A former colleague shared this article on Facebook today and a bell went off: this'll be my final blog entry for the month.
These are very common errors in perception, often misdiagnosed as character flaws.. Some of them I'm immune to, and always have been. Some of them are things I've overcome in my life. Some of them are very much still with me, and I'm trying to fight them.
Behold, TEN WAYS YOU ARE (or might be...) MAKING LIFE MORE DIFFICULT THAN IT HAS TO BE
1) YOU ASCRIBE INTENT...."Happy people do not do this. They don't ascribe intent to the unintentional actions of others."
This one plagued me through my teenage years. I was absolutely certain that every little slight (and I was very good at manufacturing slights) was not just intentional but pointedly aimed and fired at me. I don't do this anymore. It's exhausting, and I realized long ago that most people are just intent on living their own lives. It's also emotionally liberating to shrug bad things off, intentional or otherwise. Pain is real; suffering is optional.
2) YOU ARE THE STAR OF YOUR OWN MOVIE.
Uh, no I'm not. I kind of like to fade into the background. I can do stuff right up front if it's required, and I'm trying hard to summon the self-confidence to be a leader, even if only in my own life...but I've never been vain enough to think the world revolves around me.
3) YOU FAST FORWARD TO APOCALYPSE.
Guilty. I'm terrible for this. I'll start worrying and worrying and things will go wronger and wronger and wronger in my head until everything's gone completely to shit...and then I'll feel sheepish when my fevered imaginings prove to be so much chaff in the wind. And yet for some reason it doesn't stop me from doing it again next time. Every slight medical symptom in anyone *except me* is a sign of imminent death. A strange sound from the car is a sign it's going to blow up in less than three minutes.
If repeated apocalypses amount to less than a hill of beans, why do I keep doing this?
4) YOU HAVE UNREALISTIC/UNMET EXPECTATIONS.
Nope.. I don't have any. Not one. How many times have I said...if I say I love you, you don't have to say it back? If I write you, you don't have to write back, let alone immediately. That's not to say I don't care if I'm ignored: of course I do. But as I wrote in that blog, "a relationship based on needs will always fail."
5) YOU ARE WAITING FOR A SIGN.
It probably looks for all the world like that's what I've been doing, as stagnant as I was for a couple of years, there. But no: I don't believe in signs. Or rather, I believe we make our own signs. I do think that we create our own experiences, so if I tell the universe that I want something, that's exactly the experience that'll get thrown at me...wanting something. For a long time my contentness at the stability in my life was at war with my desire to change and grow. I'm learning those two things aren't mutually exclusive, and I'm overcoming my fear of rejection, and that's a sign.
6) YOU DON'T TAKE RISKS.
No, I don't, because they're risky, and according to #3 they'll blow up in my face spectacularly. Oh, wait a second, I'm supposed to take risks...oh, yeah. *slap*
7) YOU CONSTANTLY COMPARE YOUR LIFE TO OTHERS'.
As much as I'd like to say, pshaw, I don't do this...I do. It's mostly outward appearance. It drives Eva nuts that I have such a hangup on my own outward appearance, and that in turn bothers me because...
...well, look. I'm just not telegenic. Not physically attractive. Please don't think I'm fishing for you to say of course you are, because I don't need you to lie to make me feel better about myself. I AM NOT PUTTING MYSELF DOWN. I know I have more than enough qualities to compensate for my physical issues But people have to look below the skin to see them, and, and many, perhaps most people don't. I'm not talking (just) about love. Physically handsome/beautiful people do better in professional life, too.
Now, I've fixed the most glaring issue, my teeth, and getting these tattoos will help me walk a little taller. But Hugh Jackman I ain't, Nor am I Johnny Depp, or whoever your paragon of male attractiveness is. Not even close.
As far as comparing life paths, though, one poem I read in my OAC (grade 13) put that to rest permanently.
Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.
And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
'Good-morning,' and he glittered when he walked.
And he was rich - yes, richer than a king -
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.
So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.
--EDWARD ARLINGTON ROBINSON
(Interesting, I've always focused on the rich, admirably schooled part of that and ignored most of two stanzas about his appearance. Maybe beautiful people have problems of their own. Maybe I have one more big insecurity to root out.)
8. YOU LET OTHER PEOPLE STEAL (TIME) FROM YOU.
Not any more, I don't..
9. YOU CAN'T/WON'T LET GO.
I think this is related to #4. I don't have expectations in my life, but that doesn't mean there aren't consequences for emotional abuse or neglect. I probably cut more slack than I should, at times, but I can let go with the best of them. Friends can be in your life for any amount of time and serve their purpose. Some I would choose to keep indefinitely, but if that isn't their choice as well, in the name of love the best thing to do is to let them go.
10) YOU DON'T GIVE BACK.
Not enough. I try, on a personal level, with as many people as I can reach. But (confession) I have never volunteered my time anywhere. Until fairly recently I haven't felt bad about that: I always told myself that work and sleep and life in general took up all the time I had--but that's clearly bullshit, since people much busier than I was still found time to give time. No, it's even uglier than that. Volunteering is a job...a job that doesn't pay anything. They make companies pay people money to do jobs, but now there's an expectation that people do other jobs for free?
Ugly, ugly mindset. I need to work on this...
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