I'm writing because I often don't know who to talk to about this stuff - you know, about feelings and life, and just generally how to interact with people. That's the irony, the catch-22 of it all - in order to get over stuff around interacting with people, you actually have to interact with people. No amount of theory or reading wikipedia is going to give you the answer on that one.
The truth is, too, that I recently watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower again. It's my second time seeing the movie and I'm working on reading the book again, too. That's not such a huge truth.
What actually is the huge truth is how much I relate to that story, and how I wish I'd found it earlier in my life. But I guess I wasn't ready. I could have read the words but they wouldn't have meant a damn thing...or they probably would have, but I would have connected it to something else, something indirect - and cried just the same.
The other truth is that I'm inspired by the story, the writing style. Writing letters to an anonymous friend. That's who yous are, Yous. All of my anonymous friends and probably real life friends, too. But I am not who I am in real life here. I am my real self here. Not that I can't be in real life, it's just that I can only seem to be my real self in waves, in real life. At certain times, if the conditions are right.
You know what thing I realized recently? Is that I don't have to react to emotions. I always thought I did. Whether they were mine or other peoples', I was simply a ping pong ball being bounced back and forth between responses, unsure of their meaning and what, if any, place I had in the whole scheme of things. What power do I have to react without being squashed? Well, I guess anesthetizing myself gave me that power sometimes.
I have a lot of innate power, it turns out, but that power must be built from daily habits and positive thoughts. Well, I guess power can be negative too - sometimes it feels moreso to me than not - but here I'm talking about the power to change myself, to make meaning out of this existence, to stop focusing on myself so damn much. I have a black hole inside of me. A lot of other people do, too. I would even venture to say that all people do. Hey, we're all gonna die, right?
Morbid!!! But you can't escape it. That's the truth.
On a positive note, I quit my job again. I may have told you before, but I quit my consulting job four or so years ago to pursue music. And then I just joined back on again for another project and am at "that point," six months in. I can't take it. The mundane monotony of caring about details I don't care about. Mind you, my mind loves details, but it must be focused on details that matter to me otherwise I'll burn out and self destruct.
Iso. Lation.
I'm sure you understand, Yous, cuz apparently we all gotta go thru a lot of the same things from different perspectives. The connection is empathy. That's what connects our different experiences. If I can see past my own shit while we relate, then I can see the actual you, and see you in myself and vice versa. And then it's not so bad, you know? It's not so bad.
The mundane shit doesn't matter so much. It is exactly what it needs to be. Mundane shit that's best spiced up with some good music in the background. Good thoughts spinning on other things. Let the work fall out as it will. It's gonna happen anyway, you know, and I tend to feel the struggle is necessary. What's it just like to relax? Into it all, into the struggle, into the glory of letting it go, into touching other people, into being touched. And hey, that's not even such a big fucking deal, probably the most normal thing of all. Human touch.
But when I am isolated, I may feel as safe and stable as an isosceles triangle, protecting a side of myself that I make smaller than the others - the side of myself that's happy to be alive, that appreciates human connection, that trusts in the relative tolerance of it all - but if I'm protecting that side from harm, then it never comes out and I never feel balanced, whole, connected. Equal.
When I am connected to other people, I am OK. When I am connected to humanity, I am OK. And so that's why I'm writing Yous, in this way, in this form, because it feels safe. I don't need to protect myself as much this way.
Sometimes the truth is best handed indirectly, you know.
Love,
Casey
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