The curious comfort of contradiction

There’s a line from the film Two Hands that has always stayed with me:

“If you’re going through some sh*t in your life, chances are somebody else has gone through the same thing before ya. And they’ve written about it. Some poet or philosopher has been through the same type of crap, and they’ve written about it. And when you find that poem or piece of writing, you think bloody hell, this bastard has just summed it all up. It’s kinda comforting, know what I mean? Something that’s good can still have a little bit of bad in it, and something that’s bad still has a little bit of good.”

Two Hands shifted something. It introduced me to a different way of seeing the world. It showed me that stories, especially the gritty or imperfect ones, can hold truths in unexpected places. For me, it was more than a film; it was a collision of art, music and emotion that stuck. It also introduced me to Powderfinger, Heath Ledger and Rose Byrne, and to the idea that stories could be raw, funny, uncomfortable and deeply real all at once.

Art, in any form, tends to hold up a mirror to its moment in history. Sometimes it calls out what is not socially acceptable, at the time to name. Sometimes it introduces concepts, changing the way experiences may be perceived. At times it acts as propaganda, shaping collective belief. At others, it simply reminds us that life can be experienced in more than one way, all at once.

Alanis Morissette sang Hand in My Pocket and Ironic, and I felt as if she was peeling back the surface of what I had learned to keep tidy. Exploring what it means to be human in real time. One hand in her pocket, the other flashing a peace sign. Not resolution, but coexistence. Hope and hurt. Courage and doubt. Flaws and worthiness living side by side.

Meredith Brooks, I’m a Bitch, felt like a continuation of that conversation. She wasn’t apologising or asking to be understood. She was curious about her own contradictions. Sweet and sharp, soft and fierce, all in the same breath. The stereotypes carried for centuries, the tidy binary of Madonna or a Madame. As though we must choose between purity and power, softness and strength, approval and autonomy.

Those labels once served as boundaries, and in many ways, they still echo through culture today. What about the middle space, the one where we are both and neither.

Like music and arts through the ages, songs may be considered soundtracks of their time; and reflections of people learning to hold more than one truth at once. Inviting listeners to question the idea that identity needs to be neat. What if being complicated wasn’t a flaw but a form of honesty?

Maybe strength isn’t about certainty. Maybe it’s about staying open in the middle of the blur.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re too much, too messy, or too layered to fit anywhere, maybe you’re already enough. Because something that’s good can still have a little bit of bad in it, and something that’s bad can still hold a little bit of good.