disclosure / remorse. how often can you truly be open with your friends? a popular game to play is to ask your friends how much they think they know you, or vice versa. often, the percentage quoted is around sixty or seventy. some people go as high as ninety, leaving little to no room for surprises. which isn't a bad thing, because what do you have to hide from true friends? best friends? but i find that sometimes, people aren't ready or willing to talk about what they really think. the literally millions of little thoughts that they bury because they don't want to face ridicule, judgement, or just general grapevine-ness. i mean, for me personally, do you have any idea how many little things i don't bother to say just because i don't want people to know that this is what i really think? and this doesn't encompass "mean" things or "bad" things. but things that will really change the perception of someone towards you/me.

is it fear that holds people back from full disclosure? does anybody need to know another person that well? should we hold nothing back? there is a certain freedom to letting someone hear your every thought, i'd imagine. i can name maybe two people that i'd -- at times hesitatingly -- even consider letting know certain things. and these aren't deep dark secrets, but maybe motivations, plans, insecurities, or general schemerisms. of course, nobody is as clever as they think they are. so friends who've known you for a long time have already generally figured you out and know more about you than you'd like to think they do. but still.

i've always, maybe subconsciously, kept a policy of telling more to the people who are further away from my normal group of friends. don't mix business with pleasure they say. and staying honestly expressive is a business, if you are inclined to hold back as much as i am.

and oftentimes, in expressing something, you're already diluting or twisting it, thus making what you're saying not match up to what you're actually thinking. which makes it all sort of pointless.

and who can keep up with all of those little thoughts anyway? it's a struggle to document it yourself, much less document it and share it with any sort of efficiency or clarity.