The Road Less Traveled | Repression | Issue #22
A weekly newsletter for those in pursuit of continuous growth.
“Repression is my heaven, but I’d rather go through hell.”
- Zach Bryan | Song: “From Austin”
“Just rip it off.”
Something everyone reading this heard as a child from an adult. Whether it be from a nasty burn from sliding into second base or a scuff on the knee from a crash on the bike you just took the training wheels off of.
At one point in time, we all have found ourselves conducting painstaking non-invasive surgery to remove that one band-aid that seemed to have the adhesive properties of welded steel. While all of our attempts were made with meticulous attention to detail, as we got older, wiser, and our threshold for pain grew stronger we realized,
Our parents were right…
It is almost as if we see our past pain and mental anguish as a living creature. One that we try our best to appease and not startle. We speak softly around it. Cower in its presence even, and every so often when we garner enough courage to approach it, we poke it with a stick, and when it inevitably moves we run away as humanely as possible and revert to the state of repression we feel safest in.
Half the battle is choosing to fight it. Outrunning your demons doesn’t beat them, it simply makes you too tired to fight once you come toe to toe with them. It might not be today, nor tomorrow, but one day.
The Zack Bryan quote I began this issue with sums up in 10 words, a question that all of us will one day have to find the answer to…
“Is the devil you know truly better than the one you don’t?”
We will all know hundreds if not thousands of people in this life, even those we know and love, who will spend decades in a hypnotic trance of Stockholm Syndrome* to their current “Devil”. They will neglect to ever truly address, and will even ignore completely, the seemingly immovable obstacle life threw in the way at one point in time that has halted them from pursuing becoming the best possible version of themselves. The version of themselves that their spouses, siblings, mothers, fathers, and children deserve to meet. All because they have grown comfortable with the pain issued by “the Devil they know” and fear what “the Devil they don’t” has in store for them. This is why I have said numerous times over the years that 99.9% of people are not after maximal joy but rather minimal disappointment. We get to what we deem is an acceptable level of comfort for the pain we have endured and throw our ambitions out the window in favor of appeasing “the devil we don’t”. If you relate to “Repression is my heaven” just know you have been deceived. Repression is a purgatory to which we dictate our own sentences. We are the judges, guards, and wardens of our self-induced imprisonment in a wasteland of infinite untapped potential. Oh, you want an example?
Exhibit A: Good Will Hunting (ie. my favorite movie ever)
A story of a boy genius from an impoverished south Boston neighborhood with a rap sheet as extensive as the day is long and a medical record to match from the abuse he endured at the hands of those who were supposed to care for him.
Over the course of the two hours you indulge in watching this masterpiece, you begin to realize the effects of repression on a person who by all accounts has limitless potential. Someone who has a ticket to go places no one from his environment had ever been and still fights the urges and impulses to stay in the environment he has grown familiar with. To stay with “the Devil he knows”. You watch Will as pain repressed for years begins coming to the surface with the help of this therapist, Sean, played by Robin Williams. You witness the toll that is taken on Will’s ability to develop interpersonal relationships through his lack of vulnerability and his propensity to sabotage healthy additions to his life due to the fear of being hurt in the same way he was abused by the individuals who were supposed to care for him as a child. Robin Williams' character sees through this and despite Will’s attempts to push him away, he stays. He remains present.
(SPOILER ALERT)
In the climax of the movie where Sean (Robin Williams) confronts Will about his trauma, Will’s repression makes a final last-ditch attempt to push him away until four magic words are spoken that cut through the calloused mind of the young Will Hunting…
“It’s not your fault.”
What happens next is Will’s departure from his purgatory. He gets in his beaten-down Chevy Nova gifted to him by his “brothers” and turns his headlights west to take a leap of faith to “see about a girl” and follow his complicated love affair, Skylar, to California.
What does this represent? Ripping off the band-aid.
Does everything work out in Will’s story? No one knows. However, it shows his willingness to risk meeting “the devil he doesn’t know”. If there is anything I have learned in this life it is that love and grief go hand in hand. Grief is merely the byproduct of love, and spending every waking moment trying to control and mitigate potential grief and disappointment based on past pain, you will only deprive yourself of the naturally occurring ecstasy and joy this life has to provide.
“Neglecting to try due to fear of failure is to ensure the outcome you claim to be trying to avoid.” - Conner Furu
I am not telling you to hop in your car and drive somewhere you have never been and start a new life, however, what I am telling you is to begin the process of addressing the demons that have gone unchallenged in your psyche for who knows how long.
Once you rip off that band-aid, who knows where this life will take you? Or better yet, where will you, take you?
God Bless,
- Conner Furu | @conner_furu (IG)
*(Stockholm syndrome is a proposed condition or theory that tries to explain why hostages sometimes develop a psychological bond with their captors.)