Over the past few weeks, I’ve been planning for an upcoming trip to Colorado. Whenever I work on the computer, I listen to upbeat music. From gospel music, to 90’s and 2000’s pop, to KPOP and OPM, to trashy music. One band that came to mind while planning for my trip is 3OH!3. 303 (pronounced three-oh-three) is the area code of Denver and Boulder, where they come from. Despite the trashiness of 3OH!3’s greasy, upbeat music, I put their songs on repeat to get into a “proper state of mind” in planning for the trip.

After sharing their song “My First Kiss” with my girlfriend on how “my first kiss went a little like this 😘”, I reminisced the side of me that enjoys trashiness. From listening to blinged-out Southern rap to watching people dancing on a Walmart parking lot and over-the-top drama in the Maury Povich show, trashy content brings an amusement and laughter that helps me decompress (and perhaps lose some brain cells) from a long day at work.

Now why talk about trashiness 🚮? It’s because we often present ourselves to different groups of people with a different persona. We don’t swear as much at work or at church, but we swear to our closest friends. One time I called my friend while he was at work and he spoke formally with me for the first time. I joked with him afterwards that he didn’t swear while he was on the phone with me, to which he replied, “So you noticed? 😂”.

When I first joined a Catholic community, one of the topics presented discussed masks 🎭. A friend from the prayer group community even went as far to warn me about the masks people in the community wore to hide their brokenness. Of course, cracks inevitably showed up in the masks through social media, gossip, and spending time with those people for a long period of time.

One of the lessons learned in this journey is that the best mask to wear is no mask, where we show vulnerability. No masks mean people see us for who we truly are. Acknowledging those trashy aspects of us brings an authenticity that is often missing in today’s world of presenting ourselves with a façade of perfection.

We start wearing no masks through vulnerability. Vulnerability encourages showing a side of openness that most aren’t willing to show. And that side of openness is often enough for others to open up and share, creating a fun and engaging conversation.

That doesn’t mean that we tell people the stories of our lives when first meeting. Or start swearing while at church or at work. There is a time and place for swearing and sharing our trashy side.

The strongest friendships I’ve had were those where neither of us wore masks, showing vulnerability and accepting each other for who we are. Even though we don’t see or speak with each other for years, we easily pick up where we left off when we see each other because that bond of truly knowing each other remains. We reminisce our trashy sides in the past and share good laughs about them, because the trashy sides are funnier and more memorable than our “memories of perfection”!

And the friendships and relationships that sucked the most were those where there was little or no vulnerability. One of the most common interactions often went like this:

How are you doing?

Good.

(That is one way to suck the energy out of the room. The best reply to this is, “That sounds dull”. That’ll wake them up to be a bit more vulnerable 😉)

Even though I like to believe that I’m an embodiment of perfection and do my best to chase a semblance of perfection, none of this makes me relatable to others.

How often do we find ourselves feeling a bit worse after looking at Facebook and Instagram photos of people projecting their life highlights? I never told myself, “Wow! I feel great after a browsing session through social media!”

We often show our best sides, hiding the drama, struggle, and trashy parts behind it. Yet, we best connect and relate with others through our brokenness. This helps us attract the right people and repel the wrong people in our lives, which was key in my journey of dating.

Our brokenness and shortcomings are what make us human. We show compassion and support for each others’ shortcomings and journey to become better versions of ourselves. In this journey, we become less broken and our relationships become that much stronger and worth it. No masks required.

So yes, Noy Sauce will continue sharing his trashy side from time to time and listen to 3OH!3 when he visits Colorado 👌😎👌.

It’s all part of adding “flavor, dip by dip” to life.