Pondering Unhappiness
I am unhappy.
There is simply no avoiding that fact. In my life, I’ve spent more time unhappy than I would like, and certainly more time than I would like to admit. It’s not as if my life is a Greek tragedy (or any other variety), though it has its share of genuine ills; I don’t want to give the impression of being self-pitying and pathetic. And I really hate admitting to unhappiness that has been directly or indirectly caused by someone, for fear they’ll realize it, and recognize the power they have over me. How embarrassing, how vulnerable; how frightening.
I have always felt things keenly. Existence seems to be in slightly sharper focus for me than for most people, and I’m not at all sure it’s to the good. I was a very sensitive child, quick to display high emotion, and easy to shame. Shame is a wretched thing. “Don’t you realize what you look like when you’re doing that?” I learned to realize it, and I never stopped realizing. I am self-aware to the point of occasional obsession. I am even self-aware about the potential annoyingness of my self-awareness and self-consciousness. Don’t think the irony of that is lost on me.
I learned to feel shame in the wake of a display of emotion, so gradually, I learned to hide the emotions. Of course, that had its own difficulties, not the least of which was the sheer impossibility of denying my nature. For years now, I’ve tried to find balance, between the poles of keeping myself safe, and being myself: someone who feels keenly and desires connection with others above all things.
In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s not working very well. I always lean too far in one direction or the other, and usually exactly the wrong one at exactly the wrong time, just when it seems to matter most. Just one more thing for me to agonize over, and I do. Especially now. I spend far too much time inside my own head. I work, I read, I watch movies, I organize my room, I drive. That’s all. I play the piano, a little bit, usually the same song; soon it will be polished and finished and then what will I do? Work exhausts me in every conceivable way: emotionally, mentally, and physically, it takes everything out of me. The things that make me a gifted therapist are the things that make it too much, too hard, to be sustained.
I have no social life to speak of, really. There are a couple of friends I see occasionally, too many of whom I used to date. I am achingly lonely. For the first two months after I moved to Pasadena, I tried. I tried so hard to keep friends, to make friends, to go out, to date, to be young and vibrant and alive. But things happened - don’t they always? - and I couldn’t do it anymore. I didn’t have it in me to keep trying. I feel like I’ve been sleepwalking since the beginning of November.
I’ve tried to have fun, a few times. It’s been exhausting.
There were a lot of things that happened, a lot of things that are happening, and plenty in my own nature that make up this equation of unhappiness. However, there is one thing in particular that remains unresolved, whereas much of the rest has been straightened out. But this one thing, its effect on me - however fractional - makes me despise myself. Shame on me, for feeling this way. Shame on me for giving this thing power over me. The inherent shame of this one thing makes me want to hide it and run away from it, but the more I try to ignore it, the more it creeps back and jabs me in the ribs.
So I’m going to try an experiment. Since trying, somewhat belatedly, to stifle, hide, ignore, and otherwise distort my emotional display has been wholly ineffective at making me feel better about it, I’m going to stop stifling it.
There was someone I cared about, far more than I ever planned to. I hadn’t been making plans at all, and then there it was, and I didn’t know what to do with it. I over-thought it - I often do - and ended up in a hopelessly tangled mess. And then somehow, over sushi and tearful political victory, it seemed that maybe I hadn’t written myself into a corner. What a lovely, lovely thing. What happened next? I don’t know. I really don’t know. To my immense frustration (I loathe unfinished business) I probably never will. Hardly for the first time, someone I cared for…disappeared. How hard is it, really, to say goodbye? To say “You know, this really isn’t what I want. I don’t think we should see each other anymore.” To say, “It’s come to my attention that you might be a wee bit more emotionally unstable than I’m comfortable with. Please go be crazy somewhere else.” To say SOMETHING!
This person talked a lot about honor, and about honesty. We both did. Apparently I was the only one who meant it.
So, really, if by some peculiar chance the person in question is reading this - all I ever wanted was to understand. I wouldn’t have thrown a tantrum, or begged to be your one and only, or made it difficult in some fashion. We’d been involved long enough that you really did owe me an explanation, but I was too confused and too painfully aware of my vulnerability to push for one. But really - if that’s who you are, someone who runs away rather than facing up and even saying goodbye, then, well, better I found out sooner than later. Still, could I have my movies back? And also those pictures?
Even so - I meant every word. I really did think you were amazing, and I wish we could have parted on terms that didn’t force me to wonder how much of it was an act, a lie, or a game.
Now, I must backtrack and clarify that this unstrung romance is not the sole cause of my ongoing unhappiness. But I’ve spent months now trying to convince myself - and everyone else - that it’s not bothering me, to the end that it’s banging on the door trying to get out, and I’m tired of listening to it, so out it goes, however anonymously. Ask me tomorrow, and I might have a better metaphor. Right now, that’s the best I’ve got.
Shame is a hideously powerful thing. I’m so afraid of feeling ashamed; that awful, sick shame when my emotions are exposed and I’m vulnerable and everyone can see that I’m broken. I’m so afraid of that shame that sometimes, I would do just about anything to keep from feeling it. So I hide my emotions, or I try to mislead or misdirect. I make people angry, so they’ll look at something, anything other than me, so they won’t see the power they have over me. Understand that I don’t just mean lovers; this applies to friends, to family, even to casual acquaintances. I will make myself into an idiot, a whore, or a bitch, just to avoid being seen, when I’m afraid someone might see too much. It’s incredibly counter-productive.
I am unhappy. I am unsatisfied with my unhappiness, and I am fighting it tooth and nail - some days more than others. I am fighting on so many fronts, and I am exhausted. I am alone, and I am exhausted. I rarely have fun; I miss fun. It’s a new year. A year in which I will turn 24, and move away from everything I have ever known. A year in which I will start over. The countdown is on. There are things to do, and things to be.
I want to be more fully honest, and less ruled by my fears. This was a start. And do you know what? I feel a little better. That thing that was sitting in a corner of me head, unacknowledged but refusing to leave and growing stronger in the darkness - well, it’s sitting on the internet now. I have released it into the world, and it is welcome to become gossip if it chooses. More likely, it will continue being ignored, but it’s just not my problem anymore.
And now, because I have been so oppressively serious, I will leave you with this, a quote from the UK television program Coupling: “I want you to know, I intend this breast satirically.”
There are so few contexts for that remark.
There is simply no avoiding that fact. In my life, I’ve spent more time unhappy than I would like, and certainly more time than I would like to admit. It’s not as if my life is a Greek tragedy (or any other variety), though it has its share of genuine ills; I don’t want to give the impression of being self-pitying and pathetic. And I really hate admitting to unhappiness that has been directly or indirectly caused by someone, for fear they’ll realize it, and recognize the power they have over me. How embarrassing, how vulnerable; how frightening.
I have always felt things keenly. Existence seems to be in slightly sharper focus for me than for most people, and I’m not at all sure it’s to the good. I was a very sensitive child, quick to display high emotion, and easy to shame. Shame is a wretched thing. “Don’t you realize what you look like when you’re doing that?” I learned to realize it, and I never stopped realizing. I am self-aware to the point of occasional obsession. I am even self-aware about the potential annoyingness of my self-awareness and self-consciousness. Don’t think the irony of that is lost on me.
I learned to feel shame in the wake of a display of emotion, so gradually, I learned to hide the emotions. Of course, that had its own difficulties, not the least of which was the sheer impossibility of denying my nature. For years now, I’ve tried to find balance, between the poles of keeping myself safe, and being myself: someone who feels keenly and desires connection with others above all things.
In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s not working very well. I always lean too far in one direction or the other, and usually exactly the wrong one at exactly the wrong time, just when it seems to matter most. Just one more thing for me to agonize over, and I do. Especially now. I spend far too much time inside my own head. I work, I read, I watch movies, I organize my room, I drive. That’s all. I play the piano, a little bit, usually the same song; soon it will be polished and finished and then what will I do? Work exhausts me in every conceivable way: emotionally, mentally, and physically, it takes everything out of me. The things that make me a gifted therapist are the things that make it too much, too hard, to be sustained.
I have no social life to speak of, really. There are a couple of friends I see occasionally, too many of whom I used to date. I am achingly lonely. For the first two months after I moved to Pasadena, I tried. I tried so hard to keep friends, to make friends, to go out, to date, to be young and vibrant and alive. But things happened - don’t they always? - and I couldn’t do it anymore. I didn’t have it in me to keep trying. I feel like I’ve been sleepwalking since the beginning of November.
I’ve tried to have fun, a few times. It’s been exhausting.
There were a lot of things that happened, a lot of things that are happening, and plenty in my own nature that make up this equation of unhappiness. However, there is one thing in particular that remains unresolved, whereas much of the rest has been straightened out. But this one thing, its effect on me - however fractional - makes me despise myself. Shame on me, for feeling this way. Shame on me for giving this thing power over me. The inherent shame of this one thing makes me want to hide it and run away from it, but the more I try to ignore it, the more it creeps back and jabs me in the ribs.
So I’m going to try an experiment. Since trying, somewhat belatedly, to stifle, hide, ignore, and otherwise distort my emotional display has been wholly ineffective at making me feel better about it, I’m going to stop stifling it.
There was someone I cared about, far more than I ever planned to. I hadn’t been making plans at all, and then there it was, and I didn’t know what to do with it. I over-thought it - I often do - and ended up in a hopelessly tangled mess. And then somehow, over sushi and tearful political victory, it seemed that maybe I hadn’t written myself into a corner. What a lovely, lovely thing. What happened next? I don’t know. I really don’t know. To my immense frustration (I loathe unfinished business) I probably never will. Hardly for the first time, someone I cared for…disappeared. How hard is it, really, to say goodbye? To say “You know, this really isn’t what I want. I don’t think we should see each other anymore.” To say, “It’s come to my attention that you might be a wee bit more emotionally unstable than I’m comfortable with. Please go be crazy somewhere else.” To say SOMETHING!
This person talked a lot about honor, and about honesty. We both did. Apparently I was the only one who meant it.
So, really, if by some peculiar chance the person in question is reading this - all I ever wanted was to understand. I wouldn’t have thrown a tantrum, or begged to be your one and only, or made it difficult in some fashion. We’d been involved long enough that you really did owe me an explanation, but I was too confused and too painfully aware of my vulnerability to push for one. But really - if that’s who you are, someone who runs away rather than facing up and even saying goodbye, then, well, better I found out sooner than later. Still, could I have my movies back? And also those pictures?
Even so - I meant every word. I really did think you were amazing, and I wish we could have parted on terms that didn’t force me to wonder how much of it was an act, a lie, or a game.
Now, I must backtrack and clarify that this unstrung romance is not the sole cause of my ongoing unhappiness. But I’ve spent months now trying to convince myself - and everyone else - that it’s not bothering me, to the end that it’s banging on the door trying to get out, and I’m tired of listening to it, so out it goes, however anonymously. Ask me tomorrow, and I might have a better metaphor. Right now, that’s the best I’ve got.
Shame is a hideously powerful thing. I’m so afraid of feeling ashamed; that awful, sick shame when my emotions are exposed and I’m vulnerable and everyone can see that I’m broken. I’m so afraid of that shame that sometimes, I would do just about anything to keep from feeling it. So I hide my emotions, or I try to mislead or misdirect. I make people angry, so they’ll look at something, anything other than me, so they won’t see the power they have over me. Understand that I don’t just mean lovers; this applies to friends, to family, even to casual acquaintances. I will make myself into an idiot, a whore, or a bitch, just to avoid being seen, when I’m afraid someone might see too much. It’s incredibly counter-productive.
I am unhappy. I am unsatisfied with my unhappiness, and I am fighting it tooth and nail - some days more than others. I am fighting on so many fronts, and I am exhausted. I am alone, and I am exhausted. I rarely have fun; I miss fun. It’s a new year. A year in which I will turn 24, and move away from everything I have ever known. A year in which I will start over. The countdown is on. There are things to do, and things to be.
I want to be more fully honest, and less ruled by my fears. This was a start. And do you know what? I feel a little better. That thing that was sitting in a corner of me head, unacknowledged but refusing to leave and growing stronger in the darkness - well, it’s sitting on the internet now. I have released it into the world, and it is welcome to become gossip if it chooses. More likely, it will continue being ignored, but it’s just not my problem anymore.
And now, because I have been so oppressively serious, I will leave you with this, a quote from the UK television program Coupling: “I want you to know, I intend this breast satirically.”
There are so few contexts for that remark.