just silently admitting the blames or because you don’t matter. It’s because I’m exhausted. Every ounce of my mind and body is exhausted.
I’ve become so tired of defending myself, clearing confusions and resolving misunderstandings that even if it’s our first instance of miscommunication, I’m shutting down because of being worn out from past battles. You probably matter more than most but you’ve caught me at a time when I’m at my weakest.
People hate one thing about me. I have an uncontrollable drive to see everything in positivity. I’m not an optimist. It’s not the same as that. I have fears and worries. I’m skeptical about a lot of people and ideas. I don’t know how to explain this but somewhere down the line I’ve subconsciously learned to flip a ‘+’ switch the moment something bad or discomforting happens and try to convince myself and others to find ways to something good — peaceful resolutions, silver linings, new beginnings, lessons, surprise offsets and what not.
In this era, it’s easier than ever to be seen, to be heard, to be noticed and recognized. But it’s harder than it was ever before to be understood. And I know I’m not the only one. We’re all misunderstood. We have more ‘friends’ than our ancestors had but we’re lonelier than they had ever been.
It’s the same reason why I’m writing this. Why is there such an innumerable quantity of people beating away onto their keyboards day in and day out? Because we keep accumulating a lot to say and keep looking for someone who will listen. Anyone. Anybody who would willingly and attentively listen, with no bias, no presumptions, no prejudice. Just a blank slate to begin with that we can scribble our hearts out on.
And we pour it all out because it’s a survival mechanism. We would suffocate to death otherwise. With so much happening deep within us and no outlet for all of it, our minds would explode into insanity and our bodies would crumble. We don’t write to show off how articulate we are or how much depth we carry. We write away to barely survive.
Sometimes scribbling away at a boring white screen keeps us alive better than shouting our lungs out into a pillow. The demon always comes back. But until it does, we want to catch a quick breath in the void.
