The Relief Of Facing Things Head-On
Despite the discomfort of handling hard truths.
One day you’re going about your daily life, just as you normally do, when, seemingly out of nowhere, you become disturbingly aware of how your version of “normal” doesn’t feel all that normal anymore.
Moments of reckoning like this have actually happened to me a few times throughout my life. One of them took place earlier this week.
It sort of feels like when you realize your fingernails are much too long. Without warning, the itch to cut them becomes almost unbearable. At least, it does for me. And when I think back on the times where these unannounced paradigm shifts have shown up, it’s because there was something important going on that I blatantly ignored, actively tried to avoid, or missed entirely while overwhelmed by the many moving parts of life.
If I’m honest with myself, they were probably avoidable and, at the very least, they were predictable. All of them.
But I’m human…
I wanted to protect my ego, despite knowing full well that Aldous Huxley was right when he said, “Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.”
Emotional safety needs the kind of honesty that’s willing to face things head-on.
Facing hard truths can be learned, but getting comfortable with it takes time. We all just want to belong. That’s what makes us feel accepted, valued, and safe. For me, the fear of not fitting in was especially powerful as a kid.
It was paralyzing.
Feeling like I didn’t belong felt like having to choose between being accepted or being myself. And, yes, of course I recognize that now as an ultimatum of my own making. But, at the time, maybe the hard truth I found myself circling was that it was up to me to decide if belonging and being unapologetically myself could be one and the same. The scary part was wondering which I’d choose if they couldn’t… and whether or not I’d be ok with that.
This is what I’m thinking about as I stand on the basketball court in the park near my house this week. I recently got a new ball, on a whim, because I thought maybe it’d be fun to shoot around here and there across the street. As I’m taking a layup for having missed my last shot, I’m picturing my step-brother, Danny, and a specific game of one-on-one we played together growing up. He was on defense, and, in a rare moment of graciousness, was trying to teach me something instead of just kicking my ass. He wanted me to drive to the hoop and finish strong, rather than drifting off at the last second for a fade-away shot, like I was prone to doing. Danny was older, taller, and unequivocally more skilled than any peer I’d play against in a game with guys my own age. And I’m still not convinced he wasn’t just doing this with me because it let him body me back and swat every shot I took.
So, here I am on the court as an adult, dribbling toward the hoop for my layup after a miss, and it’s Danny’s voice I hear taunting me “to go up strong.” But then I do. Somehow, my body still remembers how to do that, even after all these years. That was the strangest part of this whole thing: shooting with adult muscles and limited shoulder mobility. I think my form was ok, but I had no idea how much oomf to put into shooting at first. A few bricks off the backboard and just a couple of air-balls helped to recalibrate things.
Facing things head-on means embracing discomfort.
It’s cloudy, but bright enough that sunglasses help. There’s a chill, but I’m fine in my shorts and my T-shirt, so long as I keep moving around. I’d been wearing a hoodie, too, but I took it off after it was messing with my shot by tugging on my arm. Which, yes, is embarrassing; especially since I started shooting better without it.
While I’m playing around, I’m listening to the Finding Mastery podcast, where Sam Harris and Michael Gervais are talking about honesty. It feels timely. I wouldn’t have described my approach to honesty as “radical” until recently. Sometimes, I suppose I still think of myself as the kid who fibbed to avoid getting in trouble... even though, rationally, I know I’ve grown into a far different person as an adult.
This past winter was a rough one for me. They always are, to some extent. As a lifelong snowboarder and mountain sports enthusiast, I always wind up living in places that get dark, cold, and snowy for a solid chunk of the year. Some turn out better than others.
I guess I just wouldn’t have called myself depressed.
Or, maybe I just didn’t want to believe it.
I’ve been depressed before—I’m no stranger to doctors, meds, journals, meditations, or happy lights. My upbringing was spent almost exclusively in fight-or-flight mode, complete with suicidal crises, substance use, and underdeveloped coping skills. I’ve ridden my fair share of highs and lows, and this wasn’t like the ones I knew to look out for.
For starters, nothing was catastrophically wrong.
In fact, so much of my life is going extraordinarily well, it took quite a while to accept that depression could be high-functioning. Roof over my head, loving relationship, amazing friends, almost 5 years of sobriety… only by facing some hard truths did I come to realize I’d stopped tending to the basics that made all of those things possible.
Honesty’s a prerequisite for (re)connecting with life.
I’m dribbling, albeit slowly, alternating between left-handed layups and right-handed ones. Back and forth. One, then the other, across the empty court. Cracking a smile, I begrudgingly admit that, in a weird way, Danny’s beatings had worked. In basketball and in life, knowing when to go up strong and face things head-on is a skill I’m grateful to have learned.
After my low winter, and (finally) admitting I was depressed, I made exercising a priority again. So I got back into running and started noticing glimpses of my old self re-emerging within weeks. It was basically the first domino that led to visiting friends, joining a rec soccer team, and making a point to play more in everyday life. Hence, getting myself a new basketball.
It’s all adding up.
I realize I’m doing it; having fun again.
The avoidance we recognize in others says a lot about how we handle ourselves.
Later that night, I’m watching something on TV when, instinctively, I start turning down the volume before anything out of the ordinary even happens. At first I’d hit pause, but I’m trying to be better about withstanding awkward, embarrassing, or otherwise confrontational social situations on TV and in movies. I’m watching “Gary,” an unannounced episode of The Bear. Apparently, it got released as a surprise ahead of the show’s upcoming fifth and final season.
It’d taken a second to register what I was looking at when I first opened Hulu. Seeing the name “Gary” didn’t make me think of The Bear, and it wasn’t until I saw Jon Bernthal and Ebon Moss-Bachrach pictured side-by-side that I even thought to connect those dots.
Did they star in something else together?
Wait...
Hold on, is this a spinoff?
Reddit solved the mystery for me. “Gary” is a flashback episode, referencing a roadtrip to Gary, Indiana, involving Mikey and Richie (Jon and Ebon). Honestly, it could be a standalone short film. Maybe that’s why they listed it as a different show? I think that, after the marketing splash subsides, this choice will seem incredibly clunky.
Talk about confusing for a first-time viewer. And, even if they wanted to change it later, it’s not like they could just transfer it into an existing show-listing without losing all the streaming data...
I catch myself.
What kind of dork starts thinking about software system governance when faced with a new, surprise episode of a show they love, anyway? Not my problem... So I’m sitting there on my couch, leaning forward with my arms in my lap, and I’m cradling the remote while toggling mute on and off. Jon Bernthal’s character, Mikey, is just completely zooted and being an asshole to his best friend.
I’m watching his facial expression dip in and out of vulnerability and fear—between belonging and being himself. I see self-protection flash across his eyes, disguising itself through hatred and animosity.
My heart’s racing now and I’m squeezing my thumbs between my pointer fingers and middle fingers on each hand like I’d do when I was a kid before I ever had this stupid fidget ring. Somehow, my chest is hollow and tight all at once. For a guy who can’t make it through five minutes of The Office without cringing, I’m thinking I’m doing pretty good.
It’s just a TV show.
It’s not real.
It’s not yours to hold.
This show has spent four seasons making us fall in love with Mikey. We knew going in that the entire premise of The Bear is Mikey committing suicide and leaving his just-about-bankrupt Chicago restaurant to his younger brother, Carmen (Jeremy Allen White). Season after season, we’ve been given breadcrumbs of an abusive family environment and moderate glimpses into the insufficient coping mechanisms of everyone involved.
So I’m staring at the TV and I’m grinding my teeth, trying to remember to take deep breaths. I knew Mikey was an addict. I knew he was sweet, and kind, and deeply afraid of facing hard truths. I love The Bear for making him so undeniably human.
And I hate how much of it I recognize.
onward.
If you enjoy reading my writing, I publish short reflections like this each day as part of my daily column, Kickturn.
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Damn..,your vulnerability. Love it. The world needs more like this. Keep writing for all of us.
Your best work, D-Mac.