A thinner skin
A thinner skin
Of late, I have been more open; inviting. I’d like to add honest and kind, but perhaps not.
I’ve always been a bit on the isolationist side. There have been times of many friends and times with few. Of close involvement and cavernous distance. The two parameters operate independently.
Two years ago I was hurt badly as a close friendship ended. I no longer believe in absolutes or permanence. Everything fades. Everyone will drift away. Love those you can while you can. New people might arrive, but nothing lasts forever.
Perhaps one day I’ll look back on this as sad; that I had to accept this in order to survive. But for me, now, it’s an incentive: not to take my life for granted. To truly know people for who they are; and not be bitter – or hold on too tightly – when life finally leads us apart.
As I began to learn that first lesson, I learned another: I had stopped being a good person. There was a time when I reached out to the world. Asking for reasons. Searching for people who understood. I was so lost. I was such a good person – because I understood what it was to feel damaged.
Eventually I found some answers. I found some people who understood. I healed myself. I was still a decent enough human being, but a careless one. I forgot what it was like, when you’re not so far along in your journey.
I met someone. With such a shell around them; a barricade around the person they truly were. When I saw past the defenses to the innocent person behind, I realized I didn’t know how to behave anymore. I had forgotten how to care. I wasn’t callous so much as clueless.
I learned a lot from that. Or perhaps: I realized how much I’d forgotten. It was hard to learn that. To realize, then accept.
I needed to be a better me.
I tried to do all the things you’re supposed to do: listen, support, understand, care, the usual. I learned from others. I became more in tune with myself. (It always sounds so easy, but it never is) I liked myself better and, perversely, found I needed other people less. My own barricades came down a little; my thick skin thinned. Of late, what you see is closer to what you get.
I’ve also been remembering why my skin thickened in the first place. For a writer who spends his time recording what has been, I live in the now a little too much. I forget a lot.
People are assholes. (How’s that for an absolute) Trying to be an open person leaves you vulnerable. Is it any wonder that the more sensitive among us are the ones hurt most easily? Those two parameters are also unrelated.
People are forever taking advantage of a kind and forgiving nature. And some people are just dumb. Too clueless to realize how bad they’re hurting others.
I suppose my challenge is to try to remain passionate and sincere despite the barbs tossed at me. It doesn’t make daily life any easier, yet I tell myself it’s worth it – that I don’t want to slip back into a careless dismissal of things; of people. When I look back on this, will I think it naïve? Will I even understand anymore?
I will love those I can, while I can. I will love myself. I will try to remember my lessons learned. I will try to deal with all the cruel humans. And I will try to be my own person, despite the consequences.
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You know who bothers me? People who have downloads off their site, and slowass bandwidth...so it takes me HOURS to download Panzer General 2...I'm talking to YOU, CDos, you Swedish bastard!
Anyway, on to the point of the post, and yes, it does have a point. Everybody has things that they need to work on, and realizing that maybe you've let yourself slide down one of those myriad black holes is the first step in keeping yourself from shutting off, or shutting down completely. One of the things I need to work on, and have slowly been doing, is the fact that, as in the beginning of this post, I'll often just jump in to joke mode instead of actually having a serious conversation.
Now, there are times where there is a reason for making light of things, rather than treating them seriously. Maybe there are a large group of people gathered somewhere, which isn't always the best environment for a serious discussion if somebody needs to discuss a problem, so the joke will 'fill in' until another time, when a better discussion can be had. Or, sometimes a joke is just a way to ease people in to a discussion...I know I'd be a lot more likely to listen to someone who got me laughing in the first place, then somebody who just turned to me and said, "Cliff, here's why you suck, and you should change these things immediately."
But, sometimes, the joke fills in for any real discussion. It's easier. It doesn't involve any of that pesky self examination that can be a very difficult thing to face. I can't remember where I heard this, but I've always liked the line "The harshest critic in the world is a mirror." Now, it could be that that was written by some idiotic fashionista who, if you strip away the fact that she gets paid insane sums to wear clothes, is nothing more than a retarded coke whore. I choose to look at that line more in the vein of a person really, truly, looking at themselves, warts and all.
And, it can be the hardest of all to be the friend of someone who maybe isn't going through the best of times. It's easy to be friends with someone who's in a great place and mood. It's laughs and beers and jokery. It's a fuck of a lot harder to be around someone who's going through something...and I don't just mean "Oh no, I got mud on my pants." this is one of those times when I'm often FAR too quick to flip in a quick little joke, and THAT is what I'm trying to work on in the end...is actually becoming a better friend to people. I'm not saying I'll take a bullet for someone...the only way you can know something like that is to be there, and let's just hope that never happens. But I know there have been too many times when I've just avoided difficult conversations and situations because it was 'uncomfortable'...and also because I was too damn busy floundering in my own feelings of 'being left behind' and other shit like that to, frankly, give a damn.
I didn't used to be like that. I remember back in the ol' RN days, when, for God knows what reason, people kept coming to me for advice, or when things sucked, and I at least made the effort to get past myself for 5 minutes and talk to them. But somewhere along the line I became a LOT more cynical than I had been before...not so much in how I perceive a lot of things (that has always been there), but more in how I looked at myself. And when you look at yourself with contempt, it's pretty fucking hard to give a shit about anyone else.
Eventually, I just reached a point a couple of years ago where I realized that I was well and truly miserable, and probably more than a little bit depressed, and I didn't want to be there anymore. So, I started walking in a new direction. I'm still not where I want to be...but I at least feel like I'm heading somewhere positive, and it had been a lot longer than even I initially realized that I had felt anything close to that.
My problem was constantly re-examining the past...I finally realized that it's pointless, because you will NEVER get the answers you're looking for, you'll just drive yourself mad. Learn your lessons, and move on from them. I also really started to suffer from this feeling I can only describe as...I was being left behind by everyone else. In a way, yeah, it's true. But just focusing on it really wasn't doing anything but make me darker, angrier, and more resentful by the minute. So I stopped looking at it that way, and started looking at it as "How to I get where I want to be."
I guess the overall point I'm eventually getting to here, is that every single human being has problems that need to be worked out. the instant you think you don't, you're exhibiting the biggest issue of all, which is an acceptance of mediocrity, because you can ALWAYS get better at something. I wish it hadn't taken me so fucking long to reach that conclusion (see? Still a lot to work on.), but at least I finally got there, and started practicing what I preach.
So, to be brief, everybody sucks and should try to get better.
Just kidding.
Cliff, that was a good reply. Better than good.
James: Ah, a stroll down memory-lane. I hope things are working out for you.
What can I say? Sometimes I do actually have serious thoughts to get off my chest. I dunno', I think it's more myself I need to remind on occasion that I'm capable of that, rather than others.
Actually, I believe that big long spiel would have earned you a book if you hadn't so cavalierly tossed the bet aside.
Ah well...
Wasn't it a requirement that, in order to qualify for free literature, it had to be a calm and rational POLITICAL spiel?
The terms could easily have been negotiable but you decided to walk away.
Unless you're up for a new challenge.
Well, as you know, I'm not exactly a master of negotiating. Why do you think I simply yell at my Madden players and release them? The only other possibly outcome would be signing my punter for 5 mil a year. Much simpler to simply cut them loose.
A challenge you say, eh? What sort of challenge would this be?
Cliff, since noticing your post wednesday, I must have re-read it four or five times. It's a really good piece.
When I made the post, I was especially thinking of the last line "being myself, despite the consequences" ... I'd recently had some consequences that arose from being me. And I was stuck in that painful place where I kept thinking "so am I supposed to not be me now? because of what happened?" Your post made me think more, I realized that I have a lot more in common with where I was when I wrote that it
To use your words, I'd realized I'd also been accepting some of my own mediocrity. Man, I can identify with so much of what you're talking about. My way of thinking about it, sometimes, is treating my head like a garden. and what you water and feed and pay attention to, grows and thrives. It's like that with creative writing (the more I do, the more I want to do), and it's like that with negative feelings. Focusing on them and feeding them just made them bigger, and I needed to start watering the parts of my garden that I wanted to thrive instead.
When I originally wrote that piece, a minor manifesto if you will, I wondered if I'd look back with regret. Years later, I don't. It feels right, like a piece of me. In fact I recently I got a lot of questions with my bitter-single-guy-day rant when (from my point of view) I said the same things with a different spin. But to me it's all the same.
I feel sometimes that being me is difficult. But I think everyone feels that way about themselves, here and there.
Great post cliff, and I'm ready to not-joke with you anytime you like.. unless of course I'm joking now ;P
Challenge: Do what you just did, with a different topic. If it's near as good as what you wrote here (as determined by me), I will present you with pages and a couple of covers, randomly selected from my collection of page-and-cover combinations, where said randomly-selected combination will be replaced by the first unread collection in a series, should that be the case.
Okay, first off...I simply need to get this off my chest...SHUT UP, JOE THEISMAN! Arrogant douchebag...whining because he lost his job...it's because you are awful at commentary! You get names wrong CONSTANTLY, and you annoy everyone! GO AWAY!
There. Sorry, I just really get to get that off my back...listening to him whine drives me to madness...
Now then...
Liam : Well, it's going to require waiting for something to inspire me to write, and not rant, about it. Any parameters you wish to place on this? Subject...length...anything at all? Oh, and these books and covers...they'll all be from the same BOOK, right?
J-Money : Being oneself is not always the easiest thing in the world to do. But, at some point, you realize that it's just easier than playing a role. I know SOME people go the other way because they feel it makes them more likable. I realized many, many years ago that it isn't worth it. No matter who you try to be, you will never, ever, get everyone you meet to like you or respect you (and, the opposite way, you will not like an respect everyone who you encounter). So, if that's the case, just accept it, and be yourself. Life is going to be difficult at times no matter what you do, or who you 'decide' to be, so why not just take it as it comes as yourself?
I've found that context can be a very good thing, as well. For example...after the last job loss, I was REALLY pissed off for more than a few days. It was extremely frustrating to me that, even though I'd gotten nothing but praise from everyone higher up than me, I STILL got the axe. And I couldn't really vent that anger and frustration at anyone specific, since the decision was made by a bunch of total strangers making up a faceless corporate entity somewhere in Louisiana. Not very satisfying to scream at...well...a mystery.
I USED to fly off the handle with what I realize now was frightening regularity (another thing I've worked on). Eventually I just realized that you have to let things go...but not just pretend that everything is better, and you're moving on. That doesn't work, because it just eats away at you. First, you have to find a way to get that out. So, I actually took off for a few days. Headed up to the middle-of-nowhere mountain town of my youth, and spent a few days slogging through the snowy woods. Sometimes solitude is a good thing, and sometimes you need to be around people...this was a time for alone. And it helped. I got all that anger out, and realized that I could either stomp around all pissed off and doing nothing, or I could just throw what I had left of that frustration in to looking for something better. So I did. and it helped. And I moved on.
Anyway, I'm just going to run on and on forever here, so I'll cut it short. In return, if you need to get something off your chest, or just talk about whatever, I'm around.
Unless...you know...I'm not.