For the sake of politeness, you may not always say what you are thinking. You want to be kind, and you don’t know how to be nice and also say what you really think. This may be a conflict for you. You don’t want to be rude, and you also don’t want your feelings left by the wayside.

For those of you who find yourself equivocating, life in the world, life is too short to forgo your own feelings by putting other people’s feelings ahead of your own. You don’t have to play the line of least resistance. You do not have to belie yourself and say what you think other people want you to say. You do not always have to acquiesce to what others want from you or to what you think they want.

Of course, if you are out in public, and your friend asks you how you like the dress she is wearing – she is wearing it, after all, so, yes, be discreet. Even if don’t like the dress on her, say something you really do like, like the color.

However, where how you feel impacts you and your life, what makes you think you have to beat around the bush? If you wish not to participate in something, you don’t have to. Say what you feel. For how long will you evade saying what matters to you? For most of your life on Earth?

First of all, other people are not made of glass. You don’t have to tiptoe around. There is no percentage in it. Or the percentage to you may be only dissatisfaction with yourself and your friend down the road.

I understand you want to be gentle. At the same time, you can be honest.

To be a straight talker when it matters isn’t rude. It is honest. It is simply stating what you feel. Are you not entitled to state what you feel as much as anyone else?

I understand your desire to be kind. We are not speaking of rudeness. We are speaking of your saying what you honestly feel. Because someone is happy with something a certain way doesn’t mean you have to be happy with it when it concerns you. Conceding to others’ feelings can only go so far.

In the same way, some others tend to go roughshod over other people’s feelings. They may go roughshod over your feelings.

Some of these instances that you experience that cause you a certain amount of heartache whatever you do may indeed result from your having beaten around the bush too long. You missed opportunities to say what was yours to say. You put your honesty aside. What you conveyed was obscure, perhaps dishonest. You overlooked yourself.

Absolutely, be a straight talker. What does being agreeable amount to when, in your heart, you are not agreeable? What is so wrong about your saying something like the following long before a crisis erupts:

“You know, I look at this situation in a different way.”

This isn’t unkind. It is honest. You are open for discussion. To have thoughts and feelings in the open is a good thing. It is a natural way of dealing in life. Many of My children may have stifled this naturalness in exchange for pleasing.

Your decisions in life are not all based on kindness or unkindness. When a sales clerk happens to give you the wrong change, you speak up. Is there anything wrong with that?

Why would you give your perspective away out of a mistaken consideration for others’ perceptions? If truth be known, you give your truth away to save your own feelings. You just like to think you are the good guy, yet, in dealing with friends as We speak of here, you may be as good as a provocateur keeping secrets. Keeping secrets and appeasing others is no favor to anyone. The act of keeping secrets is like pulling the wool over someone’s eyes.

Given a choice – and you do have choice – in too many circumstances, pulling the wool over someone’s eyes is unkind, and being truthful is kind.