You Must Have Confused Me With Someone Else

I do not bully people…anymore. I used to do it all the time, and like all people who bully others, I convinced myself that I enjoyed it, but the truth is that I was a bitch, and it was an ugly side of myself that I didn’t like then, and like even less today.

“If they don’t like you for being yourself, be yourself even more.”― Taylor Swift

Most of the people that I bullied were guys, and it was usually because I had a reason, but never once did that make it okay. I have a ton of excuses, I was angry, I was broken, blah blah blah. The absolute truth was that ten years ago I didn’t know how to regulate my emotions, and very rarely did I know how to regulate my mouth.

I’m doing much better now, and I am a nicer person because I choose to be a nicer person because I know what it feels like to have people make fun of you for not being able to speak in a way that they are comfortable with.

I spent more than twenty-nine years trying to imitate people around me so that I would fit in, and they wouldn’t see my deep-seated insecurities, and all it did was turn me into something I absolutely despised.

The very, VERY, few people who saw the real me, really don’t know me either, because the person THEY know, compared to the person that everyone else THINKS they know, are two totally different people, and somewhere in the mix of all the pretending, is the real Devon J Hall screaming “hey assholes, I’M A FREAKIN TREE!”.

If Anna Kendrick can be a monster I can be a friggen Tree, that’s the rule.

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
― Maya Angelou

I want to leave this earth, not giving a fuck what people think of me. I WANT to do that, but I also want to know that when I am gone, people felt like their existence mattered to me.

There are people that OTHER people think I should hate, that I love with all my heart, and people that OTHER people think I should love, that I can’t friggen stand. But at least in that small arena, I get to choose who I love. I get to choose how I am loved now.

I spent years, and yes, and yes of my life, being locked away in my own brain, genuinely hypnotized by abuse, by trauma, by trauma bonds that it took more than thirty years to break, to walk away from and burn the fuck down on my way out. Some of those bonds I hold onto with everything that I have because I KNOW why some of my abusers became abusers. We were trained – genuinely – to become the people we did.

Each of us is fighting past those bonds and that trauma in our own ways, but the one thing that remains constant is that none of us want to have the kind of lives filled with the words “I fucking hate you, people,” and yeah I say that shit a lot. I am still so angry, I am still so bitter about everything that was stolen from me and I am working on it.

But here’s the difference between those of us who genuinely love – even when we’ve been hurt, and those who love to hurt.

We try. We get up every single day that we are able and we make an attempt to be better, stronger, better, smarter, and faster. We don’t give up on finding and giving love where we are able, and we choose to act with kindness and respect, instead of cruelty and trauma.

Leaving my old life behind was a shock to my system. I didn’t have to be mean anymore. I didn’t have to be surrounded by people who were very much like I was, playing a role in order to survive, without getting paid compensation that made up for everything that we were giving up or throwing away in order to get 1 more day on this planet.

I no longer had to pretend, I could just be Devon, and in finding that out…I have now developed an obsession, with being MYself, not the self OTHER people want me to be.

“I was surprised, as always, by how easy the act of leaving was, and how good it felt. The world was suddenly rich with possibility.”
― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

There are days when I KNOW I have to check myself, and I have to ask”was I in the wrong there?” and a lot of times the answer is yes, and other times the answer is no. “No, you weren’t, you were on the right path.”

Lately, I’ve been walking away from situations that push me past what I am capable of handling. Oh, you’re going to interrupt me and not let me speak during a live stream? I’m going to leave, because if you refuse to give me the chance to speak, then I am going to refuse you the opportunity of my time.

You’ve invited me to be vulnerable, but MY vulnerability scares you? Then I am out. Peace out my loves, wish you all the best, hope it works out for you, but this is not the place for me. You can do all these things, you can walk away without being mean or cruel, but you have to decide if you’re walking away because you’re scared, or if it’s because you’re tired of the bullshit.

I was and continue to be tired of the bullshit. If you think that I am someone who’s going to sit back and be silent while you remain cruel and awful, if you think I am going to talk behind your back, or if you think I am going to stab you in it, then no we can’t be friends. If you want genuinity, if you want kindness, laughter, joy, and mutual support, I am here for all the things, but I won’t waste my time. I haven’t gotten enough left.

Sending all my love,

Devon J Hall