Own Your Ugly

You are perfectly imperfect. Own up to that and see how much better life gets.

Photo by Zachary Kadolph on Unsplash

I have done some really stupid things in my life.

This is not about death-defying acts of any sort. No, these are choices I made that were less-than-smart. Various and sundry relationships that were foolish (ranging from casual dating to serious dating to friends-with-benefits — and everything in between), avoiding conflicts that might have led to better resolutions, bad investments, poor car-buying decisions, and so on and so forth.

I do not hold regrets about these things, per se. But I am acknowledging them because it’s important to own your ugly.

Our society avoids accountability better than we avoid a plague. Blame gets placed everywhere by everyone because it seems — in the moment — easier than accepting responsibility.

What’s more, lots of people prefer to place blame because they think it makes them look better. It wasn’t my fault and it was that guy’s fault can seem like they make you look better. You didn’t get something wrong or do something ugly. Nope, blame someone or something else and you remain clean.

But the truth is that you make it far, far worse. The longer you refuse to own your ugly and place blame and fault outside of yourself, the deeper…