March 5, 2008

• fitting in

  I’m noticed lately that we’ve become more and more critical of one another when we vary psychologically from the norm.  There is this sort of expectation out there that we’re all supposed to be just so damn perfectly well adjusted
   with respect to everything. That you’re never supposed to be negative. That you’re never supposed to be self-critical, or filled with doubt, or angry or afraid or lonely or introverted or shy or wishy-washy or inconstant. You can’t be ashamed of yourself. You can’t be disgusted with yourself. You’re not allowed to feel devastated or hatred or repulsion.  Not even a little. Not even for one second. 

  That’s sort of the way it goes now. If someone sees a person going through something like that, there’s sort of this “Woah, stay away from that guy!” kind of an attitude. She’s got issues. Or he’s got problems. Or they’re just spreading too much negative energy. And so on and so forth.

  Here’s the thing though. I’ve never met anyone who didn’t on some level have these kinds of issues. I’ve never encountered anyone who didn’t have dark thoughts sometimes or who wasn’t filled with angst or melancholy or self doubt at least sometimes. So if we’re all supposed to avoid these people, who pray tell, are we supposed to be interacting with?

  Maybe you’re saying “Wait wait, they do exist. I know lots of people who are just perfectly fine and don’t have any problems.”  Well I’m a natural skeptic so you’re just going to have to show me these people and prove it to me before I believe you. Cuz I’ve never met one person. Not one single person for which this was even remotely true in all my long 28 years of life

  What I have encountered more often than I like though is people who are nearly perfect at pretending to be so. People who are just fully smiling masks of positivity and flawless masters of the perception of fitting in into every circumstance in which they engage without a hint of doubt or fear or shame or uncertainty.

  Yeah I’ve met people like that.

  And to tell you the truth. They scare the shit out of me.

  Because when really bad unexpected things happen to most people, they break. And it sucks sure. Hopefully it’s a clean break and it heals clean and true in short order. For some few and in some few specific circumstances, people instead shatter. And then it takes quite a while to put the pieces back together again.

  But these people? When the time comes, I don’t think they will either break or shatter. No. Their lifetime of pretenses will have created such a pressure system within them that when something finally breaks through their walls, it won’t be pretty at all. They will explode. And I fear for how many innocent bystanders will be caught up in the blast.

  It’s all absurd really. Why expect a society where we all hide of ourselves every vulnerability and weakness? Why should we want to live in a world where we all go through our daily lives as little smiling happy go lucky automatons only to more often than not go home to bed and cry ourselves to sleep at night? It’s quite irrational. But it seems sometimes to me that that is what we are pushing toward. 

  We want to live in that fantasy world. Rather than admit that everybody else has problems too.

  • 11:13 pm
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