Letter Never SentTell me when to go.

possible? sure. likely? that's the real question.

the hardest thing about honesty is overcoming one's tendency toward self-delusion. when we're hardly ever completely honest with even ourselves, it's hard to imagine being microscopically honest with others.

I think I'm expressing a desire for understanding and a fear to be open.

I think if you really have a strong feeling of having things you want to confess but you think if you will it will be destructive, that something is probably wrong. But it could mean a jillion different things. For example, you could be maintaining relationships that aren't as firmly grounded in the truth as they should be, which would bring about such a feeling. On the other hand, you could be harboring unrealistic expectations about how intensely other people can be expected to know you and accept every part of who you are. There are lots of other possibilities too.

Mostly I would say that feeling like you can't show your real self to the people you're close to is a common and understandable thing to feel sometimes, and it's based on the fact that we all present a certain version of ourselves to others, which is not such a bad thing within reason. I think the problem is when the deficit between the person we share with other people and what we feel to be our true selves gets too big. Which could point to a problem with how you're presenting yourself (dishonesty) or a distortion in the way you see yourself (self-image problem).