Every Friday, Kate Motaung and writers across the web join Five Minute Friday for five minutes of writing on the word of her choice. There are no major edits, no second guesses, just five minutes to write. I join to grow as a writer. Here is this week’s Five Minute Friday. This week’s prompt: Tell.

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Has anyone ever told you something and it made you uncomfortable? Perhaps they started crying. Or maybe you started crying. The information was so atrocious. So horrible. So… difficult to swallow and you just wanted them to stop. Maybe they saw your discomfort and they did.

Let them tell you.

We have to start telling one another the truth about our lives. It’s when we don’t tell hat the internal destruction begins to occur. When we don’t tell the truth, we strive to cover up ourselves and begin to tell lies. We pretend our home is picture perfect and spend all of our energy striving to make it that way, when in reality we are dying inside from the truth.

I do it, too.

But when we tell the truth, the lie no longer has power over us. When we tell the truth and allow others to tell the ghastly, uncomfortable truth, then hope and healing can begin to take place, whatever that may look like.

Let them tell the truth.

Let them tell you they are depressed.

Let them tell you they feel like a bad mother.

Let them tell you their husband doesn’t love them.

Let them tell you their children have disabilities.

Let them tell you they hate themselves.

Let them tell you they harm themselves.

Let them tell you they or their spouse views porn.

Let them tell you they are ashamed.

Don’t dismiss it. Don’t try to make the bad feelings go away. Let them tell you.

And then tell them the truth.

They are loved.

They are cherished.

They are children of the God Most High.

They can seek healing. Healing is possible with God.

Others will help them.

Addiction does not have to win.

Depression does not have to win.

Hate does not have to win.

Let them tell you.

Note: I love Five Minute Friday, because it gets my writing juices going. But sometimes it is just not enough. I would have said so much more than just these words in Five Minutes. Please engage me!
What do you think? Why is it so hard to let people speak their hurts and struggles? Why do we feel we need to either comfort them with truisms or change the subject or immediately jump to ourselves?