The things we tell ourselves

I don't want to be pathetic.  Neither do you.  Who wants to be pathetic?  Nobody!  So humans take almost whatever precautions necessary so that they will not be pathetic.  One of them is lying to ourselves.  Now, deep down, I don't believe that we can truly lie to ourselves, because we know the truth.  So what we think of as lying to ourselves is really the suppression of what we know to be true.

Say there is this girl that you like.  But you either, 1) know that she's all wrong for you.  She'd just bring you down. Or 2) she has already done you real wrong (cheated on you, betrayed you, whatever).  Now, being a proud human being and wanting nothing to do with the association of patheticism, you recognize that you still have strong feelings for this bad woman, and you know the thing to do that makes the most sense to you is to reject these feelings.  But, matters of the heart are never as simple as matters of the head.  We can't just reject feelings of love.  So the next best and smartest thing to do is to attempt to convince yourself that this woman is bad, and that you can't stand her.  Suppress those feelings deep, and keep trying to convince yourself that she is ugly on the inside.  (Note, you can only do this if you have a convincing case that she is in fact, ugly on the inside.  Many times, she is.)

But what if we were just totally honest with ourselves, and with everyone else about everything.  What if, like dogs, we returned to our own vomit for another awful meal.  Self-deprecation, we so often embrace.  I imagine it would make the John Mayer lyric ring so much truer in life, "Why you wanna break my heart again?  Why am I gonna let you try?  All we ever do is say goodbye."

  It's got to be our love for ourselves that make us go through these thought-patterns.  In my analysis, I'm starting to think that instead of lying to ourselves, we can at least be honest and admit to ourselves (and maybe even some close family and friends) what are true feelings are.  In doing this, we will react better to whatever unpredictable situations await us in the future (ie, that phone call where she wants to meet you, that favor she randomly asks you, etc)  But, as we do this, let us be wise and disciplined enough to do the right thing.  Don't run with scissors, don't play on the freeway, and don't pursue a woman who will hurt you.