Blood & Ink: Beliefs are Not Facts

It took several epochs of my life to realize that other people’s opinions of me/my life were not objective judgements of the world about my character…

For a long time, in a mostly unconscious fashion, I held the belief that if I just became good enough, smart enough, capable enough, ‘perfect enough’, there would come a point in time when everyone would see me the same way and would understand (and agree with) what I said.

Sounds silly to write it out, but it was real.

Whenever someone disagreed with me or raised an eyebrow in question about something I enjoyed or believed, it just felt like I hadn’t figured it out fully yet. Like if I could just explain it better, become a better example of it, or if I was just a better person they would come around and see it my way.

The day-to-day reality of that belief system was also painful.

It kept me in a fairly consistent state of incompleteness/unworthiness because up until I could get everyone to understand/agree/support everything I did, something was wrong & not good enough about me.

With some time and a lot of work, I realized that that would never happen. Actually, I want to live in a world of diverse opinions and tastes and can stand in my self-authority without needing everyone to agree with or understand how I live my life.

The greatest gift I have ever given myself at this stage in my life is a deep trust, and respect, for my intuitive taste/style/vibe.

I spent far too long in life gaslighting myself, thinking there was something wrong with me (or everyone else!) because they didn’t come to the same conclusions as me. Now, I like me. I like where my choices take me, I like the things that I like. I like my music, tea, simplicity, natural living, kinda nerdy-punk-awkwardness…even though I know it’s not for everyone.

The opportunity is to deeply realize that opinions are not facts. I am not going to get into the reality/unreality of ‘facts’ and ‘objectivity’ in this piece.

You can take this a step further, and realize that your beliefs about yourself are also just opinions and not facts.

Most people act as if the beliefs they hold about themselves are cardinal truths about the nature of themselves and reality.

• “Oh, I’m not the funny one.”
• “Yeah, I’m not that creative/artistic.”
• “That’s great for you, but I can’t do this.”

In the great words of The Dude:

“Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.”

Realizing that your beliefs are just fleeting opinions and not objective facts is freeing. It changes YOU from a NOUN (fixed object) into a VERB (active process).

Maybe you’re not that funny yet. Great. Would you like to be? Is that something you want to work on? You can develop it.

Free yourself from the bondage of belief-as-facts. It’s both untrue and psychologically harmful.

Liberate yourself into the deep knowing of beliefs-as-opinion, and open yourself to the great process of being a verb.

With love,
EB.