This post started out as an elaboration of what I meant by "dreams", in The Prologue (Part 2): Of Lighthouses, Maps, and Dreams. After two hours of writing, I thought I had exactly what I wanted. Then I decided to put it aside, and returned to it after dinner, intent on polishing it up. Nearly three hours have passed. In that time, I realized I needed to work through a few ideas before I could fully explain my "dreams". And that has required me to work through my thoughts on “embarrassment” and “humiliation”.
That is why I am doing all this, to unravel truths, even the uncomfortable ones. While this may all seem meandering and long, please remember, it took me forty-two years to get here.
(This is why we need to be more kind and supportive, less judgmental and dismissive.)
That is why I am doing all this, to unravel truths, even the uncomfortable ones. While this may all seem meandering and long, please remember, it took me forty-two years to get here.
“And a rock feels
no pain
And an island never
cries.”
~Simon and
Garfunkel, “I am a Rock”
If someone ever
decided to turn my life into a television series, gave each stage of growth a
season, and identified each season with a theme song, from age
fourteen to about twenty-eight, the song would be Simon and
Garfunkel’s “I am a Rock”.
I wanted to be
alone, away from people, so I could avoid making mistakes in front of
them.
Throughout my
teenage years, well into early adulthood, I hated people. Well, no,
not hated them, but feared them. That fear stemmed from another one:
fear of embarrassment. Everyone makes mistakes in front of other
people. We usually end up embarrassed, and feel stupid. How we carry that
memory forward will depend on how we and others react to it. We can
control one, but not the other. And the one that we can control,
depends a lot on our internal thought processes, prior embarrassing
experiences, our emotional well-being, and the coping skills we have
learned.
In the end, feeling
embarrassed should pass with little incident, and should, after
awhile, either be put aside, or laughed about. It should not be
mocked at or punished. For most people, embarrassing memories become
something to smile or roll one’s eyes at, especially among friends.
However, for other
people, being embarrassed can trigger another feeling.
Embarrassment can
lead to feeling humiliated. That is when we feel we have lost our
standing among other people, and are unable to show our faces to
them. We are social animals, and most humans want to belong. At times, humiliation can be worse than death. For now, I am putting aside
whether the humiliation is deserved or justified. What matters for my
discussion, is that it is an awful feeling, one that we avoid at great lengths.
And that is why I
never wanted to be embarrassed: in my mind, embarrassment equaled
humiliation. That fear led to social anxiety: I did not want to put
myself in situations where I would do something wrong, or say
something awkward. So, I avoided people as much as I could. When I
had to interact with them, I was shy and introverted.
So what if you feel
humiliated instead of embarrassed when you make mistakes? Well,
instead of navigating the experience with an apology, humor, and
goodwill, and learning something of value, a humiliated person begins
to lie, lash out, and hate. Have it happen enough times, these
reactions becomes habit, which initiates a positive feedback loop.
(This is why we need to be more kind and supportive, less judgmental and dismissive.)
Also, a lot of this
is context driven; most of it is subjective. If someone walks in on
you while taking a shower, how you feel will depend on a lot of
factors. Is the person your spouse, friend, or stranger? How do you
feel about your body? How does the other person react at the moment?
What do they say or do after? All of these things will determine if
being discovered naked in the shower is just an embarrassing memory
to be laughed at later, or an humiliating experience that could
paralyze you for life. More importantly, some of these factors you
can control; others you cannot not.
What if you become tired of being a rock, living alone on an island, because of your fears? How do you break free of a cycle that has kept you there for so many years? You have to figure a way to replace old habits with new ones.
What does any of
that have to with fears, social anxiety, and habits? Simple. Work on the things you can control, acknowledge the things you cannot,
and put them aside for now. Learn to accept your vulnerabilities,
your nakedness. Teach yourself that you deserve your dignity.
Separate your dignity from false expectations. Surround yourself with
people who will laugh with you and not at you, who will listen to
your life stories, and respect you. Let go of the ones who won’t.
And should you be humiliated? Don’t bury it, but confront it.
Analyze it, and, if necessary, leave it behind you, and let other
figure it out.
None of this is easy
to do, and will take time. Friendships are not born completed, but
require effort. Some need more attention than others. Also, some life
situations are far more complicated, and their solutions may have
far-reaching consequences. Nor will anything change overnight. Or in
a week. It will take years to build better habits, and create new
ones.
And this is where my
“dreams” play an important part. A habit needs to be identified.
That is what a lighthouse does, it exposes what needs to be changed.
Changing something effectively, requires directions and instructions,
and that is where a good map becomes essential. But a habit takes
time to form, and needs constant attention. In fact, it needs
positive reinforcement in order to take hold. That is why you need a
dream: that person or thing to inspire you to continue when building
a habit becomes too difficult.
Back in my third
post, I wrote the following:
“Dreaming is what I do best. It arises from my daily interactions with people and things. Catching a smile on a beautiful face as I enter a room. Seeing dancers leaping across stage, hearing singers chanting catchy show tunes. Watching a series of folk and pop songs from foreign lands on YouTube. Reading a collection of multi-colored Post-It notes from classmates. Witnessing children take interest in your own past hobbies. Finding inspiring documentaries about hiking, dancing, poetry, and sushi. And searching for clues hidden away in boxes scattered across rooms.They all revealed the way, and I chose to embrace them.”
It was these dreams,
and many more, that played a valuable part in my overcoming a
debilitating and self-destructive social anxiety.
For those people and
their actions, I am eternally grateful.
And with all this written out, including the stuff I wrote these past two days, but did not publish, I am better able to explain how my social anxiety formed, the damage it wrought, and the lighthouses, maps, and dreams that helped me to identify this struggle, and the habits necessary to work on it.
(to be continued…)
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