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Truth Can Feel Miserable

“Before ‘the truth sets you free,’ it tends to make you miserable.” —Richard Rohr, Falling Upward

Truth can feel miserable. I don’t like seeing the truth about myself when it means I have to acknowledge that I can be selfish and fearful and petulant and snap at our kids for minor offenses and say passive-aggressive things to my husband because I’m stressed out about having overcommitted to something. 

I don’t like seeing the truth about myself when it means I have to acknowledge that there were consequences to eating all those french fries or drinking all that wine or spending all those years without using sunscreen. 

I don’t like seeing the truth about America and my ancestors’ history of willfully abusing and manipulating and perpetrating horror on Indigenous people and Black citizens and people of color.

As Rohr writes, truth can feel miserable.

And yet, these ugly truths can also be brought into the light so they can be addressed, healed, redeemed. And lead us towards freedom.


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