The truth. The plain and simple truth. What is it? Where is it? What has it become?? What is the truth, really? Has it become so subjective that everyone’s truth is different? I know the answer to that last one, and the answer is yes!
I want to write about truth because I feel that, in its original form (whatever that is) we’re losing the meaning, and the importance of it. Seems that someone out there decided that the truth was however we each decided to perceive it. And it’s gotten so out of hand… these days there are so many radical ideas of what the truth is, and one of the sickest ideas is, that if you repeat a thing long enough, it will become true. o. m. g. And it’s kind of working.
Merriam-Webster defines “truth” thusly –
Definition of truth
(Entry 1 of 2)
1a(1) : the body of real things, events, and facts : actuality
(2) : the state of being the case : fact
(3) often capitalized : a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality
b : a judgment, proposition, or idea that is true or accepted as true truths of thermodynamics
c : the body of true statements and propositions
Wikipedia defines truth as “the property of being in accord with fact or reality. In everyday language, truth is typically ascribed to things that aim to represent reality or otherwise correspond to it, such as beliefs, propositions, and declarative sentences.”
In both, I like the reference of truth as a representation of factual things, reality. But look how quickly both mention judgement, belief, proposition. And if it’s not truth that is spoken, then it must be… a lie! And to pursue that any further we need to define what a lie is.
“A lie is an assertion that is believed to be false, typically used with the purpose of deceiving or misleading someone.”
Could We Handle It?
How would we respond if some of our friends told us what they really thought of us… you know, The Truth. Would we be gracious? Would we listen? Would we perhaps try to change?
I recently thought about a friend of mine, and what I would say to him if he asked me what I really, really thought of him. (It’s not you, Darren, Rick, Joe, Jack) What i would say is, “I think you’re a great guy… you know that. You are a brilliant person, magnetic personality, always fun and stimulating to be with, a good heart, a great business mind and a friend I can always trust. To my mind, your only weaknesses are these – you are totally skewed with politics and women.” Hmm. Perhaps that would be approaching “one size fits all.”
The Truth Hurts
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.”
― Joe Klaas, The Twelve Steps to Happiness:
How would you feel if someone gave you some personal critisim, in confidence, in earnest? Would you be pissed, shocked, hurt? Perhaps grateful for an honest voice in an otherwise phony world? I would guess that most of us would automatically activate our defense mechanisms and immediately “consider the source,” and frantically search our memories for why that simply wasn’t true.
“The reason I talk to myself is because I’m the only one whose answers I accept.”
― George Carlin
First of all, do you respect that person? Do you look up to her, down on him, respect them as a peer? See, the first thing many of us do is instantly analyze that person as to whether their word might be accurate, or whether we should discount this criticism. Hopefully, at some point down the line, the question will finally arise in our minds and egos, “Could that be right? Might that really be true??”
As far as I can remember, the first honest criticism I had, of a personal nature, was way back in high school. A buddy at the time, Dick Sprout, once told me, “Oh, you’re a good guy, Steffen. I like you, it’s just that you’re so damn sensitive. I wish sometimes you’d loosen up and not care so much what others think.” He was right, of course, I knew it, and it didn’t affect our relationship at all.
“The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.”
― Flannery O’Connor
In the past 20 years I’ve lost friends… people I like, people I respect, people I wanted to stay close to. Maybe it has happened to you – they start avoiding us, not being available, and being distant when we do get their attention. This has happened to me too often. I don’t like it. And for the most part, I don’t understand it, mostly because they never told me what they don’t like about me, why they don’t want to be around me.
Ordinarily I wouldn’t have thought that a little occasional quiet, honest criticism would be so hard to get… god knows we all have an opinion, good or bad, about each other. I have told the honest truth to a few ex-friends, and no, they didn”t like it. One of them denied it, the other shrugged and said something lame like, “That’s just who I am.”
Occasionally, during my early years, I would get the feeling that my friends were learning to define themselves through me. Not that I had any idea what was going on, and was, perhaps, facilitating their search. Eh, maybe I kind of knew occasionally. Most of the time, however, the hard truth is that I was too self-absorbed to be aware of my friends’ deeper feelings and searchings. Probably because of my naiveté, basic honesty and sometimes stupid desire to make other people feel good about themselves, I might have actually helped a few of them figure a few things out. I know for sure they helped me, they grew me. But not with gentle criticism, not with quiet words.
Wait, no, there was one guy. Lou Silvestri, god bless his soul. In my second semester at Berklee, I was taking a quartet arranging class from Ray Santisi. We were to bring in an arrangement of a standard tune every week, for piano, guitar, bass and drums.Then we each got to have them preformed in class. I was so amped to try these new skills and play for my peers, I always got very nervous during class… especially when it was my turn to play my arrangement. I was learning how to arrange for a rhythm section, actually learning a lot, but my playing… I’m sure I was rushing, playing too loudly, trying to do things I wasn’t yet capable of doing.
After class one day, Lou came up to me and walked up the hall with me, his hand on my shoulder. “Listen man,” he said with a quiet intensity. “You’re doing fine. I like some of the things I’m hearing from you. But you’ve got to relax! Pull it back a notch, man. It’s just a class, you’re not going to impress anyone yet. We’re just getting started, you know? Relax, stop pressing so hard. You’re gonna be fine, just don’t take it so seriously.”
Best advice I got in all 4 years. I took his advice to heart, not only because Lou was a cool East Coast dude whom I liked, but also because I knew he was right. My palms stopped sweating when I played that class, my little arrangements got smoother, and I actually gained some confidence… simply by letting up and enjoying it a little more. Great advice. From a friend. And I never forgot it.
And that reminds me of a comment I got one day from one of my piano teachers, Paul Schmeling. At my very first lesson with him, he made me stop playing, then said, “Mr. Hulse. Your technique is horrible. I have to tell you right now, you’re never going to be a decent piano player.”
Well, that stung a little at the time, But he was honest with me. How did I handle it? I immediately found a different teacher at the school. I remember thinking that the guy wasn’t going to help me if he didn’t believe I at least had some potential. I don’t think I wanted a piano teacher to lie to me, to tell me what I wanted to hear. I wanted to learn, needed to learn, and I was absorbing music faster than I can absorb a good margarita now. I just think it might have been at least interesting for us to work on me for one semester together. But who knows? I was a fairly brainless 26 at the time.
Obviously I never forgot it, and am delighted to report that though he was right about my technique at the time, I have since proven him wrong. Sorry, Paul, more sorry for you than me. If you had shown me any encouragement at all… ah hell, you probably did me a favor.
But see, that’s the truth for you… helpful, hurtful, it can be many things. I’m particularly fond of inspirational truth, of uplifting truth. But so often truth is skewed by our perception of it. We still call it “the truth,” but it is now only our truth, our version of it. How strong our ego and our belief system is will usually tell us how close to any self-truth we really are.
Over the years I’ve found that the outside world’s perception of me has been many things, some positive, some friendly, some sarcastic and edgy, even mean. Being a musician, I’ve taken a bit of meanness from time to time from those who wish they were musicians, but aren’t. Their jealousy sometimes surfaces quickly, and it’s usually fairly ugly, exposing who they are far more than exposing me for anything other than perhaps carrying my musicianship on my sleeve sometimes. My god… sue me.
Probably you’d like to ask me if I could handle the truth, the real, brutal truth about myself? Well, good question. Naturally we’d all like to think we could and would handle it. Gracefully? Ha, that’s another matter. So hard not to get defensive when I hear something negative about myself. That’s the damned ego again, butting in to what might otherwise be an insightful exchange of thought that might help me, and perhaps others as well.
“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.”
― Winston S. Churchill
The last person to tell me some brutal truth was Tim McCabe, an Atlanta musician, singer and producer. I took a few of my songs to him one afternoon to see if he thought they might be good enough to get a record deal. He listened to two or three, then frowned. “It’s really strange, Steve… your intros are so good I think I’m about to hear a killer song. But I don’t. Turns out your instrumental intros are the best part of your songs.” Argh. I tried to be gracious, but that hurt. Tim was really honest with me that day, and he was right! My intros were better than my songs, because I was a way better arranger than song writer. Thank you for that honesty, Tim, though it was hard for me to swallow at the time.
Handling the truth is easier now. It used to be, “I was what I did…” a composer, a jazz pianist, it was “who I was.” Am sure I acted like that, too. Not proud of that, but we’re dealing with honestly here, and truth. What better time to admit a few things? …like the fact that I’m still bugged by a friend back in Boston who distanced himself from me, and when I asked him why, he said, “If you don’t know, I’m not going to tell you.” God, I hated that non-answer, and still do, which points to yet another personal flaw – vindictiveness.
“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
― Mark Twain
But I digress. All the time. We were discussing how I used to be as a younger man – I was what I did. See, those days are long gone. Now I’m an older man, just that, nothing more. Well, an older man who spends much of his time remembering, writing, armchair philosophizing and trying to figure it all out. I no longer have the luxury of pissing anyone off because of who, or how I am. Wait – there’s a good reason for that… I was semi-quarantined for nearly three years, with no one to pester but my dear Betty Ann. And she handles me so effortlessly… “You are worrying needlessly. Everything is fine, Dear. Stop obsessing.. I love you, and it’s almost time for our five o’clock cocktail. It’ll all work out.”
And therein lies the truth, the honesty, that I crave, and can handle. And one of a hundred reasons why I love her so. And that’s the truth.
Steve Hulse
