a tale of two narratives
I was working on another post that just talked around some issues. It was one of a series of posts that I would work on enthusiastically for about 20 minutes and then set aside and never finished because it wasn't actually saying anything new and it wasn't even saying the old stuff in a particularly interesting way.
What I'm working on here is a bit of self-observation. It may go a bit Ember Island on you, so bear that in mind.
I had noticed that I have a tendency to make myself a bit of a perpetual outside. I often find myself at the periphery of a group and have difficulty moving inwards. In fact, when it comes to my online habits, this has been an incredibly consistent pattern since early high school. In junior high and early message board RPGs, I was fully engaged - I did not feel self conscious and I would even look for ways to communicate with people outside the message board (chat rooms, IMs, etc). This more or less tailed off in the second half of high school; Evercrest and its shitty insular culture are perhaps somewhat to blame but some of it was simply the result of adolescence.
There have been odd exceptions since, but on the whole the pattern since has been one of lurking and seeking out communities where I don't know people (and don't end up getting to know them) or don't know a whole lot about the central focus of the forum. Now, some of this comes down to a changed social dynamic, too, where I get most of my social fix from hanging out with people in real life, but it's interesting that I have so repeatedly come back to this "outsider looking in" kind of position. I haven't just done it with communities, I've done it was specific games or hobbies as well.
It has a certain entertainment value and it can let you take the temperature of the given community/hobby/game, but when it becomes a habit, I think you forget how to follow-through a bit. You become stuck at that superficial level and have to overcome that habitual inertia to move past it.
If this doesn't make any sense to you, that's probably good. You are better at identifying your goals and interests and then achieving them than I am.
In any case, that's just the set-up. I am going somewhere different with this.
I realized that when I am considering myself and my history, there's two different kinds of narratives I fall into. The two narratives are these:
Narrative 1: I basically do what I like, when permitted by circumstances.
Narrative 2: I am basically ruled by circumstances and only get to do what I like when they permit it.
The structure of the sentence isn't that different, but the perspective absolutely is. The implication of Narrative 1 is that, most of the time, I am doing things that I enjoy and would like to continue with. There are complications and set-backs, but they are part of the overall process of well, being me.
Narrative 2 implies that most of the time I am responding to external pressures that exert a certain control over me. Only when those are dealt with can I relax and feel like myself.
It may still seem like a finer distinction, but remember that personal narratives are not just a moment to moment thing. We cast them back into our pasts (to explain our behavior in retrospect) and forward (to plan future decisions).
This is all a bit abstract, so let's take a specific example. Let's say my friend recommends a spy novel to me. At this point, I don't generally read spy novels - I mostly read fantasy. But I give the book a shot and end up reading through it in a couple days because it's written in an engaging way.
With Narrative 1, I look at this and say, "Oh! I guess I like spy novels in addition to fantasy novels!" and I can appreciate the recommendation from my friend.
With Narrative 2, the focus is more on the sense of obligation - I read this due to the recommendation, it wasn't bad, so now I can get back to what I really wanted to be doing and read about dragons. The enjoyment was still there, but it's in a secondary role - more of a "that wasn't as bad as I expected" rather than "I didn't know I liked that".
Narrative 2 sounds just awful, but it's not totally without merit when under a lot of pressure and needing to get things done. But Narrative 1 can be much more productive in the long run - rather than saying, "I will never get to play Persona/Outcast/etc until the organizing is done" (a Narrative 2 statement) it instead turns it into "Well, I have to do this organizing, but how can I do it in the most efficient way? How can I make sure that the result is uniquely mine and is in fact functional?"
It's something of a carrot versus a stick, and it's difficult to represent without over-simplifying a little bit. However, the tension between these two narratives underlies a LOT of my previous entries, as I wrestle with positivity and negativity.
An example with RPG books (what else) would be this:
Narrative 1: I have all these cool RPG books I haven't really read - I should go through them and see what appeals to me!
Narrative 2: I have all these RPG books that I have not yet read or run because they don't really speak to me*. I guess I'll go on the lookout for something new, something that I really can engage with.
* Talk about a circular argument.
As should be obvious from the tone here, I am trying to nurture the first narrative - in order to appreciate what I have and to take pride in what I do. Even if it is just weeding or mowing the yard, I don't mind doing yard work if I can listen to music or a podcast. And I can then shape the yard into something more to my liking.
This is complicated by the fact that I absolutely do have ups and downs in terms of my moods. I don't know that they're serious enough to slap some kind of label on them, but I have them. In the past, rather than trying to really understand these and being honest with myself about them, I had tried extremely hard to simply distract myself with a Narrative 2 type approach. "Oh! This thing you thought you liked was crap! No wonder it was dragging you down! The real path to feeling better is this new thing!"
The end result being a new project, an unfinished old project, and absolutely no recognition of the underlying issue - which could be anything from a mood swing to a diet change to outside factors that were honestly distressing but uncomfortable to contemplate.
This concludes Ken's amateur auto-psychoanalysis.
(That is the tricky thing about these narratives - they aren't self-contained and they have a strong influence on how you perceive new facts or even interpret old trends.)
The other thing - and final note - is that while I'm 28 and have a decent idea about the things I like, I am constantly surprised by new ones. It turns out that I do like, for instance, dramatic TV shows like Breaking Bad. Huh. I think it's super important to leave your mind open enough to be surprised by things like this - rather than define yourself too tightly and find there's no room for new things.
What I'm working on here is a bit of self-observation. It may go a bit Ember Island on you, so bear that in mind.
I had noticed that I have a tendency to make myself a bit of a perpetual outside. I often find myself at the periphery of a group and have difficulty moving inwards. In fact, when it comes to my online habits, this has been an incredibly consistent pattern since early high school. In junior high and early message board RPGs, I was fully engaged - I did not feel self conscious and I would even look for ways to communicate with people outside the message board (chat rooms, IMs, etc). This more or less tailed off in the second half of high school; Evercrest and its shitty insular culture are perhaps somewhat to blame but some of it was simply the result of adolescence.
There have been odd exceptions since, but on the whole the pattern since has been one of lurking and seeking out communities where I don't know people (and don't end up getting to know them) or don't know a whole lot about the central focus of the forum. Now, some of this comes down to a changed social dynamic, too, where I get most of my social fix from hanging out with people in real life, but it's interesting that I have so repeatedly come back to this "outsider looking in" kind of position. I haven't just done it with communities, I've done it was specific games or hobbies as well.
It has a certain entertainment value and it can let you take the temperature of the given community/hobby/game, but when it becomes a habit, I think you forget how to follow-through a bit. You become stuck at that superficial level and have to overcome that habitual inertia to move past it.
If this doesn't make any sense to you, that's probably good. You are better at identifying your goals and interests and then achieving them than I am.
In any case, that's just the set-up. I am going somewhere different with this.
I realized that when I am considering myself and my history, there's two different kinds of narratives I fall into. The two narratives are these:
Narrative 1: I basically do what I like, when permitted by circumstances.
Narrative 2: I am basically ruled by circumstances and only get to do what I like when they permit it.
The structure of the sentence isn't that different, but the perspective absolutely is. The implication of Narrative 1 is that, most of the time, I am doing things that I enjoy and would like to continue with. There are complications and set-backs, but they are part of the overall process of well, being me.
Narrative 2 implies that most of the time I am responding to external pressures that exert a certain control over me. Only when those are dealt with can I relax and feel like myself.
It may still seem like a finer distinction, but remember that personal narratives are not just a moment to moment thing. We cast them back into our pasts (to explain our behavior in retrospect) and forward (to plan future decisions).
This is all a bit abstract, so let's take a specific example. Let's say my friend recommends a spy novel to me. At this point, I don't generally read spy novels - I mostly read fantasy. But I give the book a shot and end up reading through it in a couple days because it's written in an engaging way.
With Narrative 1, I look at this and say, "Oh! I guess I like spy novels in addition to fantasy novels!" and I can appreciate the recommendation from my friend.
With Narrative 2, the focus is more on the sense of obligation - I read this due to the recommendation, it wasn't bad, so now I can get back to what I really wanted to be doing and read about dragons. The enjoyment was still there, but it's in a secondary role - more of a "that wasn't as bad as I expected" rather than "I didn't know I liked that".
Narrative 2 sounds just awful, but it's not totally without merit when under a lot of pressure and needing to get things done. But Narrative 1 can be much more productive in the long run - rather than saying, "I will never get to play Persona/Outcast/etc until the organizing is done" (a Narrative 2 statement) it instead turns it into "Well, I have to do this organizing, but how can I do it in the most efficient way? How can I make sure that the result is uniquely mine and is in fact functional?"
It's something of a carrot versus a stick, and it's difficult to represent without over-simplifying a little bit. However, the tension between these two narratives underlies a LOT of my previous entries, as I wrestle with positivity and negativity.
An example with RPG books (what else) would be this:
Narrative 1: I have all these cool RPG books I haven't really read - I should go through them and see what appeals to me!
Narrative 2: I have all these RPG books that I have not yet read or run because they don't really speak to me*. I guess I'll go on the lookout for something new, something that I really can engage with.
* Talk about a circular argument.
As should be obvious from the tone here, I am trying to nurture the first narrative - in order to appreciate what I have and to take pride in what I do. Even if it is just weeding or mowing the yard, I don't mind doing yard work if I can listen to music or a podcast. And I can then shape the yard into something more to my liking.
This is complicated by the fact that I absolutely do have ups and downs in terms of my moods. I don't know that they're serious enough to slap some kind of label on them, but I have them. In the past, rather than trying to really understand these and being honest with myself about them, I had tried extremely hard to simply distract myself with a Narrative 2 type approach. "Oh! This thing you thought you liked was crap! No wonder it was dragging you down! The real path to feeling better is this new thing!"
The end result being a new project, an unfinished old project, and absolutely no recognition of the underlying issue - which could be anything from a mood swing to a diet change to outside factors that were honestly distressing but uncomfortable to contemplate.
This concludes Ken's amateur auto-psychoanalysis.
(That is the tricky thing about these narratives - they aren't self-contained and they have a strong influence on how you perceive new facts or even interpret old trends.)
The other thing - and final note - is that while I'm 28 and have a decent idea about the things I like, I am constantly surprised by new ones. It turns out that I do like, for instance, dramatic TV shows like Breaking Bad. Huh. I think it's super important to leave your mind open enough to be surprised by things like this - rather than define yourself too tightly and find there's no room for new things.