#tragic comedy

Jacob Lee - Tragic Comedy

"Stencils and needles and ink Covered up all the scars that I wore A decoy designed on my skin Until I wasn't me anymore" - We tend to shy away from openly showing our scars, thinking of them as something shameful or as something that might be used against us. It's natural, who would want to have a chance in getting hurt. We cover them up more and more with hopes that they won't be there one day, that we'll burry them so deep that nothing of them will remain. But we have that attitude with many things, not just scars, but with perceived flaws as well. I ain't perfect, not even great by a long shot, yet I am the person I am and try to make best with the hand that I've been dealt. Our scars, same way our flaws, are not something we should shy away from. They might not be pleasant but they are there, they are part of us. We should learn from them, learn to deal with them and live with them. Both, the scars and the flaws, will come out at one point or another, so be fine with them existing. You are you, you are great and enough, but there always is a room for growth and betterment. As Tyrion said in Game of Thrones:  "Never forget what you are. The rest of the world will not. Wear it like armor, and it can never be used to hurt you," and I just think that fits so well in topic of covering your scars and flaws.

"If it's weakness, I've achieved it If it's sorrow, I deceived it If these colours were my feelings Then my blood is black for a reason" - We are our own worst enemy and the harshest critic, gladly tearing ourselves down when we feel inadequate, covering our own feelings and emotions for many different reasons, deceiving ourselves. No feeling or emotion will disappear if we cover them, they still be there just gnawing at us from the inside. Same way when we tear ourselves down with criticism. We might see that as normal, as fine, "I'm just talking to myself", but reality is that the inner 'I' hears us and we end up beating ourselves up for real not just as a way of coping. Be nicer to yourself, inner 'You' is always listening and slowly reacting to all that. We naturally associate certain colours with certain traits, feelings or emotions even without us delving deeper into the colour theory. While black is not usually associated with something good, I think that to certain extent people with black blood aka someone that might be not really a sunshine personality, tend to have such a bright light in them that if shown can be really blinding in a positive way. Most are just hurt, defensive or misunderstood really, but given the chance they can and they will shine if the trust you.

"Would you show me Which of my wounds made you loathe me? Which of my flaws hurt you mostly? All of these faults, yet, you chose me" - It is easy to go looking for our flaws or wounds that might have influenced or hurt others even when our flaws have nothing to do with it. Sometimes we focus too much on them and project that outwards that we are nothing but flaws and wounds, and because of them we can't possibly be loved or that if we are we will, because of them, destroy what connection or love we have. That is inherently fatalistic approach and in attempt to run, to "save" the other person from these our wounds and flaws we actually end up projecting it all and pushing those people away when in reality they did not care for any of that, that it all was perfect for them the way it was, that we were perfect in their eyes. We essentially create a self fulfilling prophecy that had no place to be in the first place. Weirdness about love is that we tend to feel ourselves not worthy when we have plenty of "bad" things in us, be it wounds, flaws, and anything else, yet that is so only in our own eyes. True love, and I mean true one, not the one that is mostly just 'I like them', which we often times confuse with love, tends to be blind to those things we might don't like or hate about ourselves, and I do not mean it in a toxic way. I do like the quote of Hermann Hesse in this regard, and I do agree with it: "When you like someone, you like them in spite of their faults. When you love someone, you love them with their faults." Do not deny yourself love because of fear, feeling of lacking, possible pain or flaws. Love is one hell of an energy that helps us actually heal, that helps us grow and become more and better version of us. Do not wait till you become 'adequate', you'll be waiting till you end up in the ground. Live now.

"Still expose me Peel off my skin, oh, so slowly You'll find a boy, oh, so lonely He is why you couldn't know me" - We hide ourselves under layers and layers of various things, characters, masks, hiding the real us. And by hiding the real us behind so many layers we tend to forget to actually develop it, to be in sync with it. Sometimes we can slowly expose ourselves more and more by ourselves, sometimes we need some help and sometimes we just have to do that so that things would work out for us with someone, for if we share a connection with someone through mask and without any input from the real us, then how real it really is? If we base our connections on or through characters we play then how much of that is genuine and for how long can it actually live? Once we start peeling layers off, like peeling off skin, we might reach the real us that we hid long time ago, still a kid that we didn't develop really and were not in sync with. How can you open up and help someone know you if you do not know yourself, if you have kept yourself lonely and hidden from yourself? We learn to know ourselves through interacting with ourselves as much as we learn from interacting with others. So don't hide yourself from others and especially yourself, don't be foolishly open to everything and everyone, but do not hide as well. Find your voice, the longer you wait and keep it hidden the harder it will be to find it, but it is worth it.

*Chosen are just the parts of the lyrics that speak to me the most at the current point of time, they are, however considered in the full context of the song. Thoughts are my own. Interpretation of the song and meaning put into into the lyrics and their interpretation is purely subjective*

hangi yaralarım benden tiksinmene sebep oldu ?

seni en çok hangi hatalarım incitti ?

bunca hataya rağmen beni seçtin

yine de gör beni

maskemi çıkar, öylesine nazik

bir çocuk bulacaksın, öylesine yalnız

“Look what I became My tragic comedy Did I entertain? Aye aye Covered in mistakes Honestly, honestly I am just a fake, fake“

For a moment, we contemplated the possibility of stepping away from the relentless agony of rolling that boulder, from the archetype of eternal struggle. What if we could embrace something more chaotic, more unpredictable...yet somehow, less agonising?

But then, in a twist of fate that only the universe could find amusing, someone asked, “Can I be Oedipus?”