A Game of Hide and Seek

I love the passion and the "real"ness in people. Real? What does that mean? I love the real, raw, flawed part of people. That sounds crazy. But to get there and to see that part of them means that they've let you in. It means they are open, they're honest, and they're vulnerable. It means they have decided to lower the mask to at least one person.

Mask? Yep. That facade we all hide behind. Thinking we're safe from questions as long as we keep up the image of having it all together. When we begin to let the mask slide, we're convinced that terrifying things will happen. Our hearts start racing at the thought of being discovered... that perhaps we don't know what we're doing. That perhaps we are hurting. That perhaps we do mess up. That people will see who we really are... the raw, exposed people behind the perfect, pretty masks.

It's that rush of adrenaline... feeling your heart throb in your neck... just like when we were little kids hiding in the closet during a particularly intense game of Hide and Seek. The footsteps near the closet door... the door opens, light floods in. We squint in the sudden brightness... hoping that some miracle will keep us from being found. Searching eyes comb over the contents of the closet where we're hiding. We hold our breaths... hoping not to be found. The moment it seems it's all over, the door closes and the Seeker leaves. All is quiet, dark, "safe" once more. But as we hear the footsteps drift from the door, we feel a strange emptiness... and besides. It's cramped in the closet. We were kind of hoping to be found.We suddenly feel a strange urge to cry out. To announce to the world that we're here... that we've been here all along.... that the Seeker would come back and look closer... we were so close to being found.

Isn't that how so many of us feel? We feel trapped in the fakeness of pretending to be perfect. When in fact we sit here comparing ourselves to others. We think someone else is prettier, stronger, faster, smarter, more capable, more confident, more godly. We are convinced we're at the bottom. That our struggle is our own. That we are the only one that struggles with things.

Ah, and that is the lie. When we are cornered and alone we are forced into believing that we are the only one who doesn't have it together. That we're the only one that fails time after time. That falls into the same terrible, destructive habits.

Finally we feel the need to tell someone. The heart throbs. The adrenaline rushes. Our secret is out. And the listener.... accepts us anyway. The listener.... loves us anyway. The listener.... has been there too. What shock. What joy. What freedom.

The freedom from finally lowering the mask and being real... being raw... is overwhelmingly beautiful.

How can a listener run from such rawness? Such honesty? Such a moment of freedom?

Yes, lowering the mask is humiliating. But it creates real, passionate, beautiful people that understand one another.

Basking in the freedom of being understood.