I really really shouldn’t be awake at the moment. I just heard my housemate get home from work, and that means dawn is getting a little close for comfort. As usual, insomnia only strikes me when I have something to do today. In this case, that something is work. That something is looming closer and closer and do you think for the life of me that I can sleep? No. Not a chance.
What is unusual for me is that there is no one pressing thought or worry or preoccupation that is keeping me awake this evening. I am tired, I know that much. I also wasn’t dwelling too much on any one thing in particular, so I can’t say for certain that it was my mental state that has kept me awake.
But yet here I am, on the blog that I use as my mental sounding board. It’s nearly 5am, and I must have something I want to talk about or I wouldn’t be here.
I suppose one thing that I want to share is that I’m almost at the point where I want to stand up and say “You know what, I’m sick of being alone, can I have someone please?”. I have a funny feeling I’m not going to be able to use that sentence in conversation in any real sense, but I do want to explore the topic of my returning self worth.
My mental state over the last decade has been curious to say the least. The reality of the issue is that I nurse some pretty epic self worth issues that would rival many of my more obviously damaged peers. I guess the individual sort of crazy that I have is a little more insidious, as I’m not sure I would have admitted or even believed that I was a bit broken even five or so years ago, but the wisdom of hindsight is a wonderful thing and I think that it’s starting to become clear that I just didn’t value myself enough to believe that I had a right to inflict myself onto anyone.
I’m starting to get to a point where I want to explore the possibility of not dying alone. I still think I could live my entire life without ever feeling like someone is returning my affections, but where once I had this crazy sort of acceptance of that possibility, I am moving towards a cloying sense of fear that my life might end up that way.
How positive is that? I know right.
But if we look a little closer, it is perhaps a little more positive than one might imagine. Fear is a much more powerful motivator than apathy, which only really motivates you to recite “Meh.” when prompted to do anything other than sleep. Like all negative emotions, fear can be my friend if I use it in the right way, and I’m the master of negative emotions, so I’ve decided to use that as my fire to start clearing out the cobwebs.
And thus, I suppose, this leads us to the reason why I am here. I was having a look into the how to meet gay guys in your area section of the internet today. Specifically, I wasn’t looking for dating sites, as I am finally at a point now where I can say comfortably that I will not find what I seek on some trashtastic fuck fest website. No, I was looking into LGBT groups and trying to form an action plan to at least try and find a friend or two that might share my preferences.
I’m a horrible isolationist, and I acknowledge that that is a massive issue that I have to work at resolving. I can’t expect change in any aspect of my life to just happen because of a change of weather or scenery. I have been stoic and even proactive in limiting the outside influences in my life for years now, but even 5am clarity can’t shed much light on why I took that stance now. I’ll lament the wasted years when I get a chance to grieve for them, but I feel an intense need to just get on with it before I’m 40 and alone with my half a dog and zero prospects at happiness.
Anyway, good old friendly Mr. Internet didn’t really give me much to work with this evening. I couldn’t find much by way of groups that meet to just hang out, especially for adults. Makes me wonder if people my age that are LGBT on average seem to already have it together by 27. I’m sure that isn’t realistic. I’m not in the closet (really) which puts me head and shoulders above a lot of other people that are in denial about their preferences.
But that’s an issue in and of itself. I’ve been wanting to go out to a gay bar and experience the scene in person for the first time. I’m reasonably certain I’m going to hate it, but it’s a developmental step I think I skipped, and I feel that I need to have some exposure to that element of the demographic to move forward. However, the words of my les-bi housemate have troubled me somewhat. She says I’m not ready yet, despite the fact that I feel that I am. Now, this girl isn’t really close enough to me on an internal working level for her to be bang on right, but she provided enough by way of reasoning that it did encourage me to explore my position a little deeper.
What shocks me is that I think she might be right. I think I’m going into this with the wrong attitude, and that my fundamental attitude towards LGBT people and issues is flawed at best and misguided at worst. I mean, lets look at it this way. I’ve never liked at any level any gay person I have ever met. I’ve never seen them as anything more than painful stereotypes of the group they hail from, and I have been tearing myself away from stereotypes since I could spell the word.
You know, for all my psychological wisdom and counselling experience, I’m not too sure where to go to get that fixed. I mean, I am the first to move people away from self-diagnosis, but I don’t think what I have/am/do has a name, and I don’t know if there is a specialist or therapist that would have any answer other than “Grow the fuck up” on file.
And yet the question remains. If I’m at the point where I fear the idea of approaching inevitable and unavoidable entropy and death on my own, but I struggle to find people attractive, then I believe I have an issue.
But yet, when I was writing that last paragraph, I think I stumbled into something worth exploring. I wrote in that last sentence that I don’t find men emotionally attractive, just physically. That right there is interesting, because there is a name for that. Differing attractions are part of the human emotional and sexual experience, and they are not always inclusive.
That’s an interesting discovery and one that I move forward with.
See, I knew there was a reason for me to write this all out. I mean, my instincts are pretty good, and wanted to come out and write after about the first hour of lying in bed hoping sleep would be something I could complete tonight. What I got was an answer to a question that I had to work through a fair bit to get to.
Anyways, I’m going to round this post out with another thought to ponder. I mentioned above that I’ve been tearing myself away from stereotypes for as long as I can remember. I fear being ordinary or the same as anyone else, which is a driving personality marker for me. I don’t know why it is exactly, but my individuality is something I’ve fought over at the expense of all else for years and years.
What is interesting is that I’ve worked so hard to ensure that I am not ticking any of the stereotypical gay boxes that I don’t feel any connection to the group at all. I’m denying that aspect of myself, turning off switches to essential facets of my personality in an attempt to… hell, I don’t know… exist worry free… I really don’t know why I do that. It’s not a healthy coping mechanism, as referenced by any person that I’ve ever seen do it, but what worries me slightly is that over the years it’s getting easier to do. Almost instinctual to turn off something when it gets painful or hard to deal with.
This is a trap. For god’s sake, I need to read and understand that soon or things are gonna get bad in a hurry. Denying any part of yourself, any vital essential part, is self-destructive, dishonest and dangerous. You know that! You are smarter than that.
Practice what you preach! Geeze!
Still, we go back to our first year psych lecture when the Professor was asked if psychologists were the most balanced people, and I remember him laughing and saying that it was quite the contrary.
Insight into the minds of others is a blessing. To balance that, most mental health workers struggle for insight into their own minds. I can’t remember exactly what his response was, but it was something Confucian and had a ring of truth to it.
In any case, despite the dark smear at the end of the post, this has been a positive experience for me. That essential fire inside each person that gives them their light has been dead a while for me now, but I’m stoking the fire to try and see if I can’t ignite it again.
I mightn’t be able to get it going on my own, and I realise now that this is probably the case, so I need to get the tools and then go out on an adventure to find someone who is really good at lighting fires.
Time to go find my spark.
“The full value of this life can only be got by fighting; the violent take it by storm. And if we have accepted everything we have missed something -- war. This life of ours is a very enjoyable fight, but a very miserable truce.”
-G. K. Chesterton
FallenPhoenix
