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Jan. 30th, 2004 11:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vaxjediSometime it is hard to exist in a vacuum.
I'm home watching the Mouse. It's a different environment. I stayed up really late last night. I couldn't sleep, because I had nowhere to be the next day.
When I am alone for a while, I begin to unravel a bit. A lot of the concepts that seem so important when people are around just seem to cease to exist for me. My focus and identity becomes incredibly diffuse. Time is really a hard concept for me to grasp in the way most people see it. Without significant external indicators, I lose all sense of time. When I am at work, I am very aware of dates and times. But this week, I keep forgetting what day it is.
I think this is what frustrated my parents so much. I'd come home from college and not really 'do anything'. My sleep schedule would fluctuate in weird ways. They tried to impose structures on me, but they lacked motivation. Now that I have a job, and a family, I have responsibilties that give me a lot of motivation. So I am constantly aware of when I need to be to work, how much time Eleri is taking care of Miri, etc. But this week, when my responsibilities are less demanding, I begin to dissapate.
This sort of disffusion, while vaguely disturbing, is also ultimately relaxing. You see, identity is an effort for me. I don't really know who I am or what I am. The process of interacting with people requires me to have some sort of point of view, to exist in the conversation in some way. That takes effort, to provide a center when my natural inclination is to be formless. That's part of why crowds stress me out so much - so many angles that one has to maintain stability for.
I don't often know exactly what I am going to say until after I say it (or type it). When at work, I'll rattle off answers to questions and not realize what I said until I think about it afterward. Sometimes I wonder where it came from. Other times I'll actually think "Wow, that was pretty cool. I must be smart or something." When I write (or type to someone) I am a little more conscious of what I say (maybe that's why I prefer chat to the phone). And a lot of my reactions to things really feel like they come out of the blue.
For a long time, this didn't bother me - I generally trusted who I was, even if I wasn't that sure about it. Thay began to decline in my last year in college. And the stress from dealing with Mousie has put it deeply in question. I find myself acting more out of stress and anger and doing things I don't like. I can usually catch myself as the begin, but not always.
Maybe that's why some of my other identity issues have become so pressing for me. I want to know more about who I am and find parts that I like.
Anyway, I feel diffuse. I absorb a lot of information when I am diffuse. I spend a lot of time reading. Last night, I started reading a bunch of the interviews in the Onion. They have gotten a lot of good interviews. Today, I read an analysis of the last State of the Union address. I used to do a lot of reading like this while at work. But it's so busy now that I never get a chance to - I barely have a chance to absorb the information for work that I have to. Maybe' taht's part of why work is so stressful for me lately. No time to take a breather and absorb.
It's so hard to get things done whem I am this diffuse. I can't focus on chores or projects I have. They slide off so easily. But when I'm around people, they all come into clearer focus. Ryan came by last night to hang out and suddenly I wanted to do some cleaning, play parts of Uru I hadn't gotten to, work on my langauges, etc.
I think this weird sense of time affects so many parts of me. Under stress, I am acutely aware of time. Out of stress, it is nigh incomprehensible to me.
It affects my libido as well (it always comes back to my libido, doesn't it?). Sex is a timeless activity for me. When I have to be aware of time, or it is made painfully aware to me through stress or pressure, then I deal with a lot of cognitive dissonance. And so much of my life is under a time-pressure or stress (which creates a time-pressure in my perception) that I am constantly at conflict and dealing with colliding signals. This explains partially why I feel horny a lot of the time, but actually acting on it seems so difficult.
My emotions run wild without references. When I'm alone, they all come crashing in. I go from desperately horny, to drowning in futility, to resolute to depressed all with in seconds and over and over again. I think this is part of why I seem to be oddly stuck on other people's feelings and perceptions - I just don't feel like I exist unless I can use them as reference points, even a sort of 'wow that is so wrong and I'm way different' comparison. That's why I tend to compromise or give in - it just doesn't feel like I'm losing much.
Sometimes I want a more definite identity. I fond concepts, labels, lifestuyles etc and try to identify with them. The most successful for me was my identification with the Back Table in college - which I think is why I still get so emotional over the subject when others have gone on with life. I am unable to really identify with a lot of things. So I feel unstuck and lost.
I've lost my train of thought. Mousie has gone from being quiet watching Lilo and Stitch to a fit and then a bath. So my concentration on this subject is gone now.
I know there are things I should be doing. Chores and such. But I just can't focus.
I'm home watching the Mouse. It's a different environment. I stayed up really late last night. I couldn't sleep, because I had nowhere to be the next day.
When I am alone for a while, I begin to unravel a bit. A lot of the concepts that seem so important when people are around just seem to cease to exist for me. My focus and identity becomes incredibly diffuse. Time is really a hard concept for me to grasp in the way most people see it. Without significant external indicators, I lose all sense of time. When I am at work, I am very aware of dates and times. But this week, I keep forgetting what day it is.
I think this is what frustrated my parents so much. I'd come home from college and not really 'do anything'. My sleep schedule would fluctuate in weird ways. They tried to impose structures on me, but they lacked motivation. Now that I have a job, and a family, I have responsibilties that give me a lot of motivation. So I am constantly aware of when I need to be to work, how much time Eleri is taking care of Miri, etc. But this week, when my responsibilities are less demanding, I begin to dissapate.
This sort of disffusion, while vaguely disturbing, is also ultimately relaxing. You see, identity is an effort for me. I don't really know who I am or what I am. The process of interacting with people requires me to have some sort of point of view, to exist in the conversation in some way. That takes effort, to provide a center when my natural inclination is to be formless. That's part of why crowds stress me out so much - so many angles that one has to maintain stability for.
I don't often know exactly what I am going to say until after I say it (or type it). When at work, I'll rattle off answers to questions and not realize what I said until I think about it afterward. Sometimes I wonder where it came from. Other times I'll actually think "Wow, that was pretty cool. I must be smart or something." When I write (or type to someone) I am a little more conscious of what I say (maybe that's why I prefer chat to the phone). And a lot of my reactions to things really feel like they come out of the blue.
For a long time, this didn't bother me - I generally trusted who I was, even if I wasn't that sure about it. Thay began to decline in my last year in college. And the stress from dealing with Mousie has put it deeply in question. I find myself acting more out of stress and anger and doing things I don't like. I can usually catch myself as the begin, but not always.
Maybe that's why some of my other identity issues have become so pressing for me. I want to know more about who I am and find parts that I like.
Anyway, I feel diffuse. I absorb a lot of information when I am diffuse. I spend a lot of time reading. Last night, I started reading a bunch of the interviews in the Onion. They have gotten a lot of good interviews. Today, I read an analysis of the last State of the Union address. I used to do a lot of reading like this while at work. But it's so busy now that I never get a chance to - I barely have a chance to absorb the information for work that I have to. Maybe' taht's part of why work is so stressful for me lately. No time to take a breather and absorb.
It's so hard to get things done whem I am this diffuse. I can't focus on chores or projects I have. They slide off so easily. But when I'm around people, they all come into clearer focus. Ryan came by last night to hang out and suddenly I wanted to do some cleaning, play parts of Uru I hadn't gotten to, work on my langauges, etc.
I think this weird sense of time affects so many parts of me. Under stress, I am acutely aware of time. Out of stress, it is nigh incomprehensible to me.
It affects my libido as well (it always comes back to my libido, doesn't it?). Sex is a timeless activity for me. When I have to be aware of time, or it is made painfully aware to me through stress or pressure, then I deal with a lot of cognitive dissonance. And so much of my life is under a time-pressure or stress (which creates a time-pressure in my perception) that I am constantly at conflict and dealing with colliding signals. This explains partially why I feel horny a lot of the time, but actually acting on it seems so difficult.
My emotions run wild without references. When I'm alone, they all come crashing in. I go from desperately horny, to drowning in futility, to resolute to depressed all with in seconds and over and over again. I think this is part of why I seem to be oddly stuck on other people's feelings and perceptions - I just don't feel like I exist unless I can use them as reference points, even a sort of 'wow that is so wrong and I'm way different' comparison. That's why I tend to compromise or give in - it just doesn't feel like I'm losing much.
Sometimes I want a more definite identity. I fond concepts, labels, lifestuyles etc and try to identify with them. The most successful for me was my identification with the Back Table in college - which I think is why I still get so emotional over the subject when others have gone on with life. I am unable to really identify with a lot of things. So I feel unstuck and lost.
I've lost my train of thought. Mousie has gone from being quiet watching Lilo and Stitch to a fit and then a bath. So my concentration on this subject is gone now.
I know there are things I should be doing. Chores and such. But I just can't focus.
