A long awaited revelation of who I am. I'm not sure I'm entirely up to the task yet, but here I am attempting it.
I started out life as an idealistic feminist, a boy raised by his mother alone, then raised by both his caring mother and somewhat awful stepfather, then a witness to a suicide, then after it was after a point of being impressionable because I was an adult living at home, a caring mother and a good but distant man. I guess I'm saying that I was malleable up until I was 17 at the most, so it was a childhood of generally positive female role models and a handful of (ok, one) positive male role models.
I was socially aware. Fought actively against bigotry, racism, misogyny, and meanness.
On the negative side, I battled low self-esteem, depression, and loneliness.
Then I got married. I was no longer lonely, usually, but I acted more like the negative male role models of my childhood than the social activist I started out to be. This did little for my self-esteem and depression.
I could never really reconcile my beliefs and my actions. This, and many other factors, caused me to become a hermit. To this day, I can count the number of close friends I have on one hand. Friends that I talk to at least once a year, two hands.
One day I decided to be living again.
One part of that decision was to live and act according to my beliefs, not my examples.
And for the most part, I've been on a path of redemption.
If I have made a difference in people's lives, and I'm not claiming I'm magically giving hope to everyone I meet, it has been a positive difference. Until now, at least. But I have to look at this as a temporary setback, and get back to the fight to be me, and be true to what I believe in.
Back to redemption.
I like to think of all setbacks as temporary. We shouldn't let the silly little hairs clog the drain. You just have to figure out what your Drano is in life. [apologies for lame and sort of nasty metapohr]
ReplyDeleteMine is my own optimism. The bright side, the funny side, the side where I enjoy the view. I just try ever so hard not to let anyone or anything hold me back.
Needy is as needy does....to one you may not appear needy, to another you may. I believe it also depends on where they are in life as well as you. I have been in relationship with a man in the past who appeared to me extemely needy...calling constantly and freaking out if not called back instantly...but I'm sure I appeared "un-needy" for my inability or desire to call him as much as he did me. I say it's all in how you look at it...perspective. No right or wrong, it just is what it is.
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