Love and Radical Honesty
When I describe Radical Honesty to people there are generally two kinds of reactions: either an excited “Where do I sign up?” or a horrified “Why on Earth would I want to do that?”
Believe me, I understand. The idea of being completely honest can be frightening. Beneath the surface is the fear that if people really see us as we are, we won’t be loved. There is the fear that if people really know what we think about them it might hurt their feelings and they might leave us.
The idea underlying Radical Honesty is simply that we create more love and intimacy with people in our lives when we are honest about what we think and feel. That’s it. However, Radical Honesty isn’t just the concept that being honest is a good idea, it is the practice of actually being honest. In Radical Honesty we practice the skills that enable you to do that, so that truth-telling becomes a tool for building trust, not a weapon that destroys it.
Being radically honest is not some panacea that guarantees smooth sailing. On the contrary, it tends to sharpen conflict, at least initially. A lot of the garden variety lying and withholding we do is designed to minimize conflict, so when you stop doing it suddenly the conflict bubbles to the surface. This might make it seem like you’re on the wrong path. Don’t let it throw you. Stick with it.
Welcome conflict. There’s no need to create it where it doesn’t exist. But, when it does occur, if we have an attitude of curiosity and an expectation of learning something new, that will serve us well. And we can learn to distinguish between constructive and destructive approaches to conflict, and to choose the former.
Learn to tolerate discomfort. The emotions that arise when we engage in truth-telling are often what I call the “less preferred” emotions: anger, fear and sadness. By learning to tolerate, and even enjoy, intense sensation we enhance our ability to engage in conflict in a constructive way. We learn to stay present even when our buttons are getting pushed. By expanding the dynamic range of emotional expression we create more fluidity, which in turn leads to more “contact-ful” relationships.
Our goal with Radical Honesty isn’t to eliminate conflict. Instead, it’s to re-frame it so it becomes a constructive force in our lives, an opportunity for contact.
It’s in this moment of contact that love is possible.
Our most fundamental relationship with each other as human beings is one of love. You can be certain that when love seems to be missing it is only obscured — by desire, by aversion, by all the manifestations of the mind’s grasping. The path of love isn’t so much the creation of something new, as the revealing of something that already exists. Love is the mutual exploration of “what is,” and that can only happen when we are honest with each other and ourselves.
Here is the crux of the matter. Love is an exploration, a process, something you do. It can only exist in the moment, this now, where all doing takes place. Love happens in the domain of experience, not the domain of thought. That’s what renders it a mystery instead of a known quantity.
It’s inevitable that our partners will do things we don’t like, and vice versa. We will show up in ways that trigger each other. A partner in loving keeps returning to that exploration of “what is”, wherever it leads. That’s very different than a partnership based on the mind’s evaluations. It’s the difference between loving and the concept of love.
Another way of looking at it is that intimacy arises as we free our minds from what we know, and learn to rely on what we experience. There is a Zen koan to this effect: “Not knowing is most intimate.” We are brought more into connection with our “partners in relating” when we approach them with “don’t know” mind. Of course, this means letting go of control, and the mind hates that.
Why on Earth would you want to practice Radical Honesty? Because you, like every other human being, want to give and receive love. The only way to be loved for who you are is to be honest about who you are, and that includes being honest about the ways you are imperfect — your judgments, resentments, fears and shortcomings.
In a society where pretended perfection is the norm this is a scary thing, a risky thing, maybe even a crazy thing to do. But do you really have a choice? If someone loves you for who you have pretended to be, will you feel loved? No. You will know it is a charade. They love your act, not you.
If you want love, find someone who is willing to be radically honest with you, to allow you to see their imperfections, someone who has the courage to engage in conflict and stick with it even when it’s uncomfortable, to keep returning to the exploration of “what is”. If you make Radical Honesty your own practice as well, you just might end up with the love of your life.
[If you’re interested in learning more visit my Radical Improv site, which combines Radical Honesty and Improv, or find me on Facebook.]
