This Is The Unedited Truth About What It Means To Be A Blunt Person

“At times I fake my enthusiasm. At others, I fear I am incapable of communicating the depth of it.”

– Maggie Nelson, Bluets

My biggest fear, as someone who is unabashedly blunt, is that the extent of my honesty will create a false sense of ease around the act of being so open. That this perceived effortlessness will diminish whatever feelings I find myself compelled to be so candid about in the eyes of whoever I’m sharing them with. Like they will be left with the impression I’m not capable of hurting or caring enough because the words make it out of my mouth intact. Like it can only be serious if it’s too hard to say out loud.

But I think the bluntest people are people who understand what it is to feel nothing. They know that being numb is worse than getting hurt. Give me sweet. Give me sour. Give me something so hot it burns my tongue. As long as I can taste it, whatever that may be. As long as I’m not trapped in a never-ending blandness. It is something you can lose yourself in – that wondering when the not-feeling will end. 

Because when a blunt person gets hit head-on by a speeding freight train of feelings, the impact cannot just be ignored. The contrast is undeniable. Suddenly there are feelings that don’t fall into the buckets of apathy, indifference, lethargy, and aloofness a blunt person knows so well. Suddenly there is something to say.

And a blunt person is too smart to not know how rare, how special it is to have anything to say at all. To feel something that is worthy of words. Words that make you nauseous in a way that your first reaction is to try and hold them down because they make the room spin, but also in a way you know that deep down, letting go is necessary. That spewing is the only way you’ll find relief.

Because at their core, a blunt person is the most genuine kind of person you will ever meet. What they occasionally lack in tact, they will make up for in honesty and loyalty. A blunt person will tell you when they fall in love, and when they fall out of it. Because a blunt person refuses to live in anything other than reality, and they would never subject anyone else to living a lie or even so much as a half-truth. They know it’s just not possible to sustain. 

They’ve tried to manufacture feelings in the past, tried to fake their way into caring about the somethings or someones that looked good on paper, and found that despite all their efforts, there was just nothing there. And the only thing worse for a blunt person than faking feelings, is to fake not having them. To pretend the feelings just don’t exist after acutely experiencing their absence for so long. This is a blunt person’s worst nightmare.

So tell the truth. Say it out loud to whoever needs to hear it, even if it’s just yourself, knowing full well that it will not change a thing other than allowing you to exist comfortably within your own skin. Fuck it up royally. Be fully transparent for no other reason than to leave the best version of yourself on the table before you walk away. Because you know it’s there. Because you recognize that something more that exists inside you now, if only because of the situation you find yourself in, and you cannot live with the version of yourself that decides to hold any of it back.

Because you know that for every blunt person, there is someone out there who knows how to recognize the truth when they hear it, immediately. Someone who values honesty just as much as you. Someone who knows just how much growth is required to be able to be honest with yourself, let alone others. Someone who sees the practice and preparation behind that final delivery, and knows there was nothing easy about it. Who knows some things are just so important they need to be said.

Good or bad, and always with love, they need to be said.