Do I Frighten You

Greetings all,

Another week another post that is the way of this.  This week has been tough.  With the snow and cold I am realizing I need to buff up a bit if I want to be able to handle winter.  Emotionally I have also been sort of down.  I've been taking side trips into the blues and the blahs.  It happens usually more in February (and it did then too).  I get this way sometimes, impatient for what I've been working hard on but that has yet to fully manifest.

I've realized I've been hooking into other people's perception of me, and it hasn't been from my admirers either.  For some odd reason I've been resonating with people who only see what is lacking in my character.  It's a big trap you see worrying about what people think of you.  Once you latch onto that you hook into their paradigm.  From what I've noticed most people don't have the most enjoyable paradigm.  There are too many rules, limitations, and do not enter signs.

In a nod to authenticity the past few months I've taken off the kid gloves.  I've lowered my mask now and then.  For some reason people find what lies beneath frightening.  I really don't think I'm all that scary.  Okay occasionally the fires of fury come out, but there are always warning signs.  There is plenty of time to get the women and children to safety.  Those that know me well understand that if I am directing my ire at someone they've worked at it, for a while.

Being enmeshed in other people's view of you causes problems not just for you but for them.  There have in the past been people who didn't understand the nature of my work.  They feared it and thus me.  Now they never came out and said it, but their reactions spoke volumes.  What they ended up doing though was behaving in a way that brought about just what they had feared.  I'm pretty laid back but you can only treat me poorly for so long before I respond in a way that most would deem unpleasant.  So fears become "justified", a self fulfilled prophecy caused by not minding our own business and projecting our worries and concerns onto another.

I'm quite sure we've all been on both sides of this equation.  In our culture right now we have the most managed facades ever.  Between all the social media platforms, peer groups, and family we are self monitoring continuously for how our brand is trending or not with the general populace.  In the words of Admiral Ackbar, "IT'S A TRAP!" This way is the way of madness, of abandoned dreams, and most importantly abandoned pieces of ourselves.  It is hard to not care what others are thinking about ourselves, but it is a skill we all must learn if we are to pursue our passions and be happy.

So what about you?  Are you paralyzed by what the peanut gallery is saying about you?  Do you still live in the high school mentality of the in crowd?  Are you constantly judging yourself by what you perceive to be the measuring stick of others?  Perhaps you are projecting onto others your fears, shoulds, and should nots.  It is the other side of the same coin.  In either case you are not free either in your perception or in your choices.  So why not try and detach and do things because it comes from within yourself.  Give yourself a privacy screen to keep out the unsought opinions.  Unplug from the memes of the crowd and just get to know which way you're going and why.

Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle