The worst lies are the ones we tell ourselves about ourselves & end up believing. When those lies are taken from us we are disorientated & feel the pain of their removal. But as we begin to see past them, we see the distance we have created btwn ourselves & reality, & we despair.
Courage is needed first to seek out and confront the truth about yourself and reality, and then to conform and develop yourself accordingly. It takes courage to confront and develop one's inner life, and above all to conform and develop that life to reality as it is.
We are most often cowards not because we make the effort to run away, but because we merely turn away—we turn our gaze from the truth about reality, both without and within, and act according to our willful ignorance.
Having so turned, we too easily recreate ourselves in our own preferred image by way of simplistic amputation, bifurcation, or cosmetic concealment. Over time, we each begin to live within a partial framework of habitual blindness or willful fantasy.
But whenever these fantasies are ripped away, we are again offered the chance to live rightly and well. To make ourselves stronger. We might choose not to do so, and retreat back into our caves. But to rid ourselves of these lies and illusions is a necessary first step.
