Here’s the thing.
On the one hand, I’m highly intelligent, articulate, deep, thoughtful, and in the right milieu, I can even be pretty impressive.
On the other hand, it seems to be a fundamental part of my nature and my life that I am going to do dumb shit over and over again.
Why? I think the core cause is my dreamy, introverted nature. I am always going to prioritize my inner world over outer details, and that means I will always forget things or not think them through properly or otherwise become terribly confused because either my demanding inner processes will overwrite whatever circuitry was holding the important information or I never really had enough room for it all in the tiny space left over from the presence all that heavy machinery inside my head to begin with.
It’s an amazing thing to realize that all the heavy duty thoughts in your head could be making you, in some ways, stupid.
And I don’t feel like there’s much I can do about that. Not directly. If ever I stop making these dumb mistakes that make he look like a bubbleheaded idiot, it will be because the process of recovery has freed up enough of my mental space to allow me to keep things in my head more easily.
Either that, or I have to somehow construct the equivalent of protected memory in my mind. Memory that can only be used by the “keeping track of things” program, period.
Ick. Even the idea of it sounds gross to me. My dreams must always come first. Imagination over all. Walling off some of my memory would limit the size of my ideas, and that’s something I simply cannot abide. I dream big, as big as I can. It’s the wellspring of both my creativity and my insight.
So that’s out of the question.
Looks like I am just going to have to make peace with the fact that I am going to keep doing goofy shit.
Like today. Today, I somehow got the idea in my head that I had to have pages done on my TV spec script by Friday. So I posted a question to my class’ Facebook page asking how many pages were due, thus unnecessarily (as it turns out) freaking out a few people.
Because we do not have pages due this Friday. What some people (not me) have due is the final version of their detailed outline. All I have due is my comment sheets on those once they are posted. That’s a matter of an hour’s work or so. No sweat.
So not only did I manufacture a reason to panic for myself, I brought other people into it too.
And I am doing shit like that all the time. I guess I should be glad that I am an affable, lovable person who would never dream of pretending like my mistake was someone else’s fault or get super defensive about it. When I mess up, I admit it right away and apologize. And I imagine it’s hard to stay mad at someone like that.
So I got that going for me.
And I feel like I am slowly pulling myself together over time, for which school is a wonderful stimulus. I already feel like this little vacation has given me enough time to work through some very heavy duty stuff, the result of which will be a better me when I go back to school.
I will once more push myself into not being so withdrawn and insular. I have nothing to be ashamed of! And yeah, I know, I am not really on most people’s frequency. But I am determined to learn to dial them the fuck in. So I can’t express my innermost depths without talking like an alien as far as most people are concerned.
That doesn’t mean I can’t relax and have fun with people. I just need to stop being so childishly set in my ways and be flexible enough to learn the local lingo. It’s no compromise, it’s me pusuing something I want, mainly a more engaged life where I am not so goddamned alone.
Aaaand it would probably help if I can dial back the desperation a fair bit. Desperation is one of the worst possible things to reek of. If I can find my way to at least pretending to be more confident and independent than I really am, it would probably do wonders for getting myself the sort of social approval that would help to make it real.
Self-enhancing cycles don’t have to negative.
I still won’t know how to make friends, sadly. But maybe that’s not an active skill people know. Maybe it has a lot more to do with what you let in. I am positive there are people in my life who tried to befriend me but I was just too cold and scared inside to take them up on it, or even perceive it consciously.
And if I am being totally honest, I know I am still very scared of forming new friendships, with all those unforeseeable consequences and untamed variables and the real and potent threat of making me leave the safe and comfortable life I currently lead and end up in the land of social exposure and terror.
That is literally how I think. Or rather, how the unhealthy part of my mind thinks. I have been clinging to my sad little life like a barnacle for a very long time and it’s very hard to convince myself that it is okay to let go. That’s how anxiety robs you of all courage.
I wish I was the sort of person who could embark upon a life of risk and adventure (the real kind, not that fantasy shit) but I just don’t have that kind of confidence yet. It will take something exterior to me (like a job offer) to get me to do that.
Until then, I will just toddle along in my usual way, getting a little better every day.
It might be slow, but it beats the hell out of going nowhere.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.