Weakness Is A Choice

I really don’t care about celebrities. I just don’t. I can’t bring myself to actively care about who’s divorcing who or what who wore to whatever. Obviously, I think some celebrities are very talented or attractive or dress impeccably, but I have no interest in the goings on of their lives and frankly I’m disgusted by our society’s obsession with them.

That being said, I was made aware through social media that Lana del Ray made some comments in an interview that Frances Bean Cobain was not too fond of, because she felt that it glamorized and glorified the untimely, drug infested deaths of the entertainment business. If you aren’t familiar with the incident, feel free to get context here.

Someone wrote a lengthy and in my opinion ludicrous comment about sensitivity. This is the first half of it:

“He was sensitive…” Yes, he was. And so are a lot of other humans on this earth. Some cultures value sensitivity while others, like ours in America, devalues it and views it as a weakness with constant admonishments by the less sensitive that we, the sensitive ones (which, incidentally has a LOT to do with how our nervous systems are wired and not just a product of upbringing or learned behaviors/affectations), need to “toughen up,” “get thicker skins” or “quit being so sensitive.” Saying these things to a sensitive person is as ludicrous as telling someone short to grow taller or someone with cystic fibrosis to just knock it off.

We are all who we are…each and every one of us on this rock…and if all people would learn to be more patient and understanding of each other and our differences then maybe sensitive people, like Cobain, wouldn’t seek out the numbing effects of substances or the ultimate misguided “solution” of suicide because they would feel more supported and less isolated by society.

Growing up, I’d cry at the drop of a hat. I was extremely sensitive. My mother married my step father the summer before I started fourth grade, and he never, ever babied me or my emotions. He always told me that my tears meant nothing and that I would have to toughen up if I ever wanted to be anything. And you know what? He was fucking right. Naturally, over the years, I developed a spine. I learned how to suck it up. I learned how to hold myself accountable. I learned that I could hear an opinion about me without accepting it as true.

I’m absolutely exhausted with the bogus excuses and fairytale science that my generation likes to use to make their unwillingness to adapt and succeed seem like an inability. Unless there are special circumstances to be considered, everyone is capable of changing themselves. Life isn’t about disabling yourself it’s about proving to yourself that you are more capable and competent than you could ever imagine.

I believe that everyone should strive to be as kind and understanding as possible, but kindness is not ignorance and understanding is not coddling. To blame the world around a person for their own choices is to not only strip them of their agency but to patronize them.

In the words of Stephen Covey, “I am not a product of my circumstances I am a product of my decisions.”