The astrology this week is asking a question: what is your relationship to truth? It seems like such a simple and obvious question at first, but there are many ways we compromise that relationship, with various levels of awareness.
Take, for example, the cultural imperative to ‘try to be nice’ — which often amounts to just being passive in place of being clear, direct and honest. And then when problems arise because the other person doesn’t ‘get it’, it’s that person’s fault for overstepping boundaries or ‘pushing’. It’s rarely seen to be the fault of the person who avoided clear honesty in favor of ‘being nice’.
People of both genders do it, but I’ve particularly noticed this self-defeating dynamic in women (including myself at times) when a man whom they’re not attracted to expresses interest. Maybe he’s a little too persistent; maybe he’s just lonely and socially awkward. But if all you keep saying is, ‘I’m busy that night’ when he asks you to a movie, can you blame him if he still has hope?
And if he continues to act on that hope, to the point where you feel uncomfortable in social situations, what is the more honest course of action: to ask friends and authority figures to exclude him for your protection because you think he’s ‘creepy’, or to let him know, clearly but compassionately, that you are not interested in dating him — but surely someone else will be?
That illustration is gender-weighted in one direction, but really, most of us get caught in the trap of ‘just trying to be nice’ at one time or another. Some make it a way of life, and find themselves pulled by guilt and obligations into all kinds of contortions and ‘white’ lies. We hate to feel ‘mean’, but often forget that the alternative can be much more cruel.