Happy Friday, All!
And it wouldn’t be so happy if I hadn’t learned to say . . . T.G.I.F.!
Have you ever heard the expression: ” We all wear the mask”? Yes, it seems that from infancy, us humans learn how to do different things to disguise our true feelings. And the more we “mature” in this life, it seems we become more and more theatrical in order to perhaps … protect our true selves. Many times, we don’t even recognize that we are doing it because we’ve become so accustomed to it. Just last night, a friend of mine who is going away told me she was going to Nebraska. So, I asked her, since she has always told me about her boyfriend and how much in love they were, if she was going with him. Of course, I was happy. But, when I asked her if she was going to Nebraska with her boyfriend, she replied: “Well, I’ve been lying to everybody else but I am really going there to see him!” She continued telling me that since everyone thought he lived with her, she was telling people that she was going alone but hesitated to tell me the same lie . .
One of the most disturbing true stories I’ve heard lately was the one about a U S District Court Judge from Montana, Justice Richard Cebull, making a joke and sending it on his court related e-mail to a bunch of friends. It was about our present president, Barack Obama, who upon realizing in his later years that he was lighter complexioned or something like that, asked his mother why. She told him, as the tasteless joke goes, that she (Barack’s mother) is surprised that he is not barking like a dog considering the party or gathering she had attended on the day of his conception. Correct me if I am wrong . . .
Yet, Cebull, when asked about the joke, said it was not a racist joke but just an anti-Obama joke . . . Has he been making these kinds of jokes or harboring these kinds of thoughts so long that he can not tell that the joke is clearly racist? I guess we all should not get too far removed from our true selves along this process and journey called “life”.
“We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin.” – Andre Berthiaume
May I have the courage to drop my phony masks in order to grow stronger in self-knowledge. (TOUCHSTONES March 9th)
Have a wonderful weekend as Spring is upon us, and, enjoy the beautiful full moon!
Peace,
John I. Cook, Director
Educational Excellence 