Love, and then some.

“One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: That word is love.”

- some know-it-all named Sophocles.

If I had a nickel for each time that I heard that, then I’d be investing my millions into something far more lucrative than journaling. Just kidding. But, if I had one for each time I truly believed what that guy said, then I’d be in serious nickel debt.

Last year was nuts. A lot went down, both good and ugly, stuff turned into stuff, and I forgot to pay for my website subscription [The $y$tem, man]. In that time, I formed some new behaviors drawn from my own curiosities which metastasized into what could have been destructive patterns and I…bla, bla, bla…ran for a blinking red “RESTART” button as though my life depended on it. If you’re imagining a SCI-FI scene where awkward, but oddly tech-savvy aliens are 4 seconds away from blasting you into smithereens, UNLESS you hit like blinking button, then you’re with me. Except, the creatures in this movie were self-hatred, deprecation, and shame. And I’d given them a home for 24 years. My life depended on me hitting stop for jobs, good gigs, and the rhetoric that I tried selling to everyone around me: “I’m finding myself,” when I was actually just distracting.

Distracting from truth I silenced for a long time.

The first I ever talked about my sexuality to someone else was with a best friend, in my earlier twenties. Then, my loving sister and patient mom. So, there it was, I was out, and I didn’t have to talk about it because I had people in my court that knew me and that was all I needed. Let the rest learn. (PS - I know this approach is accepted and widely embraced, so you go if this is your method). What I’d done was, yes, confide in people who I knew would never reject me…and they didn’t. But I also learned how to resist embracing who that man was. Who this man is. Who this man needed to become. I learned to silence truth even after it was acknowledged. And that lead to certain disappointments as I started to involve other people. Yikes.

The truth is that I had this conversation with myself since I was far younger. A bible boy whose internal dialogue stopped at the pulpit because some people told me to believe against what I wanted to know. And I grew up thinking the love of my creator was limited. Bear with me, here - my rooted faith gave me a lot of stability during that time and I’d never discount its impact. I, now, know of other alternatives that could have been used while exploring. Despite spirituality that steered my perspective, I didn’t want to talk about ANY of it with anyone. Not even my God. Most relationships were guarded and while my confidants felt “close” to me, I was distant. As a performer and man of faith, I got skilled at playing different personas, all of which I felt a need to protect. In tandem, I grew into a charismatic, but emotionally aloof scaredy-pants. The “skills” I sharpened soon dulled and people caught on.

To what end?

Conversation triggered me. Honesty scared me. I got anxious sitting in a room with just my family. I was always tired. I desperately tried to keep giving everything that I had with no replenish. Even though what I gave were knock-off versions of my conversation and honesty. I did the “fun stuff” but much of it became distracting in short time: work, travel, date around, more than date around. I’d leave encounters with friends defeated because it wasn’t genuine but audaciously held my few cards for them to pick out. While clawing at more from others, I kept what I’d ask for far from reach. The bar I set for the world was higher than my own. Unachievable, in a lot of ways. I was confused - getting lost in guises I’d make over and over, and over again. When my truest self became more convoluted with other versions, I’d retreat. And often stay.

I lived enslaved by my own fear of love.

I won’t drone on about why that is so but my therapist and I have some ideas - #dadissues. But something that rings true, and very loudly, was thinking that I owed hiding more of my time than at real chances to love. True love. Not just the sappy stuff that forces tears after witnessing your niece’s first steps. But, the kind that is goopy and forgiving after something you say to your best friend of more than a decade backfires. The kind that forces you to do what’s suuuper uncomfortable, like calling up your two, highly revered brothers, to fill them in on your little (HUGE) secret. The kind that gives yourself a hell of a lot of patience as you try to let someone else in on that love. Like, a lot of patience. And then, that love develops into a love for love that either watches your excuses fade, or forces you to sandpaper them right the hell away. Because now, you deserve the love you’ve worked, battled, and prayed for. And in time, the self-entrapped, scared of being truly loved, person looks into the mirror at someone newer. Someone taller, a little more clumsy, far more forgiving, and believable. Someone who wakes up and goes to bed with the same but ever-growing, bonafide personhood. And while there’s a ton of room for improvement, that person patiently loves themselves and can offer it back without total reservation. They’re no longer an alien in their own house and refuse to host any thought, idea, person, or doctrine that object. In THAT love, he’s finally free.

I haven’t scaled this part of my identity to grandeur. And I won’t pretend that I have. Getting here has taken time. Lots of time. Freedom ain’t always grassy fields. Sometimes life will burn it up; freedom is knowing you can grab the plow when it does. If you’re reading this and you’ve felt alone, scared, misunderstood, or desperate about a search to a better-loving self, then I hope you consider this letter as a reprieve. Let’s give each other grace. Because I haven’t figured it all out either. And while I’ve had only a few years of public accountability, I’ve got a long a way to go to. We all do. I also trust that you know our paths to truth are dynamic depending on our circumstances. In some ways, I got it easy, and others, I know I don’t. Grace.

What’s reflected in all of us is the propensity to love. I don’t care how skilled you’ve gotten at refuting it. Love you some you so that you can better love others - whomever, him-ever, or she-ever it is. We all want it, and baby, it’s closing in, ready to smother us. LOOK ALIVE. Some people will give it to you on a silver platter, and others will make you knife your way to it. And some, well they’ll just remind you that your self-love is irrevocably key. What I’m understanding is that the more I try it, the less I care about how it’s given back onto me. The less I care about conventionality. The less I care about what I used to care about. Because, somehow, I still get it. And it feels good.

Jesus is love.

I lived enslaved by my own fear of love…until I decided otherwise.

So I guess Sophocles had a point…

Tevin