"Saying the wrong thing" is an important belief of mine. Often we (and I leave it to you whether you are included in this "we") are afraid of upsetting others not because of compassion for them but because we don't want to be less than, imperfect, or weak. This is why so many people speak boldly or barely speak at all, and each path has its own internal bullshit where after a while, you start to believe the presentation as your truest self. Breaking out of that habit is the greatest freedom I've known or seen in others.
"I am afraid that this world is composed of truth and lies intermixed in such a way that I can not unravel or understand or trust or belong. Maybe I can only accept[.]"
I just posted about how absorbing information helps me to see the greater scope of reality in such a way that understaning, trust, and acceptance invariably follow. My seeds were planted by the Tao te Ching, but it comes down to words being labels and truth being only approximable. Improve your approximations well enough and you can see that all lies point to a truth. At least that's how it works for me.
"Would I have gone to a manipulative place with it? That would have made me a bitter person. [...] I look like I have integrity and grit because I don't understand how to comfort you. I try to comfort you by accepting your pain as a necessary part of this time in your life, and not fix it, and offer my presence or to leave you to feel it alone."
Pretty awesome that you recognize these things. :)
"I wonder a lot about whether I can ever train my skillset to approach normal enough that I can feel like I belong to this world. "
I believe a small change makes the greatest difference and can't help wondering if the only thing that makes you so different is that you became self-aware earlier than others and so your learning was much more conscious and cerebral than anyone else's. Whenever you talk about having to learn how people express themselves, how to read their expressions and voices, etc... those are steps most people have been through, but almost never with an awareness that they were learning it. The learning comes, then the meta. You got to the meta first and then filled in the learning with full awareness of how difficult and bizarre the whole process was. It was difficult and bizarre for all of us, but we were blessed with inattention of that fact most of the time.
"It makes me sad that I can never let myself be exceptional at any of the things I'm really good at because that would make me less human."
Humanity isn't about normalcy, it's about choice. Again, I point to your meta-levels of cognition and say that there have been plenty of humans who were exceptional at things, they just didn't make the same choice you did (if they recognized the choice at all). You have no choice about analyzing and interpreting the world around you: you can't shut that off and you accept it about yourself; but rather than exercise that on a project that would alienate most people, you chose to redirect it toward interpreting the people themselves, giving you conscious insight into what is subconscious and unchosen by most of us. That makes you remarkable in my opinion. Would you choose to do something more with it so others can recognize your insight with fame and wealth, or are you content to thrive quietly? There is no wrong answer unless it is wrong for you. Do you, oh great examiner, know why you make that choice?
"I think I used to have social anxiety disorder before I figured out that you're all big fakers who don't know how this stuff works much better than I do. Bravo."
Again, I want to point out that most people have been faking so long they've forgotten they were faking. That's why you're so powerful (and even frightening) to them (us?): you're the stranger on the corner who clearly saw Superman enter a phone booth and Clark Kent stumble out. You haven't done anything wrong, and there's no reason to believe you will, but the potency of what you know cannot be forgotten.
This is all just idle speculation. Sometimes I think you hate it when I try to figure you out, but I'm going to risk saying the wrong thing anyway. ;)
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2011-09-01 06:40 pm (UTC)"I am afraid that this world is composed of truth and lies intermixed in such a way that I can not unravel or understand or trust or belong. Maybe I can only accept[.]"
I just posted about how absorbing information helps me to see the greater scope of reality in such a way that understaning, trust, and acceptance invariably follow. My seeds were planted by the Tao te Ching, but it comes down to words being labels and truth being only approximable. Improve your approximations well enough and you can see that all lies point to a truth. At least that's how it works for me.
"Would I have gone to a manipulative place with it? That would have made me a bitter person. [...] I look like I have integrity and grit because I don't understand how to comfort you. I try to comfort you by accepting your pain as a necessary part of this time in your life, and not fix it, and offer my presence or to leave you to feel it alone."
Pretty awesome that you recognize these things. :)
"I wonder a lot about whether I can ever train my skillset to approach normal enough that I can feel like I belong to this world. "
I believe a small change makes the greatest difference and can't help wondering if the only thing that makes you so different is that you became self-aware earlier than others and so your learning was much more conscious and cerebral than anyone else's. Whenever you talk about having to learn how people express themselves, how to read their expressions and voices, etc... those are steps most people have been through, but almost never with an awareness that they were learning it. The learning comes, then the meta. You got to the meta first and then filled in the learning with full awareness of how difficult and bizarre the whole process was. It was difficult and bizarre for all of us, but we were blessed with inattention of that fact most of the time.
"It makes me sad that I can never let myself be exceptional at any of the things I'm really good at because that would make me less human."
Humanity isn't about normalcy, it's about choice. Again, I point to your meta-levels of cognition and say that there have been plenty of humans who were exceptional at things, they just didn't make the same choice you did (if they recognized the choice at all). You have no choice about analyzing and interpreting the world around you: you can't shut that off and you accept it about yourself; but rather than exercise that on a project that would alienate most people, you chose to redirect it toward interpreting the people themselves, giving you conscious insight into what is subconscious and unchosen by most of us. That makes you remarkable in my opinion. Would you choose to do something more with it so others can recognize your insight with fame and wealth, or are you content to thrive quietly? There is no wrong answer unless it is wrong for you. Do you, oh great examiner, know why you make that choice?
"I think I used to have social anxiety disorder before I figured out that you're all big fakers who don't know how this stuff works much better than I do. Bravo."
Again, I want to point out that most people have been faking so long they've forgotten they were faking. That's why you're so powerful (and even frightening) to them (us?): you're the stranger on the corner who clearly saw Superman enter a phone booth and Clark Kent stumble out. You haven't done anything wrong, and there's no reason to believe you will, but the potency of what you know cannot be forgotten.
This is all just idle speculation. Sometimes I think you hate it when I try to figure you out, but I'm going to risk saying the wrong thing anyway. ;)