[3W4DW] 6. What do you wish people who read your journal knew about you?

[kaberett]

(Still from finch's list of 21 prompts.)

I'm... not sure there is, really. I'm generally very open about most things, I think; even the one that springs to mind - that I'm not as cool as I pretend to be, that I'm more insecure than I present as, that I care more than I let on - is, I think, a mixture of, well, rampant impostor syndrome and self-delusion.

Because, well, I do talk about insecurity, though amusingly I wish I could do it better; I'm not pretending to be cool, I am authentically myself and that someone is Actually Pretty Kickass a lot of the time; and I think you know that I care -- about poetry, about music, about fannishness, about my people, about sharing the things I've learned the hard way so some of you can get there along a slightly easier path.

Perhaps what I actually mean is "I don't trust easily". I've talked recently about not really trusting myself, and that being the major block to meditation as a thing itself for me; and it's not that I don't think you're wonderful, don't think you're safe, don't want to trust you. I think it's this: that I am scared to ask for help, still, in ways that aren't structured; that I'm scared to show myself vulnerable and give people the responsibility of taking care of me. I have an absolute horror of making people feel obliged to look after me, and a lot of the time that keeps me from asking at all - but I can't find it very difficult to trust unreservedly without knowing that I'll be safe if I fall to pieces in front of you.

The realisation that I think my counsellor has been pushing me towards for the entire time she's known me? That I like helping people, and making sense of the world for them, because maybe if I do it enough I'll learn to/someone will do it for me. Which - is not the whole story, and is kind of twisted in its way (oh, but tiny child, let me hug you and love you and make you safe--), but is interesting to bring to bear on the matter of why and how I get so much out of this, and how I can get better at it, for others and myself.

-- so I've once again circled back around to trust, of myself and of others; this is something I'm going to have to spend some time working through this year. And it will be hard, and it will take time, but that's okay. I don't have to decipher myself all in one go.

Comments

[cxcvi]

That I like helping people, and making sense of the world for them, because maybe if I do it enough I'll learn to/someone will do it for me.

I don't feel qualified to comment on the accuracy of this comment for you, but it feels remarkably yes for me.

[kaberett]

&hearts) Yep.

[pipisafoat]

I decided the other day in the shower (where I do most of my slightly-ridiculous deciding) that the point of my life might be to learn how to trust the right amount. Because I pretty much live trust at the extremes, in that regard: I either am paranoid (it gets pretty extreme and is sometimes really scary) and will tell you nothing at all ever, or I trust you completely absolutely with everything.

and mostly that's a semi-permanent decision based on how I felt when I ... not necessarily first-interaction but first interaction of consequence.

[kaberett]

Hah, I feel like "I don't trust easily" is maybe - not quite true for me either? Because it is much more like I-don't-trust-absolutely. I'm not quite as all-or-nothing as you describe, I think (which is not necessarily a bad model of interaction with world? is just not how I do it) -- such_heights said a while back in a love meme that I give friendship generously and pretty much instantly, and I think that's... fairly apt? In that if I am introduced to someone as a Good Sort, I will be warm, I will treat them with good faith, I will reach out with compassion and try to make space for them. But that's not the same thing as trusting them to want to do the same for me? So perhaps: I am rather one-sided when it comes to trust? In that I think I make it relatively easy for others to trust me (not in a deliberate or manipulative way! just in terms of how I behave left to my own devices), but I'm still really wary of- and so on. I can like people a lot without "trust"ing them, because that feels like burden of obligation, and I suppose in part I don't feel okay dumping that on people without negotiation? And because I'm Like That I'm kind of unlikely to be the person initiating the negotiation? So.

THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME RAMBLE

[gwendraith]

> I'm generally very open about most things, I think; even the one that springs to mind - that I'm not as cool as I pretend to be, that I'm more insecure than I present as, that I care more than I let on - is, I think, a mixture of, well, rampant impostor syndrome and self-delusion.
Gosh, I so empathise with this. I'm 62 and still wonder who I am and why I am as I am. I'm too trusting in most instances. I also like helping people (I was a Samaritan for a long time) and I wonder if my desire to help people was my way of understanding more about myself. You appear to be far more self aware than I have ever been.

[kaberett]

Thank you :-) I've been guided and shoved through a lot of this by my various counsellors, and I'm hugely grateful to all of them for giving me the tools I need to continue self-reflection away from them.