It's Not Who I Am Underneath

Last night, we were having a family dinner and just talking about different things that had gone on in our days as my dad and I still go out to work (as essential workers), my sister is doing online school for her senior year of high school, my brother is working from home, and my mom is at home doing stuff around the house and administrative stuff for my dad.

Since it's my sister's senior year, we had originally started planning for a graduation party as we had similarly done for both myself and my brother when we graduated years back. There had been apparent discussion of my sister being on the fence about inviting someone in her friend group (or something like that, I don't really know), and she was talking about how things said in her online class made her once again lean towards not inviting that friend assuming the party can still happen someday.

There was discussion of what my sister and the other people in her friend group had done for one of their mutual's birthday. Most did a drive-by horn honking and distanced wishing, and my sister had done a separate thing of making a gift and cookies and dropping it off. There was apparently passive-aggressive wording directed at my sister for not being a part of the group drive-by, and then there was further talk of how the person whose birthday it was saw how each person wished a happy birthday. I know that the birthday person and my sister have a closer friendship than what seems to be of the person who was being passive-aggressive, so I could naturally see a bit of bias. I'm like that too, I just was able to notice it here because it did not involve me, a.k.a. I was a third party person with no bias to either side.

My sister seemed to claim that her friend said my sister's actions were better and more meaningful than the gift my sister had made. I get it that some things mean more to people than other, but I feel like that maybe there's something missing her. My sister always uses the quote, "There's three sides to the story: your side, my side, and the truth." I only got one side of how the birthday wishing went, as explained as "aggressive honking of the horn from a distance". I don't mean to instantly side against my sister and side with this friend who she has mixed feelings about, but I feel like it's unfair to decide against inviting her based off of this. Sure in the past this same friend didn't invite my sister to I think a Halloween party or something, so it seems like there's some partial nodes of not inviting her out of spite. Anyways, since I didn't hear, nor did she, about how this friend perceives how she wished a happy birthday, I felt like that this example could not be used to go in favor of not inviting this person. I used that same quote of the three sides. She instantly tells me, "don't use my quote against me".

Then it hit me.

While I do think the quote she uses is a good quote, because in emotionally charged moments or in various perceptions and underlying biases, we all have times in which the true story is never told, and only the parts that are necessary to try to win people over is what is told. But then that is exactly as the quote says; our side. There is still the other party's side to the story, and then there's the objective truth that tells of all the potential wrongs of all or one or neither's side, and the rights of all, one, or neither's side.

Take my own life for example: Earlier this year, I have what I now label as the February Fallout, and subsequent minor instances that are still a result of said fallout. I have the way I perceive things, and they must have their way of how things are and how things went. Then there's also the truth to what happened. And in that truth, I realize that I indeed have my wrongs and that I was nowhere near close to being innocent of the aftermath and the results that have arrived.

What I then need to remember is the quote I put in my own bios on social media, and the quote I would go to whenever someone asks me what my favorite quote is. It's (surprise surprise) from Batman Begins (2005) when Batman reveals to Rachel Dawes who he is by repeating a quote she had said to Bruce Wayne earlier: "It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me."

The beauty of it is that first of all it's a Batman quote, so I'll have it memorized and I'll pay a bit more attention to it (I mean how many times must I mention my admiration for the character), and the simple truths in the quote. We can say we are one thing or another. We can say we have changed, we can say we have moved on, we can say we have become better people than before. We can say whatever we want other to believe about us. But the truth is simply this: no matter what we say about ourselves, at the end of the day it doesn't matter how much we run our mouths, it's what our actions say about us. About the true person inside of us. About the person we really are. Our words can only maintain a facade for a certain period of time, and then we will either fulfill our words because we truly are that way, or if it was a myth that we were tricking and deceiving others into believing, if we were so "lucky" to have deceived them.

Another quote that ties into this last part is: "An apology without change is just manipulation"

So while I am here nitpicking my sister's behaviors and decisions, I also need to more importantly focus on my own behaviors and decisions. I keep saying that I've fallen down from grace (so to speak). That in my time of being at Liberty and being the Liberty Batman I was better. That I had aligned my morals and values and changed my behavior to reflect more closely to that of a superhero that Batman would be. I keep saying I've healed and moved on, but as we can see that after the first attempt to rekindle a friendship with Sophia that I was still hurting and that I was apologizing and I was manipulating someone. I'm not sure who, whether I was manipulating myself or her, but I wasn't truly changed. I hadn't moved on in that moment of reaching out once again. But the point of the matter is that my words have said I was better. That I had healed, that I had moved on, that I was ready to climb back up to this perceived state of being higher than I was before the Batman. That I was being higher not to flex or flaunt to others how much better I was, but that I was better than my yesterday and that I would keep climbing ever upwards to be as best as I could possibly be.

As I think about publishing that drafted post, seeking a chance to forgive, to maybe truly try with a clean slate to repair friendships, to really have healed and moved on from the past, I need to think: have I really healed? Am I actually the words I will utter? When I go to forgive them and apologize for the distance and the previous wrongs (I'm not sure how much I can or should apologize because I know that Sophia has already forgiven me for my wrongs, so even if I am guilty feeling of it, I need to realize I have been forgiven and move on, as that's what pushed her to create space between her and I so I can truly heal) am I truly different? Am I the healed man I claim to be? I know I am healing, but am I healed? Am I actually ready?

Like I was saying about the quote: it's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me. So I need to remember that quote more than ever as I work on my healing and as I go on with life from here on out: will my actions speak louder than I ever could? Will my words be true to what my actions say about the person buried deep inside of me? It's a noble quest, and one that I should undertake as I work on myself, and as I begin to approach a month since the space creation and 3 months since I last talked to others. It's been too long of not working on myself and realizing if my actions match my words. It's no longer time for just talk: it's time for action. Time to really hunker down and work on my betterment, not just for myself, but for everyone else around me.