To Be Seen

To Be Seen

By Levi Duren

It is rather a funny feeling to both want something and despise it at the same time. Although, funny is not quite the right word. But I’m not sure there is any one word - or group of words for that matter - that captures the paradoxical nature of feeling both desire and its opposite for the same thing at the same time. Yet this is how I feel about being seen when my world has been oppressively and wantonly disassembled by suffering.

I crave companionship so desperately in those moments; to be in the presence of someone who understands and sympathizes with the scattered yet poignant emotions that darken my mood and cloud my thoughts. Like the first bite of a warm meal at the end of a long cold day is the embrace of a friend who sees me for what I really am. Somehow, speaking out my feelings seems to break their power over my mind. It’s rather like turning the lights on in a child’s room: the shapes and shadows that were once demons and monsters settle back into reality and become clothes or curtains once again. But for some reason, I rarely allow it to be quite that simple.

To be seen in these times somehow also grips me with terror. I’m not quite sure why; I’ve been lucky to have friends with me in these moments before and have known nothing but relief for their being there. I think I might fear the responsibility. In one sense, to make known my struggle is to accept that, whether my fault or not, it is now my burden to bear. Until I voice the pain, maybe I can pretend that I don't have to face it. Maybe I can keep wallowing in self-pity and sink into its dull pleasure like staring at an open wound or taking a second breath of a putrid scent. I think, though, that I also fear the ways in which the pain is my fault. Whether by privilege or by luck, it seems I am rarely the victim of sorrow that is not, at least indirectly, of my own creation. So as long as I keep silent, I can pretend that I am instead subject to the cruel designs of some other poor fool or, even more dramatically, God himself.

So I stay silent. Or rather, I remain hidden.

I choose to avoid the thing that would give me the most relief because it appears to make demands of me. Pity asks nothing of me; in fact, it gives generously of the mist that hides me from reality. It’s not an escape in the conventional sense as it gives me the power to endlessly play with my circumstances, yet almost nothing real ever comes from it. It yields no fruit for it exacts no labor. 

I may yet take a step toward that which can change both me and my circumstances, but all too often I remain hidden in the cold, damp mist that keeps me unseen and offers only false comforts.