so about Japan
I keep trying to make myself sit down and do a proper "long-form writeup" of the Japan trip. Something to put a better narrative to all the tweets-as-I-went and unlabeled pile of Flickr photos. Maybe at some point the urge will win out and I'll actually do it. Until then I keep stumbling over the same thought: it's not about where I went or what I did there. It's about why I went, and why I did it the way I did.
Most of my life my self-confidence has been decently balanced; not too egoistic, not too much of a doormat. But over the last few years I finally learned to start standing up for myself -- adding some self-defense to the self-confidence. Doing so has vastly improved a number of things for me, but at the expense of a lot of the social side of life. The fact that I had to get safe distance from a number of people only helps prove that I (rather improperly) learned to tolerate maintainable levels of being used instead of working harder at meaningful relationships for a lot of my post-college life. I could always take care of myself and keep going, even when far too many people would latch on to get dragged along. Makes me wonder how life would have gone if I'd recognized this earlier and spent more of my 20's and 30's accelerating instead of held to a slower pace by all that drag.
So, yes, the changes have been good... but they've also been painful. Even if a lot of it was just being used or taken advantage of, the old levels of social interaction were cozy and comfortable, like a favorite old shirt. I miss it, and getting used to things being quieter is harder than I would have predicted. Reaching back out to ramp things up has been met with a lot of skepticism and cynicism. Health and age make it more difficult as well. I worry that becoming used to this "new norm" will put me on a more hermit-like path than is healthy. In short, I'm trying to keep from over-correcting.
Therefore it starts with the urge to Get Out And Go Do Things. To go do things despite high levels of work, health issues, mobility issues, worries and frets. To go do things just to make sure I can. To confirm that I can still rely on myself. To actually enjoy life and its experiences -- instead of my old ways of doing things for others and relying on their joy instead.
At the same time, I still needed some space. I really don't know how to word this part or explain it well. :( But it's something along the lines of knowing I'm an outsider and coming to terms with it. Exploring without having to rely upon others or deeply participate in their society felt necessary. A foreign country where I don't speak a lick of the language would give me that separation while still letting me experience new things. It'd still require me to interact one some basic levels but would keep me as the external visitor that I am.
Japan -- specifically the remote northern island of Hokkaido, which in the US is like the equivalent of going to the low-population areas of the midwest or mountain states -- fits those requirements. It fits while also being incredibly interesting, notably different and yet monoceros-tolerant. The bits at the start and end (plane flights, the big city of Tokyo, the insanity of Akihabara) would temper it into a decent mix. The fear of how unplanned the middle was, and the risks being taken, would provide the challenge. And then, hey, great luck: I found those stupidly cheap plane tickets and my boss approved the time off.
So that's why I went.
----
For a while I tried to convince others to come with me, but then I realized that's exactly what I shouldn't do, at least not this first trip. It would have broken that distance I needed so badly, and locked me into a tight space with someone else. Every time things got tough we'd be two people chattering away at each other, isolated from the entire country around them. We could turn to each other for comfort and safety, "us against the world" -- and no matter how distant, how alien or how separate I feel I am from this world, I never want to feel "against."
Without that safe zone of another familiar and communicative person alongside me, I was forced to interact to survive. I couldn't just live inside my head if I wanted to eat, find shelter and get around. I'd have to participate. I'd have to, well... just be me. Even if it meant all I could do was point, gesture and smile.
So that's why I went alone.
----
I spent a good seven days or so in the middle of that 16 day trip where I didn't talk to anybody, beyond a nod or a point or handing over a credit-card after filling a gas tank. I was a stranger in a strange land. A monoceros amongst these humans, unable to really communicate, but happy to smile, share food and explore around their world. It put some daily reality into how I feel inside my head.
It was lonely.
It was distant.
It was quiet.
It was calming, needed, and close to the heart.
Yes, I still retreated to Twitter in between the gaps, to drop off pics and quips and thoughts, knowing they'd be understood... but I didn't stick around to react. I treated it like messages being sent back on postcards to a distant home.
For most of the last few decades I haven't really felt that I'm a part of things in my own life; I'm just participating so that I may study and report, like a good researcher. Going where I did, how I did, let me put some reality to those feelings. This does the opposite of what one might expect: it actually shortened the distance between mind and experience and made me feel a lot better. It reattached me a little more to this world, by letting me live a few weeks being as separate as I feel.
In the weeks since I've returned I've been trying to hold on to that reattachment, with decent success. Maybe, just maybe, it'll help me open up a little more again.
Most of my life my self-confidence has been decently balanced; not too egoistic, not too much of a doormat. But over the last few years I finally learned to start standing up for myself -- adding some self-defense to the self-confidence. Doing so has vastly improved a number of things for me, but at the expense of a lot of the social side of life. The fact that I had to get safe distance from a number of people only helps prove that I (rather improperly) learned to tolerate maintainable levels of being used instead of working harder at meaningful relationships for a lot of my post-college life. I could always take care of myself and keep going, even when far too many people would latch on to get dragged along. Makes me wonder how life would have gone if I'd recognized this earlier and spent more of my 20's and 30's accelerating instead of held to a slower pace by all that drag.
So, yes, the changes have been good... but they've also been painful. Even if a lot of it was just being used or taken advantage of, the old levels of social interaction were cozy and comfortable, like a favorite old shirt. I miss it, and getting used to things being quieter is harder than I would have predicted. Reaching back out to ramp things up has been met with a lot of skepticism and cynicism. Health and age make it more difficult as well. I worry that becoming used to this "new norm" will put me on a more hermit-like path than is healthy. In short, I'm trying to keep from over-correcting.
Therefore it starts with the urge to Get Out And Go Do Things. To go do things despite high levels of work, health issues, mobility issues, worries and frets. To go do things just to make sure I can. To confirm that I can still rely on myself. To actually enjoy life and its experiences -- instead of my old ways of doing things for others and relying on their joy instead.
At the same time, I still needed some space. I really don't know how to word this part or explain it well. :( But it's something along the lines of knowing I'm an outsider and coming to terms with it. Exploring without having to rely upon others or deeply participate in their society felt necessary. A foreign country where I don't speak a lick of the language would give me that separation while still letting me experience new things. It'd still require me to interact one some basic levels but would keep me as the external visitor that I am.
Japan -- specifically the remote northern island of Hokkaido, which in the US is like the equivalent of going to the low-population areas of the midwest or mountain states -- fits those requirements. It fits while also being incredibly interesting, notably different and yet monoceros-tolerant. The bits at the start and end (plane flights, the big city of Tokyo, the insanity of Akihabara) would temper it into a decent mix. The fear of how unplanned the middle was, and the risks being taken, would provide the challenge. And then, hey, great luck: I found those stupidly cheap plane tickets and my boss approved the time off.
So that's why I went.
----
For a while I tried to convince others to come with me, but then I realized that's exactly what I shouldn't do, at least not this first trip. It would have broken that distance I needed so badly, and locked me into a tight space with someone else. Every time things got tough we'd be two people chattering away at each other, isolated from the entire country around them. We could turn to each other for comfort and safety, "us against the world" -- and no matter how distant, how alien or how separate I feel I am from this world, I never want to feel "against."
Without that safe zone of another familiar and communicative person alongside me, I was forced to interact to survive. I couldn't just live inside my head if I wanted to eat, find shelter and get around. I'd have to participate. I'd have to, well... just be me. Even if it meant all I could do was point, gesture and smile.
So that's why I went alone.
----
I spent a good seven days or so in the middle of that 16 day trip where I didn't talk to anybody, beyond a nod or a point or handing over a credit-card after filling a gas tank. I was a stranger in a strange land. A monoceros amongst these humans, unable to really communicate, but happy to smile, share food and explore around their world. It put some daily reality into how I feel inside my head.
It was lonely.
It was distant.
It was quiet.
It was calming, needed, and close to the heart.
Yes, I still retreated to Twitter in between the gaps, to drop off pics and quips and thoughts, knowing they'd be understood... but I didn't stick around to react. I treated it like messages being sent back on postcards to a distant home.
For most of the last few decades I haven't really felt that I'm a part of things in my own life; I'm just participating so that I may study and report, like a good researcher. Going where I did, how I did, let me put some reality to those feelings. This does the opposite of what one might expect: it actually shortened the distance between mind and experience and made me feel a lot better. It reattached me a little more to this world, by letting me live a few weeks being as separate as I feel.
In the weeks since I've returned I've been trying to hold on to that reattachment, with decent success. Maybe, just maybe, it'll help me open up a little more again.