[997] Tag - You're It

I don’t feel well. Today (I’m lumping in all of Tuesday until now at 6:20 AM on Wednesday) has been a struggle. I didn’t see it coming. I’m ridiculously tired and have a needlessly convoluted day ahead. It seems a lot is happening at once I haven’t been able to pay close enough attention to.

Last night, around 8 PM, I get an email from my ex. It’s a comprehensive yet concise summary of her perspective related to issues she experienced while she was here, what she’s discovered about herself, and the better and more stable situation she has managed to work out for herself. My initial inclination, not seeing the email until 10 PM, was to write very briefly that I’m glad she’s in a better place and that I’m around if she needs help. There’s a decent chance this exchange set the groundwork for my difficulties the rest of the day.

For long periods of time, I’m professionally open, empathetic, patient, and using my brain to try and wedge bits of helpful information. I’m often trying to do this for people who are hell bent on not learning, changing, or even speaking honestly about how little they care to learn or change. While I don’t have the propensity anymore to have wild mood swings or extreme elevations of sadness or anger, it does not mean the tools I use to stay that way can’t break or get exhausted.

My ex is emotionally exhausting. Watching myself work in contrast to my better self is emotionally exhausting. Hearing crickets and feeling stagnant when I earnestly try to improve my circumstances or proactively do something better is emotionally exhausting. All of these happening at once mean I’m waking up at 4AM to get my notes in just before the 48-hour deadline because I can’t find myself in the wasted hours at my meaningless job.

I’ve made the group discussion topic this week about bragging on yourself and discussing the things you like about your personality. There’s a slew of people who all consider themselves “hard-workers.” There’s many who think they’re “loyal.” A lot of proud parents (except for that year or 3 when they weren’t able) or grandparents (“to make up for how I wasn’t with my kids.”) So many consider themselves helpful and willing to give of themselves in much greater proportion than they get back. Many enough struggle to say 2 positive things about themselves back-to-back, and even if they manage to, each answer is glued to reiterations of, “I don’t know.”

I could draw any number of damming conclusions from my series of informal take-aways from people’s aggregate answers. It’s “obvious” to me that whether you’re describing things you like or hate about yourself, you’re probably doing it in a very fuzzy way. You don’t realize, not really, the impact of doing so and how it feeds your inability to remain emotionally stable or evolve your relationship to yourself. Are you a hard-worker, or obsessive compulsive? Could you tell the difference? Are you even interested in learning how? Each question probes different and nuanced layers that the vast majority appear either uninterested in or incapable of accessing.

That means, as a society, you create pill-mills with passable optics and hostages-named-counselors who need to pay back their sign-on “bonuses” if their conscience catches up to them. That means a lot of fancy words about “care-coordination” and “golden threads” tracking progress. That means entertaining a difference between “maintenance” and “stabilizing” per hazy diagnostic criterion, but hardly practically employed or useful for more than passing an audit. That means overlooking the demonstrable harm of employing people wholly incapable of remaining consistent and professional, and prioritizing their ability to parrot company lines over look too closely at their tangible impact and conduct.

What I want must be the hardest thing in the world to achieve. Maybe I’m making a huge thinking error in regarding it as “easy” because of the isolated examples I can set for myself. I have this analogy in my head about real accountability or moral behavior, responsible exercises of power, methodical and deliberate practice, and recognition and reciprocity that feel practically fucking mythical in this moment.

When I want to learn a song, if nothing else, I get in the habit of sitting down at the piano, picking up the guitar, or leaving my alto sax case open and assembled so I can catch and flow with the moment. I’ve watched myself learn a new song on the piano over the last few weeks. I’ve felt myself die and recede with regard to my “professional” development. I’ve felt myself punished for the goodwill and effort I’ve put forth. In echoing my ex’s language, after failing to establish and protect my boundaries, I’ve allowed myself to get disrespected over and over again. But I don’t know what else to do, and help is not forthcoming.

Do you think I should reach out to my past exes and tell them how much more mature or accountable I’ve become? Do you think any of my past “friends” care to hear how I’ve incorporated their perspectives or concerns for my “negativity” or the parties or the pain I’ve resonated as for them? None of them give a fuck lol. They aren’t reaching out to me anymore than I am to them. I bet if they were in my groups, they’d talk about how hard-working, loyal, open and honest, and effusively giving they were in spite of how much they might get back. And then it’d be my job to encourage that self-talk to “break a negative thought pattern” so they can “improve” or incorporate a “coping” mechanism to deal with “cravings” to act like disingenuous or malicious cunts.

Meanwhile, I wait around for the next obligation to listen indefinitely, encourage, translate, entertain, or otherwise try to account for any reason you can’t be bothered to join me, answer me, or even feign solidarity. Does it cost too much? I’ll pay for it. Still, no? Must be me. Did I not give you enough time? Here’s weeks, no, a year, no wait several years. Can’t be bothered? Must be me. Didn’t resonate with this one’s tone? Here’s a thousand more. Crickets? I’m batting a fucking thousand over here.

It doesn’t matter how much I work or share. It doesn’t matter how often I try to focus on the good things about you, myself, or my circumstances. It doesn’t matter all the little psychological games I play to distract me or box in my capacity for self-destruction. It just matters that in the most fundamental way I remember I’m alone. Occasionally our industrious or indulgent pathologies will line up, and we’ll call it a team and ferret away our profits. But the heart of the perpetual betrayal will manifest eventually. It’s nothing personal. It’s no one’s responsibility. Not that they could tell one way or another.