Being Brutally Honest Made People Label Me As An Asshole

There comes a time when being brutally honest to others can make you look and seem like an asshole. I've been there time and time again. It's also not a good feeling. I've struggled with defending myself after being brutally honest with loved ones, coworkers, strangers, and even friends. I have also had moments after just being truthful with someone that I then apologized and tried to sympathize with that person out of empathy. I wasn't always someone who just spilled my truth to someone at all. 

Photo by Etty Fidele on Unsplash

As an adolescent, I use to hold back speaking up for myself. People use to tell me so many mean and hurtful things that just crying about it no longer validated how hurt I used to feel. It took me years to muster up the courage to stand in my own validated truth. 

Today as a black woman in my late 20's I'm now learning how to pull back from being too transparent with others. I am now scaling back with doing hair care product reviews on my YouTube channel in many ways. I'm no longer going approach giving honest feedback or given constructive criticism as something that may be taken lightly.  

Everyone has different levels of constructive criticism that they choose to handle and respond too. Even in my personal life, I have lost friendships and relationships behind talking as if I had my shit all together or figured out. I've also had many of these same situations in my marriage. 

My mouth has gotten me in a lot of trouble and has taught me many valuable lessons throughout the years. In those sad ass moments of feeling like an asshole for just speaking my sometimes invalidated opinions, I picked myself up from having an invitation-only pity party. I learned that I must be gentle and compassionate with my approach to transparency. 

I can not control how others feel or respond to my opinion. However, I can control how I project my thoughts and feelings about something or someone without invoking any negative energy upon others from my words. 

Have you ever struggled with being brutally honest? If so, how have you coped with it, or you just embrace it? Do you consider others' feelings before saying something that might hurt them?