starting over

[sanmagic7]

feeling better today.  as someone in my other journal wrote, i'm not doing it wrong, just doing what works best for me.  also talked w/ my D about it, and she's never felt like she fits in here, either.  it's true, i don't often hold the same life values as others here - i'm much more curious, more likely to be adventurous, less trendy/more comfortable, more accepting of my body, especially in public.  stuff like that.  free spirit and mostly unconstrained.  i've been told people are jealous of that, envious of how i've lived.  intimidated by me, even, cuz they can't see a pattern when it comes to my words or actions. 

it's just difficult at times, to be thrown back into the midst of that mindset when i'm around others.  i was raised very conservatively, my cousins are extremely conservative, and i'm just not.  i haven't been around very many of those kinds of people for a long time, and it kind of took me by surprise, i guess.  i just don't like feeling judged.

when my D and i were talking, she brought up the incident of meeting my cousin.  my D was playing her video games online w/ others - something she does every day as part of her routine and part of her way to socialize and relax her brain/mind. so, that's what she was doing when i introduced them, and my cousin immediately said 'how old are you?'.  my D was quick, and said 1002.  the next day i realized how very disrespectful that was of my cousin, in that tone of voice.  to me, a very limited world view, one that isn't very accepting.

families . . .

[sanmagic7]

it's been a while.  been sick w/ stress flu, it's only just beginning to get better.  still not walking right, tho.

this thing w/ my cousins has really knocked me for a loop.  have gotten so very tired of feeling like an outcast or some kind of fruit loop just because i see or do things differently than what 'they' might consider 'normal'.  when i went for the visit, one of them said - o, you're wearing a dress.  haven't seen anyone wearing a dress in a long time.'  since there was no compliment in there, it felt like a judgment.  but a lot of their 'being' felt judgmental cuz i wasn't the same religion as they, (which has been a bone of contention in my family forever, actually, cuz my mom left her religion when she got married to my dad, and her family disowned her, priests wouldn't baptize me cuz she had strayed from her religion, and one of these cousins would actually cry for me cuz she was taught that since i wasn't the same religion as they were, i was going to *. period. then i moved out of the country for a period of time which was referred to as 'and you (meaning me) were who knows where!'.

am i just too sensitive?  i know i am sensitive, have been called out on numerous occasions for being 'different' such as from a therapy supervisor to a colleague - this is san, our flaky therapist.  not really complimentary, again.  i know i have actual, thought-out reasons for what i do, and they have always made sense to me.  i know i would not be alive today if i hadn't gone to mexico - i ran from an intolerable life, and didn't know where else to go.  but i was dying where i was, so had to go somewhere.

ach!  the other day i thought about the idea that these kinds of 'judgments' or non-acceptance sting/hurt cuz the person believes them in the first place.  i know i'm different, have a different perspective from many of the people here where i live now, which is where i was born and raised, and have felt much more accepted in other places i've lived which had different cultures or viewpoints on living and being.  i just don't like feeling judged because of it.  and maybe that's my own projection.  but i've lived to the best of my ability the other way, doing things the way others wanted or approved of - maybe that's the word/feeling that stings so much, that my way of being isn't approved of in this part of the country - and all it did was repress the real me to the extent that i had anxiety about being me since i was a little girl.  well, that's not right, either.

so, i continue to struggle, but i hope letting this out will help.  struggling to be is not new.

maybe i just need to accept w/in myself that i DO do things differently than others, well, actually, i do accept that.  but i don't like the feeling of being put down somehow because of it. 

[Chart]

Hello San, hoo-boy where can I begin... so many things in your post ring for me too... Like "am I too sensitive"? Moley jehosephat, I say that in my head all the time. I wonder I wonder I wonder... I speculate, I analyze, I reflect... if only I wasn't so darn "sensitive"...
True and not true... maybe. But for me the thing is not to not be sensitive, but rather not be controlled in my reaction... AND (of course) not beating myself up all the time "because" I'm so sensitive.
Ouf (as the French say)

So lately, what's been formulating in my brain is, Yes, be sensitive, but re-wire the impact of my sensitivity.

Not easy, but I'm getting some ideas and trying out some new thought experiments. Just an example... I watched something that encouraged attaching the "desired-thought" (not what I'm actually experiencing) to the fact that I am Conscious. Hard to describe... Like the fake it technique, but I force the thought and bring with it that all this/that is solid Consciousness.

Did that make any sense?

I'm going to continue and the try and explain it better.

Regarding your past life in Mexico... Have you read Thomas Wolf, You Can't Go Home Again?

Imo, you have not returned to your birthplace. It's no longer that. But probably you know that already. I can't imagine, for the life of me ever going back to my ancient haunts anywhere in the US. Even visits to Paris now are too heavy, too much past, too much feeling of sadness for the naive boy I used to be. Just too weird. It's culture shock with each little walk. Maybe I'm in denial. But it seems more and more the past is not interesting for me.

But I'm rambling... sorry :-)

I'm on the highway, returning from a short week of work. Some time of reflection.

Thinking about you, glad you're feeling a little better.

    

[Papa Coco]

San,

That religious abuse is one of the most insidious parts of my life also. My family was very weird. THEY forced me to go to church 6 days a week for 14 years, and THEY put me into Catholic school against my will and ignored my begging them to let me go to a safer public school with my neighborhood friends. And then when I succumbed to the teachings of the church, that same family scolded me for being religious. (Why teach me something you don't want me to know??) Talk about confusing. Then when I walked away from all that religious stuff, THEN they criticized me for becoming atheist and not believing in what they'd taught me. So...I was darned if I did and darned if I didn't. Now I'm crazy.

I've come to understand that they were nothing more than common, run-of-the-mill bullies. And that's what bullies do. They bully. Period. They would bully me regardless of what I was doing. They'd bully me for going to church and they'd bully me for not going to church. If I parted my hair on the right, they told me I should have parted it on the left. So, when I parted it on the left, they told me I should have parted it on the right. They just used anything as a reason to bully me. When you say that your relatives judged you for wearing a dress, I feel like the more accurate phrasing would be they bullied you for any reason they could grab at at the moment. To me, judging and bullying are synonyms.

If you'd have worn pants that same day they would have said the exact same thing, but they'd have said, "oh I haven't seen anyone wear [any color here] in a long time.

I have developed a response that I'm losing control of. When someone says anything like that to me, I automatically start laughing out loud. I worry that one day I'll get beat up for it, but I can't seem to stop it. It's a kneejerk reaction. But if anyone behaves like a bully around me, I suddenly think it's hysterical and I laugh before I can stop myself.

Maybe I've just taken as much bullying as I can handle in my life and there isn't room for any more of it in my psyche

I made a sign once. I should have t-shirts made with this: "The thing I hate most about bullying is that it works."

Personally I respect you more for not being "normal". Normal is not all it's cracked up to be. Normal people don't make history. Normal people don't solve social problems. Normal people follow the herd. Conformity is the only thing they're good at. Lemmings.

Elvis and Einstein weren't normal.

I think being who we are is the greatest gift we can give back to our creator. Even if the world tries to bully it out of us. It's the bullying, judgy, poison tongued conformists who are disappointing their creator.