My journey, just like everybody's journey, is unique. I've been many things and seen many things, and the things you live have the power to change you. And here some people say: don't let them! and other people say: it's inevitable, if you have a shitty life you'll be miserable and perhaps even a bad person, and vice versa. I say things do change you, but you do have a say in the direction that change takes.
I was born loved, healthy and cute. Then I was raised by weird (erhum, somewhat alternative) standards that set me apart from the flock and made me a target. And I was (and still am) an emotional person, and was not ready for or aware that people could be so mean for no apparent reason. As I grew, I grew further apart despite all my frustrated attempts to fucking belong somewhere. I tended to be bullied everywhere, from the playground to the cafeteria, to the kids in my own neighborhood, including the ones that were supposedly my friends. I felt ugly, lonely and desperate. I also always feared I might be crazy. I felt different, in a very bad way. I thought the problem was me and when i finally tried to reach out to my parents at some point in middle school they inadvertently reinforced this idea. You see, my father has his own journey and he taught himself that when he did things "right" everything went OK (and it did) and no one would even think of bullying him or scolding him (like, society as a whole wouldn't "dare" or "have a reason"). As I grew up, this thought of being perfect ("right") took over me without me noticing it, and paradoxically made me feel like whatever was wrong, was actually ME, because I'd tried everything else and I kept on getting bad results at life (not at school, I was a year ahead and I didn't even try - I didn't get good grades but it was easy to be average at that point and I didn't give a fuck about grades anyway since it didn't count for anything until you got to high school).
Then things changed. High schools in my hometown are separate from lower level schools, so when you get to high school, you always change schools - and there's three different ones to choose from so people mix and match and I knew virtually no one of my new classmates. Suddently, people didn't call me by the same names, didn't chant in the hallways, they didn't know! And surprisingly, when they didn't know they also didn't notice anything weird, or different or wrong. But I was making an effort to fit in anyway, and at the same time trying to understand who I was and why I sometimes still didn't identify completely with the flock's views or ways. I studied hard, partied some and got into vet school. Life was good.
When things finally got bad, it wasn't social, or this or that. It was actually me. You see, you can't choose what happens to you, but you can choose how you see it. The ways I reacted to this later in college - when I failed a year and lost the only real base of my self-esteem at the time: school smarts - were catastrophic and caused me to seriously fuck up my college experience. I was a year in deep depression and the fact that I'd failed was only half of what was going on in my head, the problem was the rest. The old, buried parts. Silly stories of kids on playgrounds could induce panic attacks, self-hate, loss of appetite, feelings of worthlessness and this rage... this furious anger that was growing inside me. A feeling of unfairness and of having been wronged. Then there's the crisis and no one can get a job around here without mad skills in something or a serious college education. Preferably both. And here I was fucking up my opportunities and managing a house full of college "teenagers". Practically a homemaker or a maid. And for free (circumstances for another day...). These are pieces of my head at the time. It all scared the shit out of me.
Well, my point is, I'm not mad anymore and I'm not scared anymore. And I don't think I ever will again. Not like scared of a beast or something, that would still scare me, and that's healthy xD - like scared "trapped in your head" scared. Scared shitless of life as a whole. I now understand that everyone has a journey and choices to make. All of these nameless "characters" in my journey are people with a journey and choices to make. Now you say: "thank you captain obvious" (read with a bored, disappointed tone). And now I say: right, but that means that maybe I could have avoided the escalation if I had really understood what that meant at the time. And so, it also means that I can still remember now, that the people who mistreat you for whatever reason don't always mean to and when they do, its their choice. Your choice is what you make of that, but knowing that people tend to act out of fear or its products (anger, power, over-protectionism...) I find that those are their motives; independent from me unless I give them a reason, like retaliating or enabling them (like perhaps bursting into tears when someone's motive is power). That doesn't mean I don't try to be better, but I'm not defending myself anymore. I'm not reacting like that anymore. You know, I'm not religious but Jesus was right, Gandhi was right, Buddha was right. You cannot change others but you can be a better person everyday, and be compassionate and when someone is a shitty person or you see them as a shitty person try to remember that they have a reason even if it's not a good one and stay calm, don't perpetuate the cycle. There's no point in being angry or, paradoxically, in forbidding ourselves to be angry. Feel what you feel, then don't be scared to let it go when it wants to go and understand instead. Be at peace. It's their choice. Make yours. I've read somewhere that gay people from the initial movements used to say: when someone insults you, OWN that insult. Make it into something good. Once upon a time my bullying name was Cinderella - I know, that's very weird, doesn't sound bad at all, but never underestimate the power of creativity. When this (recent) internal change started, I met hurricanewithwings who spawned out of the blue to empower that change in unexpected ways and one day, we were probably in the middle of some wilderness and I was probably wearing fake primark pearl earrings and shivering from the summer night's breeze in my navy high waisted shorts and she mockingly called me a princess. Then she stopped and said, wait, you are a fucking princess! Like, suddently in a good (obviously metaphorical) way. Isn't that ironic? Own yourself. Empower yourself, because even a princess's name can be a bad thing if "they" want and you believe it. Are you a slob? Maybe because you have better things to do? - be a disorganized genius instead. Are you aloof? Be dreamy. Are you fragile? Be delicate. Empower your best qualities, do what makes you happy and fuck what others think respect everyone else's right to be who they are and to make their own mistakes. Be kind, keep an open mind and become part of the solution.
- An ESFJ's views on life, society, self-growth and happiness.
Major kudos for anyone who has the patience to read trough this wall of text xD
