My writing often exudes a type of emotional distance. One that feels indicative of what my actual thought processes are, but is quite lax in its true substance. That substance, of which I reserve in fear, maybe relieving far too much. In the lack of coherent nature of the times, I find myself too far involved in asking how everyone feels, rather than how everyone interprets.
How does it feel to have this happen to you? How does it feel to be talked to that way? In the grand scheme of things, the feeling and the interpretation are cut from the same cloth but coming down to the razor edge tells the true reaction to the story, the situation, the sorrow.
I was challenged because of my nature. As I extended my hand to help, it was swatted away and replaced with a prosthetic. I shut down. I turned, retreated, and thought nothing more of it. My effort was simply to find a desk. One not too big, not too small, with a few drawers. Not an effort of ill intent. When approached about this the second time, a far more respected discussion, the person in need of the desk began to talk about my character, my “thing,” my “gift.” I pondered. In this context, what gift could I possess? She finished her statement.
“I always want you to find me a desk.”
Tears threatened me. I understood what she was talking about now; often a topic of conversation when faced with the question of what I bring to the table.
“You have the gift to help, don’t let anyone’s actions change that.”
I had heard this similarly. “don’t harden your shell” and “this is what you do, and it’s not a bad thing,” and more defiantly indirect, “always look for the helpers.”
In a time I had begun to question my own character, question what I offer and what I don’t, how to refute people-pleasing, how to be more assertive without being aggressive, it felt like a weight had been replaced on my shoulders. It felt as though the time had come to reassess what it was I felt I need to act, or react, for. Rather than initially assessing how I felt, I naturally began to interpret the situation and the emotions that came with it, rather than the other way around. The latter seems to be my natural train of thought.
I could identify several things that I interpreted, all of which were relatively immediate at the moment but not to be reflected upon until later. My interpretation of the situation was an experience I had come face to face with far too often. The desire to help was misunderstood as a challenge to authority. I understood this was not a personal attack, but someone else emotionally charged instead of personifying the situation at hand and I happened to be the recipient, as I have always been. I understood my position in this person’s life was simply to be the recipient of these actions, these words, these plans, and structures. I understood that this, in no way, was a professional environment, but a personal environment with business attached. This was the moment I became far enough removed to begin to calculate the emotions that followed.
How did you feel?
I felt disrespected. I felt misunderstood and attacked and I felt my inner child work unraveling before the eyes of the room. My work on myself had been challenged by someone who refused to do the work on themself and I refused to let that impact me. I had once been scared this would keep me from progressing as if I would subsequently be reverted back to the teenager affected by tone, affected by demeanor, and someone else’s presentation of their own emotions. When the room cleared so did my concern. I was confident in this because I had done the work.
I felt confident. I felt a confidence in a decision I had been wavering on, simply for comfort. That was the moment I decided that in my fear of doing hard things, I have a habit of accepting the disrespect because it’s familiar. Because it’s comfortable. Because I know the supplier of the disrespect is simply doing this to make themselves feel better, and for quite some time that was what I believed I was solely here to do: provide others with a release of fear and emotion and concern despite the impact it has on my functioning. I accepted the mental turmoil because I expected it, it became part of the routine and accepting what I already knew I could not change would surely be less intimidating than starting new. And in my state, as I am now, I refuse to do that any longer.
Weeks prior I had wrestled with a fear-inducing change of routine. This was not a change of routine for my storyline, but it was for the time.
I attended more concerts in the calendar year of 2015 than I did between March 2020 and March 2022. I attended a concert, maskless, for the first time since January of 2020. This was only my second concert since January of 2020. I was petrified. This is the prime example of an interpretation vs emotion. My interpretations were reflective of assumptions. This was new: I was attending a concert alone, for the first time since the pandemic started, on a weeknight where I had to be up at 5:30 the next morning to attend my 8 to 5 job. I did not seem to have emotions, but interpretations. I had been keen to this artist since 2010. 12 years before I was able to see them live. 10 years before a pandemic.
It was at this concert that I heard his newest song for the first time. It was after this challenging incident that the music video for this song was released.
The monologue goes as follows:
What you are witnessing are figments of my imagination This isn’t the truth; this is simply whatever you decide it is. If I want to take the fall, that just means I believe I can catch myself or maybe it means I don’t care if I do. In the end, it’s a story and you won’t see it for what it is you will see it for what you are.
This left me to revel in my own silence.
If I want to take the fall, that just means I believe I can catch myself.
Something clicked. And not in a way that was inspiring, or in a way I longed to relate to. Something clicked in a way that was reaffirming the decisions I had made to that point. I had spent so much time trying to make friends at the fair, I didn’t buy tickets for the rides.
I had romanticized a safety net for so long that I underestimated what I was able to do for myself, for my life, at the expense of the things that caused unnecessary turmoil. And I accepted it as truth. And I embraced it as part of the routine. And I never had the confidence to garnish my own power because I was never awarded that ability. I never considered I already had the medal in my back pocket, I just had to shine it and put it around my neck.
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