So having moved the blog, it suddenly showed old comments from before I disabled them. I found a comment from this guy I used to be friends with, but stopped talking to him after I felt like he was using me for some mind game that had less to do with me and a real friendship, and more to do with projections from his conflicted world. Here’s the back story.
So I read the comment, and it sounded like familiar bullshit that he was spitting to me at the time. He was always trying to hang his issues on me, and project them as mine. The comment sounded like he was just using me to get himself to drink his own koolaid. I usually try not to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Sometimes, people say things about you that you don’t want to hear, and your automatic response is to dismiss it. But there could be some truth that might help you become a better version of yourself, if you can just objectively separate things that may be useful to you, from things that you genuinely feel don’t apply. I always try to hear what people are saying at the very least, before deciding. You can’t go blindly either way, but ideally, you have to trust yourself to know yourself best, discern what is helpful input and what is not, and to decide the direction of your own life. It’s also helpful to get someone you trust’s feedback for an outside perspective. Using triangles are easiest ways to derive perspective. So I sent it to Rie. I’m really posting this because Rie’s response is awesome.
From B:
Moments can be perfect. Like a poem or song. Everything is there, just as it should be. But life is everything in between. Life is never pure. Life is confusion. Life is the unpredictable. Life makes you vulnerable. You revel in your angst. You like the moment… because you feel alive without really living. You play a familiar role… even the “real” you you choose to share is a familiar song with a small jazz improv bit that is quickly dropped when it stops feeling familiar.
But you are not being fair to yourself. You’re more than you think you are. You are more than someone who channels. Everything you use to describe your “magic” deals with stealing and borrowing from others…unknowingly proclaiming that you are nothing more than a radio capturing a signal. But you are so much more than that. It’ll take someone with a stable sense of love and trust to allow you to discover this. Unaware, I hated myself and denied anything more than charming others with the ‘Me’ I liked. But in doing so, I hated those around me for not knowing the real me. But I met someone with that love and trust. It was tough. I didn’t believe her. I thought she was crazy. But slowly she showed me that what I thought was empty was filled. She showed me what it was filled with without condescend. I still doubt that what is there is there. I still battle with self hatred. But I can trust and love.
From Rie:
He’s trying to say you aren’t being real to him. He’s just whining, really. So his comment, to me, isn’t an analysis, it’s more like he’s complaining to you about not showing HIM the real you.
It’s interesting though; the act of analyzing someone is flattering to the one who’s being analyzed (you, in this situation), and he knows that and plays with it. It’s a double-edged sword because it’s in one’s nature to want to hear more about themselves through another person’s eyes (that’s why certain other readers are on your blog all the time). Yet, some idiots like Bobby take that opportunity to slide in some jabs, based on their own insecurities and doubts.
My take on it is, first of all, there is no “real” you. Or “real” me, for that matter. We all play a role in society, in our relationships, etc. We have our beliefs, principles, etc, and that makes up our idea of who the “real me” is, but that’s something that’s felt by others, not analyzed and confirmed. Bobby apparently didn’t feel like he knew the real you. He felt that pretending to analyze you while flattering you at the same time would make him trust you, that that would be his way “in” to you. Maybe you never showed him the real you. Or maybe you did, but he didn’t trust it.
Whatever it is, it’s irrelevant. You are whatever you want to be to other people. You’re a REAL person to me, for example, because you want to be, and I feel instinctively that you are. There’s no analyzing.