Fight or Surrender

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Fight or surrender. Grace comes either way. There comes a time when I feel I must speak. Forgive me, if you must, if it makes you feel better. I mean what I say, so I don't care for or need forgiveness. I stand by my words. They are my fight and my thoughts and my feelings. Above all they are mine. I decided long ago that I am entitled to think what I want and say what I want. If I offend, well... It's most certainly not intended. It may seem like I'm trying to spar, but I'm really just attempting to clarify my position. If that position isn't met well or happens to be misunderstood, it's far from my fault. Truly, the beauty and the disaster of the written word lies in it's misinterpretation. It's a hazard I know I may have to face every time I post something I've written. I don't want this to seem bad, but I don't care. I don't. Ask me to clarify and I will. Seethe and demand an apology and I just might tell you to go to Hell. Politely, of course, right after I thank you for reading my stuff.

I know it may seem surprising, but more often than not, I stay quiet. I do. I skip it. I surrender to whatever it is that needs surrendering to. I seldom fight. Outwardly anyway. Please don't mistake this for a lack of passion or opinion. Trust me that inside I know where I stand. Silence is just sometimes easier. Closed minds will think what they want and breath can easily be wasted. Besides, I piss off fewer people this way and get forgiven a lot less.

Sadly, these two positions don't combine well for the writer in me. I can either fight or surrender, write or not. In the past, I've tried my best to disguise the 'players'; I never name names unless I'm given permission. And even though, I generally write about global topics that stem from a specific incident, people still think they recognize themselves and get pissed. What's the problem? After all, no one knows it's them but them. Truly, I probably wasn't talking about 'them' per se, but an amalgam of many 'thems'. This means that I run the risk of having numerous people pissed at me about the same thing. Go me. Of course it occasionally works in my favor when I write something interpreted as 'good' and a bunch of people jump up and down telling everyone that was 'them' in Stacee's blog.

I've learned that the good and bad tend to even out. For everyone who's pissed about what I've written, a dozen others shout out 'Amen!'. This is when I know the risk is worth it. Still, sometimes I don't have the desire or energy to fight. In these moments, I choose to surrender and stay quiet. Fight or surrender, Grace comes either way.

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