holes, scratches, patches and painting

I’ve painted a lot over this past year. Since we moved into my wife’s grandfather’s apartment, there were pictures and decor still hanging up from after he passed away. We removed those things and what was left were holes and scratches on the walls.

Some holes were tiny, the size of nails, while other holes were huge, left due to things like a physical landline being removed from the wall.

Before I started painting, I had to patch each hole. I’m not a contractor so I imagine I could’ve done better at any of these tasks but I found filling the hole particularly difficult.

The putty is sticky and doesn’t fill the hole as you’d think. It’s more like a general smear. I always put too much so there’s often a small mound left over that looks like a speed bump on the wall.

Once it dries, I paint. Even when I tried to paint over the speed bumps and fill the holes, you could still see the patch work covering the hole. Again, probably my fault but it did get me thinking.

Holes in walls are big traumas we must fill since it’s a compromise and void of our foundation as a self. Marks on the walls are bad habits and little hurts that can be covered and undone through unlearning and relearning.

Holes

“Trauma is being powerless to establish a boundary between yourself and that which is about to or already begun to inflict serious harm or even death” as Jim Finley says. This word has become a buzzword in recent years and it’s important to name the extremes in which it’s interpreted.

On one hand, we never want to minimize the true and long-lasting impact that harm and pain causes, leading to a more permanent suffering state. We are finally coming to accept as a society how people’s actions really do have detrimental effects that need to be named and owned up to. You may know some people who still outright deny these which can feel frustrating and disheartening. Trauma is real and it has more impact than you could ever imagine.

On the other hand, we don’t want to inflate our illusions of what we allow the pain to become, based on the desire to be justified and accepted in who we are in our experience of the painful event. Things like ‘trauma bonding’, ‘gaslighting’, ‘narcissism’, and ‘toxic (insert noun)’, are all over-generalized and non-clinical terms for the every day person to assume an understanding and usage of these phrases without a non-power or true justice driven motivation.

Holes are deep, unforeseen gaps, impacts and damage to the foundation of our lives. They are dark, hidden and often not seen fully for what they are. It’s not until you go to fill the hole that you realize the true shape and essence of it.

Some of us leave our holes unfilled. Living in despair and emptiness. Some of us fill it with paint. The quick fix, sloppy choices of trying to fill the void as soon as possible. Others of us take the more appropriate and extensive route of doing it right by filling the holes with the proper material. Allowing for a restoration to our foundation.

This way of doing things doesn’t ignore or deny what’s happened but rather, allows a future state in which the hole doesn’t appear nor effect the foundation in the way that it used to.

This work tends to be more lengthy, abstract and tedious by revisiting the same holes over and over until our patchwork is just right enough to properly paint over it.

Scuffs and scratches

These are the less intense and impact choices we make and what’s done to us. It’s the name calling, hurtful reminders of the past that create smaller impacts on our foundations. These are inevitable. Some of us feel an immediate need to ‘cover up’ and paint over these wounds. We don’t want people thinking we’re human or anything crazy like that. We hurriedly paint over these soon after they happen. Others of us think nothing of them.

This can stem from an apathy or a hopeless than our walls aren’t “that bad” and who cares if they have a few scratches? It’s important to note when these scuffs and dings occur and to address them in a timely manner. While they’re certainly not holes, they’re also not nothing. If you’ve ever seen a beat up wall with a ton of scratches, you have to wonder how good of care the owner of the house is taking.

Patching and painting

Patching is done through psychotherapy, deep reflection, returning often to the same major sources of our issues. It’s not always the immediate fix but it’s essential to fixing before you can finish the job. It’s sticky, and takes re-filling the hole until it’s filled adequately with the proper healing substances.

Painting is done through psychotherapy, conversations with friends, light reflection and more immediate conflict resolution. It’s shorter term and shouldn’t be over-addressed. It’s more immediate and clear as to how to fix it. It takes an intentional yet brief act. It’s more like a unlearning and relearning process of more linearly understanding the wrong and seeing how to make it right.

The work we do on ourselves is not easy. We must come to the realization that it’s a lifetime of work with no ‘breaks’. Yet, paradoxically, we can find rest and restoration within the work.

Your home is your home. Take care of it. Do what you need to do to properly restore it to it’s original form. It’s worth it not just for you as the one living in it but also for those who visit it as well.

When people see the insides of who you are, the essence of your life, what do they see? How do they feel when they see it? We’ve all walked in to or seen beautiful homes, well decorated and taken care of, that truly take our breathe away. We long to live in these types of homes and use them as inspiration for our own.

What if you took the time do the same with your own life? To patch the holes, to paint the scuffs. To make your life beautiful, worth living in and proud of visiting.

Questions

• What are the holes in your life?

• What are the scuffs?

• What painting and patching practices can you do to address these issues?

Quotes

• “The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned”- Maya Angelou

• “Love begins at home” - Mother Teresa