July 26, 2007

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Radical Honesty

I discovered Esquire magazine tonight. It seems, based on my limited experience, to be a damn fine magazine for me. It's just pretentious enough to allow me to feel superior to the average person, and it has that deliciously smug, self-satisfied quality that seems always to be present whenever grown men aspire to be fashionable. And yet, as a magazine intended for an urbane, urban, masculine audience, it can't quite detach itself from the schlock-obsession with sex, and the suggestion of nudity (see, e.g., Stuff, FHM, Maxim, etc.)--which is also perfect for me because, as an urbane, urban, but masculine reader, I can't quite pretend that I'm not enticed by those sexual blandishments.

The most immediately compelling article I found was on Radical Honesty, the idea, expounded by Virginia-based psychotherapist Brad Blanton, that we would all be happier if we were completely honest with each other, all of the time. So I contemplated the idea, and at the least, it's intriguing. But for someone like me who has a predisposition toward blunt honesty, it's immediately quite attractive. If I trust guru Blanton, this is like validation.

The author describes many scenarios in which he attempts to be honest, and says that it is a liberating feeling. But he stops short of being able to be honest when he knows it will hurt someone's feelings. And in the end, this seems to be the way that I work. I tend to be very blunt and honest up until the point where it will hurt someone more than it's worth. Blanton's argument is that that point will never be reached if we take into account the real effects of our honesty.

I'm not sure whether I buy it. Delusions and white lies are two of the bases for civilized society. And even if we'd be happier being radically honest, we probably couldn't get a job (let alone keep it) in today's world. So the takeaway from this article is this: try to be a little more honest, even when it might be a bit offensive, or hurt someone's feelings a little bit. But don't do it for the sake of the offense. Do it because it opens channels of communication, and makes it okay for the other party to be honest as well.

In that spirit, I'm regretful that I neglected this blog so long over the summer, but the truth is that I only ever write here in order to make people think I'm witty and smart, and out of hope that someone will notice that I very rarely split infinitives or end sentences with prepositions. It makes me very happy when lots of people comment, even when their comments are pointless ("Good post") or from people about whom I don't particularly care. In fact, especially when they are pointless, because then it means that the person cared enough about maintaining our relationship to expend their energy to write the comment, without having anything they really needed to say. And if someone I haven't spoken to in a while suddenly comments, that's awesome because it means they thought I was smart and witty enough to seek out and keep reading my blog even though they have not even the thinnest of obligations to do so. I often spend a decent amount of time trying to think of things that sound like they aren't perfunctory or meaningless to leave as comments on the blogs of my friends in order to let them know that I still think they are witty and smart. Also, it sometimes embarrasses me when the first comment, and especially when the only comment, is from Jeanette, because I'm afraid that it looks like I make this big, vain production of having a blog when my only reader is my girlfriend.

Posted at July 26, 2007 4:24 AM | Comments (6)

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