“[Your blog is] like a train wreck … you can’t help but look. And that’s a victory for you. You have someone’s attention … someone who you think is wrong and you want to fix and yes, you have my attention. I read that when you wrote it and said “wow, she lives in her own little world. She sounds like I did when I was a teen …” You think you’re the only one to go through something like this, but you’re not. EVERYONE thinks the same thing, but at some point they grow up and think … “wow, I thought the world was all about me.”
Maybe it is because I am just a dumb kid like the quote describes, but I did not see my blog as a train wreck. This blog to me is a form of therapy. It is a place I can go to air my ideas and issues and get feedback. Yes I do live in my own little world; a place where things work according to what I think is right, but I use it only as a reference as to what needs to be done here.
I found out this weekend that a few people I know read my blog, but I did not know they did. Of the two people, one wrote the above comment while the other said something to the effect of “you are really deep and are not scared to say anything”. The person who said the latter comment might not remember because they were intoxicated at the time.
I do enjoy people reading my blog, but I also enjoy reading the comments, because that is what it is about; learning through other people. For those “invisible” readers, please contribute to my learning experience by leaving comments.
Back to the author of the quote. We have been having conflict for some time and it is tiring. I feel like this person truly hates me and my values but I have yet to get a clear reason why. It is like this person enjoys manipulating my words and action to make me look like an evil person. I could be wrong, but that is what it feels like.
For instance there was a conversation and I made some comments. The author thought I was referring to someone else when in fact I was referring to myself. The author then spent hours writing me e-mails about the “ethics” of talking about someone else’s intimate life. Did that author first ask if their assumption was correct? No, they dove in about a lecture on confidentially and how, since I was a psychology major, I should know all about it:
“So to be honest, I’m quite surprised that someone who wants to go into professional psychology as a career seems to be missing this concept [of confidentially and ethics].
And concluded the mail with:
“I know you’re probably thinking I’m rude or picking on you or blowing something stupid out of proportion. Honestly, I don’t really care, and I don’t really care if bringing it up causes more problems.”
So I guess that the author does not care that I am obviously upset at the attacks so much so I am writing about them. Sadly, the e-mail did not stop there. The author had the audacity to say:
“I know you have had a pretty horrible life, you keep bringing it up so that everyone knows it. I’m not trying to take away ANYTHING from your hardships and experiences. But everyone goes through hardships. Some more than others. Maybe yours is really bad. But you need to get over it. It’s time to grow up and say. “Yes, some shit happened to me … but I can be bigger than it all, I can rise up and make something better of myself and of my future.”
Get over it? It is not done yet. What am I supposed to do? Be okay with my mom dying when she was 42? Stop wishing my dad would call me? Not think about my niece’s life? Forget that my brother is going to have the hardest life out of us all? And above all, not worry that my sister might get stuck in that little ass town for the rest of her life?
If my family was in a good place, all of them, and we were all okay for the most part, then the wounds would start to heal, but not while the wounds are still being made.
And as for the last part, I think I have made something better of myself JUST by being the first to ever graduate college, but that does not mean I should ever forget where I came from.
Let’s end this with one last quote from the author:
“This is one of the very reasons why you know nothing about me and never will. Cause I can’t trust you. If I were to tell you anything … I have every confidence you would talk about it behind my back. There’s a saying “Those who gossip to you will gossip about you”.
I don’t see myself as a gossip, it is immature and very rude, but if writing in my blog about events and people, like this post, is gossip, then I guess I am guilty. Guilty like every other person in therapy discussing the people they have issue with so they might get some feedback on how they are to react. BUT it is not behind the author’s back because the author is also a reader and I encourage any comments they might have.
So what did we learn today:
- this blog is a train wreck
- I learned nothing in school
- I am a horrible horrible person
- I LOVE to gossip
Oh and we can’t forget the best one: I should totally accept the fact that bad shit has/is happening to me and GET OVER IT! Let’s play pretend that my mother’s bones are not 6 feet under in an unmarked grave because we can’t afford to buy a headstone.
On a less sarcastic note, I wonder if the anonymous author and ghost reader will comment on this post. It would be nice to hear the other side of the story yes? Maybe the author will just send me hate mail and try to make me take down the post. I hope all the readers will note the extreme care I took keeping the author “confidential” and the fact that there was not even so much as a gender reference either.
Well this train wreck is going to get back to trying to find a job.
October 30th, 2006 at 2:16 pm
The fact that your anonymous author assumed from the beginning that you had \”gossip\”ed without bothering to ascertain the validity of their argument speaks volumes about them. The smug, self-aggrandizing tone used makes me retch; the intent seems to be entirely to break another person down through fabricated bullshit in order to build their own image of themselves up by comparison.
The fact is that you are a very open person who likes to talk through her day-to-day problems in this environment. I imagine that the author of those quotes is a more private person for whom this kind of self-disclosure is uncomfortable. If such is the case, and the person is reading this, just close your damned browser. Kaston\’s posts here aren\’t cries for pity or \”woe is me\” stories, and your viewing them as such only goes to show your ignorance of the world outside of your own closed bubble of a life.
Blah… I edited the comment, which seems to have screwed up all of the quotation marks. I\’ll try to fix it later if I can.
October 30th, 2006 at 4:00 pm
Wow.
I’ve read your “blog” to see how you would turn the things that happen to you and how you honestly portray yourself. This is the first time I’ve ever decided to leave a comment. As you yourself are asking for them.
Do I know you? No. I do know that you thought you knew me enough to talk about your friends, or as you put it, your patients life. Details of his problems and how you thought you had helped this person. Do I know you or this person, no. But I do know that anyone that is that willing to share that kind of information about someone should not be trusted with anything. At all. Ever. Period.
Here’s an overview of the person I take you to be, from what you have posted here.
You have to be invloved in everything. IE your brothers/sisters lives. Have you ever thought they might be there because of the choices they have made? You have graduated from college. The first in the family. But any one of them could have if THEY wanted to.
You live off the attention you get from others. You will blow things out of proportion to feed the need you have for other people to care about you. It is very obvious your husband cares deeply for you. Latch on to that. Focus on him instead of what ever other person out there think of you. Believe it or not. 95% of the people you express your concerns, worries, problems, fear, hopes, dreams, thoughts and beliefs to don’t fucking care.
I’m not saying you are a bad person. I’m saying you think everyone alive thinks you are a bad person. You need to worry about you and not what others think or believe. Remember you have just as much right to feel the way you do as other people have the same right to feel how they do. It does not make you right or wrong. But bringing it up like you do and spinning it the way you do makes you look like a tool.
This is my opinion. This is how I view you. This is the Kaston that exists in my mind.
October 30th, 2006 at 6:21 pm
I mailed a book to you last Thursday — it should have arrived by today. It’s the one I mentioned before, called “The Four Agreements”. It’s a little bitty book, and I’m just starting to read it myself. But the reason I sent it to you is this one piece of what I feel to be really amazing wisdom. I’ll mention it here, because I think it pertains to your un-named critic, and your response to that person.
“DON’T TAKE ANYTHING PERSONALLY.
Nothing others do is because of you. What others do and say is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.”
The key to that is NEEDLESS suffering. We all feel pain because of losses, tragedies, and generally crappy things that happen to us, to people we love, to our planet, etc. But some suffering is voluntary in that we can do it to ourselves in our own minds, or we can learn not to do it to ourselves.
October 30th, 2006 at 6:32 pm
By the way, I’m not sharing these thoughts and this book with you because I think “Boy, I wish Kaston could be more like me.” I share it because it’s an area in which, at this point late in my FIFTH DECADE of life, I still feel challenged in my work life and in family relationships. But looking back, I can see how I put myself (and other people) through a whole lot of pain, particularly in my fourth decade, by taking things personally that were really about someone else’s perception of reality, and even my trying to project onto other people some perceptions that maybe they didn’t even have!
October 30th, 2006 at 7:13 pm
Haha if only I had your wisdom! Like Prabha said in a comment long ago, as you get older you calm down. I can’t wait until I can just look at a problem, shrug, and walk the other way. I hate getting so involved in everything, but I feel like if I don’t no one will. Kinda like the whole social responsibility thing: you see a crime/accident and expect somone else has already called 911 and don’t bother yourself.
October 30th, 2006 at 9:32 pm
I sat here trying to decide whether or not to write at all, and I finally decided to write something even though it was against my wife’s better judgement. And then I read Mommiet’s advice and it bears a remarkable resemblence to my wife’s … and the seeming simplicity yet overpowering clarity of your words (both of you) compel me to just let go. So I deleted everything and will start back at ground 0.
Many things have been said over the last year and a half while we’ve addressed our issues. Kaston, maybe you and I have more in common than you think. I hate this just as much as you do, and it gets deep into my skin just the same. I can’t seem to understand why everything has to be so complex and at the same time I just can’t seem to let it go. Just like you, I say to myself … “but if I can’t get through to her, noone ever will.”
Yes it’s true that you and I disagree on a number of issues … maybe all of them … and may never see eye to eye, but that shouldn’t keep us from conversing about the issues. After all, we’ve had quality debates about very hot topics, and I think we’ve composed ourselves well.
That being said, just like before, I don’t think we can just go our seperate ways and forget about the whole thing because Dean and I still work together, and you and I are still going to run into each other (most likely tomorrow as a matter of fact). However, it’s obvious our current course is going precicely nowhere.
I hope that one day you’ll truely see me for the caring compassionate man that I am … the man my wife married … the horse that my son rides around all day … and not just the boss of things in WoW that hates you because you’re you.
I won’t make any excuses for the things that I’ve said. Some of them are more worthy than others. Some of them more fair than others. I will and will always appologize for the way that I handle things. As Mommiet said, we have our own realities and perceptions of things … and they aren’t always the way things really are.
However, I don’t think it’s healthy to just ignore problems. I will attempt to start our conversation over again later in private only because it involves way more people than just us and I don’t think it’s fair to include them publicly. Please know that I do so with a humble heart and bring no preconceived feelings or notions. My intentions have never been to hurt you even though ultimately that’s what they do and I understand that. And, if you don’t want to talk, that’s fine, I’ll respect that.