“Is it true; is it kind, or is it necessary?”― Socrates

I have this long time girlfriend that is such a sweet, giving person but has terrible taste in men.  I don’t think she knows her worth and keeps settling for much less.

Years ago I was very vocal about a boyfriend that she had.  To make a long story short, she took offense to some things I said to her and stopped speaking to me.

Eventually we started speaking again and she apologized. Since then she has had other boyfriends that I also didn’t think were good enough for her but I never expressed my opinion again.  She lives a couple of hours away so we don’t see each other often, but any chance I get I just make sure to tell her to put herself first.  

Fast forward to this past weekend when I was visiting her area and she was excited to introduce her new boyfriend.  She is still getting rid of a prior boyfriend and is immediately starting up with someone else.  A mistake in my opinion.  My advice to her and to everyone after a breakup is to be alone for awhile, focus on oneself. 

“Truth without love is brutality, and love without truth is hypocrisy.” ― Warren Wiersbe

I am happy for her excitement but I don’t think the new boyfriend is any better than the prior one.  I don’t want to go into detail here why I don’t think he is the right person for her.  I met him for 10 minutes and in that short time I think, as they say in Brazil, she is changing 6 for half dozen.  

Later she called to ask my thoughts about him.  I was not sure how to kindly tell her that I was not impressed.

How to tell the truth to someone that cannot handle the truth?  By truth, I mean my truth, the way I see, which can be wrong or right but it is my truth as I see it. 

One of the good traits and also bad trait of Aries is the brutal honesty.  I normally just tell it like it is.  But with age comes wisdom and I realized that I don’t have to always tell it like it is.  There are times that it is okay to be less than 100% honest.  

“The trouble with most of us is that we’d rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.”― Norman Vincent Peale

I keep wanting her to be alone for awhile and focus her love and energy on herself.  But I have said all of that before.  

This time when she asked my opinion I mentioned to her I didn’t want to say anything because of our past experience.  She said she was immature then and apologized for it again.  Still, this time I chose a more refrained honesty.  I said to her that 10 minutes was too short of a time to form an informed opinion of him.  I said it wouldn’t fair to judge him on that little interaction. 

I did, however, pointed out to her something he did that I had an issue with.  She promptly came up with 2 excuses for said action.  The fact that she made excuses for him tells me she is not ready to hear exactly what I think. 

She is excited, happy, full of renewed energy and making a lot plans.  I couldn’t put a damper on that. So this time I chose kindness instead of brutal honesty.  I felt those were my only choices.   I pray I am wrong and he is not another one to take advantage of her.

“Today I bent the truth to be kind, and I have no regret, for I am far surer of what is kind than I am of what is true.”― Robert Brault