There's something wrong with me.
Tuesday, 2 April 2019 13:01![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yvannairieI do, broadly speaking, want to make friends with opinions that are different from mine (and I do mean opinions -- stuff like being dismissive of a narrative that resonated strongly with me, expressing an opinion I agree with in a way that feels reductive, not shit like "Nazis have the wrong methods but they're entitled to their opinion") and I realise that part of the process of becoming friends is learning another viewpoint and expanding your own consideration to encompass it
but, like, tbh nothing saps my NRE and interest in a person quicker than a lack of granularity of thought. In the past year, I've had a few instances of people whose judgement I trusted because I assumed it was founded on the same kind of... maybe not exhaustive observation as mine, but at least built on a synthesis of observations the way mine is turn out to... not... really... have that, but rather rely on emotional "truths" that upon pressing reveal their contradictory nature. Instead of a foundation that a dialogue can be built on, I now have relationships that are the result of me lucking into finding people whose initial read is the same as my eventual read.
And honestly? The only word I can use for that is "terrifying." It makes me wonder how other people see me, if they think my thinking is similarly reductive, and are only humouring me when they refer to my meticulous thinking, if they assume my reasoning and opinions are ultimately emotional and shallow like theirs, and that thing I like saying, "you're entitled to your own wrong opinion" not as a joke but as an admission that I cannot be convinced of the wrongness of my positions?
It makes me wonder if my thinking even is as meticulous and rigorous as I try to make it -- or if it's essentially just another way for me to convince myself of the validity of my opinions. It makes me wonder if calling the kind of intial read opinions that scare the shit out of me "shallow" is just another sign that I'm not intelligent, I just have a sense of sense of superiority about these things. It makes me wonder if my thought and speech, the things I regularly describe as "as precise as possible", are simply elaborate. It makes me feel like all the worst nice things that have been said to me -- that I'm an "acquired taste", that I'm "difficult (but worth it)", that I'm "demanding" (all things said to me as compliments, btw) are true, and I've never outgrown that arrogance that made past me such a toxic and dangerous person to be around.
And yes, there is a... "sensible" part of my brain that, every time this starts, scoffs and goes "you don't know them, they don't know you, calm down" and I think the biggest reason this is so exhausting is that I go through this every time someone expresses an opinion or takes a position that seems unfounded but isn't expressly acknowledged as such and it reminds me just how much I don't trust and cannot trust my own emotions on anything, and how much of a dangerous position it has been to trust people who trust their emotions.
So, maybe it's wrong to say that a lack of granularity "saps my interest" -- it's more the "being rendered unable to talk or think" that pretty much ruins my ability to reach out to people. I have been burned incomprehensibly hard by this, and I've been trying to manage it alongside the unspoken acknowledgement that I need to reign in my response to this (because as bad as I have it, that doesn't give me the right to say things I know will set off other people's rejection anxiety) so it only ever really bubbles up in private when I'm considering my relationship to someone in a space where they're not present -- which is. Most of the time, when trying to make a new friend.
But there's definitely something wrong with me if the idea of other people having different opinions than I do makes my mind blank out with anxiety, and I don't know what to do about it.
but, like, tbh nothing saps my NRE and interest in a person quicker than a lack of granularity of thought. In the past year, I've had a few instances of people whose judgement I trusted because I assumed it was founded on the same kind of... maybe not exhaustive observation as mine, but at least built on a synthesis of observations the way mine is turn out to... not... really... have that, but rather rely on emotional "truths" that upon pressing reveal their contradictory nature. Instead of a foundation that a dialogue can be built on, I now have relationships that are the result of me lucking into finding people whose initial read is the same as my eventual read.
And honestly? The only word I can use for that is "terrifying." It makes me wonder how other people see me, if they think my thinking is similarly reductive, and are only humouring me when they refer to my meticulous thinking, if they assume my reasoning and opinions are ultimately emotional and shallow like theirs, and that thing I like saying, "you're entitled to your own wrong opinion" not as a joke but as an admission that I cannot be convinced of the wrongness of my positions?
It makes me wonder if my thinking even is as meticulous and rigorous as I try to make it -- or if it's essentially just another way for me to convince myself of the validity of my opinions. It makes me wonder if calling the kind of intial read opinions that scare the shit out of me "shallow" is just another sign that I'm not intelligent, I just have a sense of sense of superiority about these things. It makes me wonder if my thought and speech, the things I regularly describe as "as precise as possible", are simply elaborate. It makes me feel like all the worst nice things that have been said to me -- that I'm an "acquired taste", that I'm "difficult (but worth it)", that I'm "demanding" (all things said to me as compliments, btw) are true, and I've never outgrown that arrogance that made past me such a toxic and dangerous person to be around.
And yes, there is a... "sensible" part of my brain that, every time this starts, scoffs and goes "you don't know them, they don't know you, calm down" and I think the biggest reason this is so exhausting is that I go through this every time someone expresses an opinion or takes a position that seems unfounded but isn't expressly acknowledged as such and it reminds me just how much I don't trust and cannot trust my own emotions on anything, and how much of a dangerous position it has been to trust people who trust their emotions.
So, maybe it's wrong to say that a lack of granularity "saps my interest" -- it's more the "being rendered unable to talk or think" that pretty much ruins my ability to reach out to people. I have been burned incomprehensibly hard by this, and I've been trying to manage it alongside the unspoken acknowledgement that I need to reign in my response to this (because as bad as I have it, that doesn't give me the right to say things I know will set off other people's rejection anxiety) so it only ever really bubbles up in private when I'm considering my relationship to someone in a space where they're not present -- which is. Most of the time, when trying to make a new friend.
But there's definitely something wrong with me if the idea of other people having different opinions than I do makes my mind blank out with anxiety, and I don't know what to do about it.
