The Exigent Duality
Bazinga! - 12:53 CST, 2/28/17 (Sniper)
I had a really profound thought hit me a few moments ago: maybe I'm not actually the one who is fucked up-- maybe everyone else is?

And no, this isn't psychological projection-- Lord knows I'm so absurdly self-aware that I would realize this projection in a heart-beat if I were doing it. My thinking is based on pure reflection of my past life's experiences. In fact, I think what's been going on with me has been reverse projection, where I've been ascribing other peoples' issues onto myself. And this is why therapy wasn't particular productive, why I still haven't been able to "solve" my anxiety through my own insights, why I can't fix my insomnia-- I've held and been treating the wrong theory!

It makes sense that I would reverse-project too-- I put a lot of pressure on myself to do the right thing, so when something goes wrong, I always point the finger at myself first. So if I'm unhappy, clearly it means that I'm fucked up, and that it has nothing to do with anyone else. I'm like the kid whose parents get divorced, and the kid blames himself! So I spend a year in therapy, and all the therapist can tell me after all of that time is that I'm anxious-- yes, that was his prognosis-- then it can't mean that there actually wasn't even a problem there to solve: no, it must mean that the problem is even deeper within me!

To explain this new theory further, let me start with this: the only place where I've ever fit in was elementary school. I'd always assumed that it was because I had issues, and the place had a warm and caring environment, so I felt happy there. But actually, I think the real reason was because I was dealing with children all day, in the form of my classmates!

Even to this day, I could spend all day around kids and not get tired or anxious. I like children-- bullies aside (I'll get to them in a minute), children are authentic and natural, and aren't trying to be someone else. They aren't constantly judging you. They just are.

But by the time children hit their teenage years, suddenly they are hormonal and irrational, they feel the compulsive need to fit in, so they start to pretend that they are someone they are not... and by the time they are full-on adults, they have so many neurotic issues from these pretensions, that they become jaded and cynical, unfriendly and skeptical, constantly judging and making assessments about others. And in America where I live, nigh-on half of them are on all manner of prescription anti-depressants and other drugs.

Now, take the case of bully children: these are kids where something has gone horribly wrong in their lives, and their emotional trauma has caused them to shift on the spectrum towards adulthood at a premature age. So essentially, very nearly all adults are bullies-- and in the case of child bullies, they are merely premature adults, and hence premature bullies.

So how does this relate to me? Well, since adulthood I have literally never fit in anywhere. Why? Because everywhere I go, the people-- adults-- are either totally irrational, self-absorbed and arrogant, judgemental, temperamental, cold and unwelcoming, or most often, some crazy conconction of all of those traits thrown together! Whereas, I'm still just a child-- in a good way! I'm authentic, and very sensitive-- just like I was when I was two, or six, or ten years old. I remember many times in my adult life where other adults have openly laughed at me, because I was so unguardedly exhuberant about something.

As I've aged, I haven't changed-- the people around me have! This is a profound realization.

So, what types of incidents happen over and over in my adult life, interacting with other, totally neurotic adults? Well, in Myers-Briggs terms, I'm a super strong INTJ, in that I read situations and patterns really well-- I tend to see things how they are. And when someone is being irrational, or a jerk, I am faced with a cross roads: do I call them out on it, in the hopes that they won't do that behavior any more? Or do I walk on egg shells, and interact with them in just such a way that they won't hurt me with their neuroticism?

When I call people out, it's a disaster-- like the gun control class incident that regular readers will recall (my brother is a first-hand witness to how friendly I was in the confrontation), or the time I called out a project manager at work, and she passive-aggressively and behind my back contacted my manager. People don't like to hear the truth-- and they react even violently when confronted with it.

But when I don't call people out, I feel like a punching bag-- subject to the whims of all of the jerks around me. And the difference between me and other adults, is that I never developed the cynical, spiteful, calloused layer around me, in the same way that children haven't yet-- so bad things tend to hit me right where it hurts, just like they do with kids.

It's no wonder that I find social interaction-- with adults, mind you-- so exhausting! And it explains why I have anxiety too-- I can't even drive to the grocery store, shop, and check out without being bludgeoned by other people flicking each other off as they drive, acting irrationally annoyed because some item or another is out of stock, a cashier being a crabby jerk because they forgot to take their Prozac that morning, and so on.

It's a catch-22, in that I don't know if there is a solution, other than to try to raise my kids so that they don't become adult bullies, and to try-- where I can-- to influence other parents to not raise their kids into bullies as well. Maybe that way and some day, there will be a critical mass of rational, authentic people? But then, aren't I dooming my kids to the same kind of hyper-sensitivity that I have, because they too won't have the "fuck everyone else" neurotic defense layer?