Life Is Only As Adventurous As You Make It

I have some somewhat younger, but still not "kids"-younger, coworkers at my retail store.  One of them is even an assistant manager, so she's above me in the hierarchy.

Often, some kind of subject comes up, in which I can say something like "oh, I've done that", or "I know how to do that", or "I used to have a job doing that", or whatever.  My coworkers, the manager in particular, boggle at how many different kinds of things I've done in my life.  She frequently asks me "is there *anything* you *haven't* done?!"  She says so with obvious envy and has expressed a desire to have accomplished more in her life so far.

So I tell her, which is what I want to tell everyone, that if there is something you always wanted to do (and you have no near-impossible barrier such as medical condition or lack of funds), just go out and do it.

The reason why I have "done it all" is because, every time I need another job, I take a job in an industry I've never tried before.  I've been officially working since I was 12 years old (like, taking-out-taxes kind of job), and unofficially working since I was physically strong enough to push a lawn-mower (but still too short to see over it - I had to hold my hands above my head and peer through the handle).

Then, when I say that an activity sounds like fun, I either do it, or I admit out loud that I'd like to but I'm not willing to make it a priority.

Do you know how many people tell me how exciting learning how to dance sounds, and how they'd love to get all dressed up and go out more often?  Do you know how many of them actually do it when I present them with opportunities literally daily to fit into their schedule and I offer free dance lessons and to go shopping with them to help them find appropriate shoes and attire?

I'll tell you, the numbers aren't even overlapping Venn Diagrams.  I've had one, count them ONE, partner who did not know how to dance, expressed an interest, and actually committed to learning, not just attended *a class* with me once and then gave up because of "time conflicts".

Unfortunately, we were not together long enough after that for him to become really proficient and I no longer speak to him so I don't know if he kept it up after the breakup.  So, even counting him as a partner who "stuck with it" is being generous.  And if I can't even get partners to learn to do a thing they express an interest in, that should tell you my success rate at getting anyone else to learn to do a thing.

(Also, I've only ever dated one person who was a dancer before meeting me, and we only danced 3 times in the 2 years we were together.  Franklin has learned how to dance since we started dating, but it wasn't because of me.  He resisted learning when I tried to teach him, so I gave up because I don't like to feel like I'm pressuring people and it took another decade and him moving across the country away from me to finally discover an interest in dance.)

So, here are my coworkers, with eyes wide and mouths open, awestruck at all the things I've done.  And I don't feel particularly accomplished - I've never traveled outside of the country, for instance (although that will finally change this summer), and for all the jobs I've held and skills I've acquired, I'm still poor as fuck.

But I decided as a child that I needed to learn things.  So I did.  And I decided as a young adult that I needed to face the things I was afraid of, so I do.   I take jobs that I have no experience in because they sound fun.  I created a social group to try new restaurants that we've never been to, just because.  I know far too many people who are afraid of food.

When someone says "I do a thing" and I think "that sounds like fun!", I make a point to try and do that thing with them (assuming they're the kind of passionate fan who likes to share their passions with friends).  Because of this, I have SO MANY interests and hobbies and things to do!  I can't even remember the last time I felt bored outside of being forced to be in a particular location where I couldn't access any of my interests (like at work with no internet).  I have vague memories of being a teen and older child who had long stretches of boredom.  I can't remember what that's like.

These days, my boredom is more about frustration that there are so many things to do but I can't get to them.

I recently pointed out some really long RV that I liked, and someone else said "wow, I can't drive something that big!".  And because of my reaction, I had to reflect on this a bit.  When he said "I can't drive that", everything in me just kind of froze, like he had started speaking a different language.  I couldn't process what he just said. What do you mean you can't drive it? You can drive a car. This is just a big car.

But before I said something out loud, I wondered at my inability to process what he said.  I realized that I drove a 40-foot school bus when I was in my twenties because it never occurred to me that I couldn't drive one.  I can drive a car. In fact, I can drive a manual transmission vehicle and most RVs are automatic transmission.  So the idea that I couldn't drive something simply because it's longer than my current vehicle ... does not compute.

So that's what I said to him - you can drive a car.  You can drive a van.  You can drive a vehicle up to 20 feet, so you can therefore also drive a vehicle up to 30 feet (the size of the RV I was commenting on), you just need to practice and learn it's longer size.

He was quite dubious.  And I realized how fortunate I am that it just doesn't occur to me that I can't do things unless I've actually tried it, or similar, and discovered that I can't do it.  I extrapolate - I can do this other thing, so of course I should be able to learn how to do this other thing that is like it, if I want to put in the effort to learn it.

I think a lot of people start out with the assumption that they can't do a thing, and that's what stops them.  I start out with the assumption that I *can* do a thing, so I need a good reason to be stopped from doing the thing.  Not being interested in trying it is one good reason.  Not having the money to do it is another.  Having a full plate of other awesome things is yet another.  But being afraid?  Assuming that I can't just because I never have?  Not good reasons.

So, there are occasionally times when I think "that sounds like fun!" but I don't make a point to try it.  But then, if I've expressed an interest in the thing out loud, I will immediately follow it up with something along the lines of "but I have so many other things I'm interested in, that I don't want to take the time to add another one, because I want to accomplish the tasks I have waiting for me from my other interests first."

Mostly, what I get from people is:

"I'd love to learn how to dance!"

"That's great! I'm happy to give some lessons, or here are a list of studios and events with cheap or free lessons."

"Oh, well, see, I don't have a lot of time, because I work 40 hours a week, and then there's that whole eating dinner thing at night, and the new episode of Game of Thrones is coming out!  So, sure, I'll go to a lesson.  Sometime.  Just let me know!"

"Well, how about a lesson right now?"

"Oh, uh, I dunno, I don't think I can right now, uh, hey, is someone calling my name?"

My point is that it's OK if you're not interested in a thing, or if you have other priorities.  Own that.  But if you are interested in things, and you feel any kind of envy over people who do interesting things, then you have to make a priority to go do interesting things.

Most of the time, people who seem interesting and exciting and who do lots of neat things don't have those neat things just fall into their laps. We make it a priority to go do those things.  If you want to be like those people, even just a little bit, you have to do what we do - go out and do things.  You have to challenge yourself, you have to do what frightens you, you have to just jump in and do it.

Nobody was good at any of the things we do the first time.  True, some of us had a little more natural talent than others, which made learning it less arduous.  But that's OK, I'm not talking about being *good* at things, I'm talking about *having experiences*.  We weren't good at things right away, and we were often nervous or frightened too.

And I'm still terrible at a lot of the things I do.  I'm like the worst bowler, for instance, but I still go bowling whenever I meet someone who likes it and is willing to prioritize going out and doing it.  Because it's not about being good at things, it's about having experiences.  I find a lot of things "fun" that I'm not particularly good at, so I make a point to find the "fun" part to be the important part, not the "good at" part.

But, the thing is, once you do a new thing, the next new thing is easier to do.  And the next new thing after that is even easier to do.

I learned how to rock climb on actual mountains in the Santa Cruz mountains when I was in high school.  I met a guy who I liked who was a rock climber with all his own gear.  So he took me to a good beginner rock that had rappel points installed at the top.  We walked up the backside of the rock, which had a nice but steep hiking trail.  He hooked me up into my harness, explained things to me, got me all safetyed in and attached to the point, and then said "go".

I stood on the edge of that rock and looked down.  It was terrifying. It was a sharp cliff edge and a straight rock face so that all I saw was the edge of rock and the ground many, many feet below me.

He said "no, you face backwards, stand with your heels hanging over the edge, hold onto your rope, and just lean back until you are horizontal to the ground.  Then you just ... jump."

It was the scariest thing I had ever done up to that point.  What do you mean, you just lean backwards over the edge of a cliff?!?  Are you fucking out of your mind?!  And then you jump?!!!?

"Yes, you jump straight 'up', which is actually sideways because you're horizontal.  You push off the side of the rock and away from it, letting some of the rope out as you go so that you kind of arc down.  You will swing back towards the rock, so then when your feet touch, you bend your knees to cushion the impact and prepare for the next jump, like your legs are spring coils.  Then you push off again, letting out more rope as you go so that you arc down a little further."

It took me a long time to trust my rope.  But I did.  I stood on the edge of that cliff, and I leaned backwards until I was horizontal to the ground, like a trick photography shot where someone is standing on the side of a building as if the side was the floor.  That leaning backwards part was the hardest part.  Once I was actually horizontal, the jumping part was much easier.

And then I learned the joy of flying.

My first rappel bounce was the most exhilarating experience I had ever had.  It was like a giant swing for grown-ups, in the most beautiful setting in the world.  I zoomed down that mountainside, learning my limits, feeling how much rope I should let out and how fast to achieve the perfect-to-me arc that gave me just the right amount of soaring and falling.

I felt like this was what I was meant to do.

This is my analogy for trying new things, not a story meant to convince you that all trying of new things results in fabulous, exciting, wonderful experiences.

It's scary to try new things.  It's like that first step of leaning backwards over a cliff - you don't know what's going to happen, you've never done this before so you have no reason to trust that your safety rope will hold you, and you don't know if you'll like it or if you'll fall to your death on the rocky ground below.

But after I touched down from my first rappel, I ran back up the backside of the mountain to do it again.  I hooked up to the point, I leaned over backwards, but this time, I knew that my rope would hold me.  It was still terrifying, but like a roller coaster that I knew I would survive.  So I leaned backwards much more comfortably and I much more quickly took my first jump out into the open space.

Once I tried a new thing and learned that I didn't die from it, the next time I tried a new thing was less terrifying.  Still frightening, but manageable.  I could deal with the nerves by telling myself that I had already done this and lived to tell the tale, and what a tale it was!  So worth it!  Maybe this time will be worth it too.

The more times I tried something new and didn't die from it, the easier it became to try new things after that, even though, by definition, they were things I had never tried so I couldn't know if I would like the experience or not.

There is still risk.  People still die from rock climbing and rappelling accidents, for instance.  I even met the guy who wrote a book, and then had a movie made about it, who had to cut off his own hand to escape being trapped by a boulder during a foolish solo hike and rock climbing trip.  This doesn't mean that either rock climbing or trying new things is always safe just because the last time I tried it, I didn't die.

But it means that being afraid is not a good enough reason to not try something that I otherwise want to do.

And there are some things that I think sound exciting but that I definitely do not want to try.  Sky diving, for instance - not my thing.  But I know lots of people who like it and I know I probably won't die from it.  But I'm not going to do it.  I own that.  I don't tell people that I want to try it, and then never commit to prioritizing it.

I also work in a craft store and I'm surrounded by all kinds of fun-looking projects that I will never get around to trying.  Again, I have lots of interests that I'm passionate about, so I am making a deliberate choice not to prioritize yet another new craft because I want to spend my time on the ones I have already started and love.  I own that too.

But if something sounds fun, and I have no medical or health reason or financial barrier to prevent me, and someone is standing right there offering me the benefit of their expertise, experience, and guidance into that world, I will take it.

And that's why I have coworkers in their mid-twenties who are shocked and amazed at all the things I have experienced in my life, who have said that they've only had this one job and no hobbies and feel like they have not accomplished anything in their own lives - I made a commitment *to myself* to have experiences, and they have not.  I made it a priority to try interesting things, so I have become an interesting person.  They have not made it a priority to try interesting things, so they feel that they are not interesting people.

This is a problem with a solution.

If it sounds interesting to you, try it.  No excuses (reasons, like health or money, sure, but no *excuses*).  Commit to leaning over that cliff.  Prioritize putting your heels out over the edge, holding onto that rope, and just pushing off.  It will get easier each successive time you try it, I promise.  Maybe only incrementally, but trying new things does get easier the more new things you try.

"Closure" Is One Big Breakup Myth

I am a science enthusiast.  I have also experienced a lot of things in my life.  Both facts about me are true because I am a curious person.  I like to learn.  I like to know.

But when it comes to breakups for romantic relationships in particular, I have learned that curiosity is not the most practical or helpful of my personality traits in building emotional resiliency and healing after the breakup.

One very huge lie that our society has taught us about breakups and endings is that we need "closure".  Not only do we not need it, it is not always possible to get, so we have to learn how to live with uncertainty anyway.  That needs to be our "closure".  We need "acceptance", not "closure".

I didn't get this for a very long time.  And, ironically, it was my late-blooming interest in science that taught me that not having the answers is an OK state to be in.  It's OK to not know something.  It's OK to live with the knowledge that I will probably never know something.

Our collective need to Know All The Things is what drives scientific innovation and exploration.  But it drives us "crazy" - it leads to a culture that accepts, encourages, and supports things like stalking, like harassment, like dismissing agency, like questioning our own self-worth, like doubting our own value, like creating and building entire mythologies out of thin air because we can't just fucking deal with "I have no idea why the world is the way that it is".

We, as a species, seem to need definitive answers, even if they're completely made up.  We seem to feel better with some kind of resolution.  So we either make shit up (some of which can be actively harmful to ourselves or others), or we drive ourselves "crazy" trying to find some kind of answer that we'll never get.

We may never understand why someone would do the things that they did.  We may never understand why the world is the way that it is.  If you want to make a career out of studying big questions starting with "why", then great!  We can always use curious scientists and philosophers with a commitment to rigor and reality-based truth-seeking methods!

But if you are just sitting at home being miserable because you don't know a "why", learn to accept that you may never know why and that it's OK to not ever know why.  Especially if attempting to answer "why" is a violation of someone else's privacy or agency (even if they were a jerk to you and you think they deserve "justice" or "payback" or whatever, or that you "deserve" answers or control over the ending).

Just let it go.  You may not ever know.  And the world will not end because you don't know, nor will you actually die from not knowing "why".

But you will continue to feel miserable as long as you keep insisting on asking yourself the question when no answer is forthcoming.  Like any really useful life-skill, it may seem difficult at first, but it will get easier with practice and your life will become immeasurably better for the practice, no matter how far along you are at mastering the skill.

Just let it go.

Thinking About "Final Thoughts"

People often talk about "last thoughts" - the people they think about right before someone dies (or thinks they're going to die).  I hear this most often in movies, not so much in real conversations.

But it seems to be a big deal - some character is about to die, and they think of someone special and realize that they wasted their life and they never told that person that they loved them, or something.  This is supposed to be a big revelation - something you won't discover until it's too late, so you better live your life now in such a way that you won't have this regret on your deathbed.

It recently occurred to me that I have had enough near-death experiences to be able to answer this question.  Between multiple car accidents (including the one where I rolled my car down a hill when I was 17), being chased by bears and mountain lions, and nearly falling a few times, I actually know what my "final" thoughts are.

Every time I think I'm going to die, I think of my parents, and how much my death would hurt them.  And my biggest regret is that I very likely won't be able to either tell them at the moment so that they can prepare, or that I would have to go before them at all.

I've been thinking about this for some time now, and I really want to share with them that I *always* think of them when I fear for my life, but I haven't figured out a way to say it without causing them the pain that would come from having to even consider their oldest child dying before they do.

So I'm saying it here.  Whatever it means to be someone's "final thoughts", I know what mine are because I've had several ... opportunities ... to have what I thought would be "final thoughts", and each time my thoughts were of the same people - my parents and the pain that my death would cause them.

I hope they know how much I love them, and that everyone I love knows how much I love them. And one of these days, I'll figure out how to tell them this.

#DoNotNeedAdviceForThisConversation #MorbidThoughts #ButWeNeedToFaceTheDarkSideOfLifeSoWeCanPrepareForIt #IHaveStaredIntoTheVoid

Life Hacks For Any Version Of Executive Dysfunction

https://theautisticalien.wordpress.com/2018/05/17/autistic-life-hacks/

I am not autistic, but I do have OCD as a side effect? of my anorexia, and I also never defeated my depression from my last depressive episode (like my first one that went totally away for decades until my life fell apart a few years ago and I had another episode that I combatted and am mostly OK from but still actively battling and sometimes lose ground with).

So I have a lot of executive dysfunction these days. I do most of the things in here. Switching to all disposable utensils has made such a huge benefit in my life. So has the dry shampoo and the tooth pick thingies instead of floss. Backup keys everywhere. Obsessive about places for things. 2 laundry baskets OTG when I started that! Giving in to pre-packaged food (sometimes the only time I'll get any veggies at all). Music and ear buds. Notes on my hands. To-do lists to prioritize. PACKING LISTS! ...

What Gaslighting Is And Is Not - Some Thoughts

What gaslighting is:

• Deliberately changing your environment and when you ask about it, deliberately pretending nothing is different so that you start to question your sanity.
   
• Telling you that something objectively did not happen a particular way when you have evidence (not just your memory) that it did, especially if knowingly contradicting you.
   
• Telling you that your subjective feelings or experiences are not what you say they are.
   
• Deliberately saying something ambiguous and then changing the stated "interpretation" based on how you react to it (i.e. Schrodinger's Douchebag) so that they can escape consequences by simply saying "I didn't *mean* it like that" when they actually did.

What gaslighting is not:

• "That's not how I remember it." - memories are fallible and people can genuinely remember situations differently ... even you and even someone you're mad at.
   
• "I know you may have heard that this thing happened, but it didn't, it happened like this."
   
• "For what it's worth, whatever you *feel* about it, *I* don't feel that way / think of you that way."
   
• "That might be how you interpreted what I said, but I did not *intend* that meaning." - may be gaslighting if they did mean it (see above) but want to make you think otherwise, may be not gaslighting but still a crap thing to say like not intending racism when saying something racist, or may genuinely be intending something benign and you interpreted intentions that were not there, such as "I did not intend to imply you were lazy when I asked what you did all day while I was gone".
   
• "I didn't realize the scheduling conflict at the time when I said I would do the thing, but now I can't do the thing because this is mandatory / more important / a one-time thing and the other can be rescheduled / I have to make a choice and this is what I'm choosing."
   
• "I had a different interpretation and if I had realized that's how you were going to take it, I would not have said that / agreed to that / would have clarified."
   
• "I don't remember saying that and wouldn't have used those words had I known you would hear it that way, and surely everything I've said on the subject in the intervening 5 years that contradicts what you think you heard should have better explained my position?"
   
• "No, that's not how I feel."
   
• "Are you sure you don't feel this way? Because your actions seem to imply this."
   
• Saying one thing, doing something different - may be gaslighting but also may be someone who isn't in touch with their own feelings or programmed by their past, like an abusive relationship, to say something placating even if the desired actions don't match up.

Some of these things may even be a dick thing to say in the moment, but they're not AUTOMATICALLY gaslighting. Please stop labeling every interaction you have with people where you don't feel exactly 100% on the same page with them as gaslighting.

Also, not every bad relationship is abusive, not every shitty thing someone does is abuse or harassment, not every person you don't like is an abuser, harasser, evil, narcissistic, or has some other mental disorder.  Even if they do, it may or may not have anything to do with that disorder, and if you're not their therapist treating that disorder, you're not qualified to make that kind of judgement call.

Part of the problem is that gaslighters and abusers in general take otherwise acceptable, innocuous, or "normal" things and twist them up with their intention to control. So a lot of these things can be *used* by gaslighters and abusers, but they are not, by themselves, automatically, an indication of gaslighting.

The point of gaslighting is to control you - your behaviour or your thoughts. Sometimes it's with good intentions, like my oft-used analogy of the tired mother trying desperately to get her kid to eat her vegetables. But she is trying to make the child do something that the child doesn't want to do, so she resorts to a mind trick in order to control the outcome.

People can be jerks to you without actually intending to try and *control* you. And people can genuinely have a disagreement or a difference of opinion or memory from you without trying to *control* you, other than to persuade you of their position. With or without the persuasion, strongly disagreeing with you is not, by itself, gaslighting, even if the disagreement is about a past event that you both remember differently.

This is how we as a culture start to get fatigued and we start checking out and not listening anymore. When EVERYTHING is "abuse", "harassment", and "gaslighting", people stop listening and real abuse victims get dismissed and ignored (which, btw, furthers the cycle of gaslighting).

Just because someone remembers events differently or interprets words or actions differently, they are not necessarily trying to gaslight you. We ALL remember things differently. The brain is not a video recorder, it does not take down every detail faithfully. Even if you think you're good at remembering details, you're probably more likely better at fabricating realistic details than the people who were with you so they either can't contradict you or they immediately rewrite their own memories to accept your new headcannon.

I've been aware of these problems since I was a child, so I take the time to record details in the moment and then cement them immediately afterwards by writing them down. There are all kinds of tricks to exploit the brain and better remember, but most people do not do them and think their memories are an accurate reflection of reality.

They're not.

Not every mismatched set of memories between 2 people is a gaslighting attempt. Not every correction or explanation of past situation is a gaslighting attempt. While it really really sucks for someone who has been gaslighted and is desperately trying to reconstruct who they are and what happened, most of the time we are not recording accurately to begin with.

More On Introversion vs. Extroversion & Why Ambivert Is Not A Thing

I wonder how many people would stop thinking that "introversion" means "hates social activity" or "shyness" (or that "introversion" and "social anxiety" are interchangeable or necessarily connected) if we:

A) taught people about self-care maybe in school so that introverts have the tools to budget and compensate for social activity by the time they reach adulthood

B) accommodated for introversion and anxiety at social events like "quiet corners" the way we used to have smoking & non-smoking sections in public spaces

C) socially accepted "down time" or "recovery time" instead of this ridiculous go-go-go attitude of always needing to do stuff and be "productive"

D) redefined "social activity" to include basically anything shared with other people other than loud music in hard-surfaced environments and people yelling their conversation at each other?

Because introversion does not mean "hates socializing". It means that socializing takes more "energy" or emotional resources that we have to pay in order to socialize.

And people are not "ambiverts" if they like socializing sometimes or in certain contexts but don't like it other times - that is included in the definition of introversion.  If an introvert feels safe or connected and/or you get us talking on a subject we're passionate about, we can become animated and excited and can talk for hours.  That doesn't mean that we're part extrovert because that's not what extroversion means.

Socializing merely has a price tag attached.  Some people can better absorb the cost without notice than others, some people have ways of budgeting their resources so that they can afford the cost, and some people have trouble accessing certain forms of payment so it feels out of reach even though they might have been able to pay the price otherwise.

And a lot of these challenges with paying the price of socializing are challenges that can be overcome with some training.  But the further into adulthood we reach without learning those skills, the more entrenched we get in the ways we've always done things, so the harder it becomes to re-train ourselves with those skills.  This makes it feel like these challenges are just *innate* and insurmountable.

Which makes people think that introversion = shyness and/or hates socializing (and therefore that "ambivert" is a thing when someone is less shy or likes socializing more, when it's totally not).  When the reality is that the type of socializing offered to us tends to be more expensive than other types of socializing and we are not given the tools to help us afford the cost of that kind of socializing more easily.

#introvert #WhoRarelyExperiencesConDrop #AndWhoMakesPeopleAtConThinkSheIsAnExtrovertBecauseTheyDoNotKnowWhatItMeans

I'm Mad Because You Made Me Lose You By Making Me Mad At You

OK, I'm waiting until I finish the whole show (up to wherever is current) before I give a full review of The Magicians, but this line really pissed me off:

She says "that's what I'm mad at you for - not the cheating part.  The part where what you did made me lose you."

Here's what happened -

A guy and a girl (both socially awkward) finally hook up after months of tension.  They start a relationship.  No conversation about monogamy takes place on screen.

The girl comes from openly poly parents.  Both the guy and the girl have a couple as their best friends who are clearly in a primary but open relationship with the guy in the couple being flagrantly bisexual and fucking every cute boy that moves.

So one night, after partying particularly hard to celebrate something big, the guy in question ends up in a drunken, debaucherous threesome with the open couple.  He wakes up the next morning with very little memory to find the girl sitting on the edge of the bed where the 3 of them are sleeping, pouting.  She storms off.

With no conversation about what any of this all means, they just assume that they're broken up now and the girl goes and has angry revenge sex with another guy in the social group.  They spend the rest of the season mad at each other and awkwardly tying to complete the tasks that make this a show in the first place.

What is pissing me off about this line is that it is totally devoid of personal responsibility.  She is not mad that he cheated, she's mad that his cheating *made her so mad that she broke up with him*.

WTF DUDE?

What he did absolutely did not "make her lose him".  That is a choice she made.  And she's totally free to make that choice, but it's still her choice.  Thousands of couples experience cheating every day and choose to stay together and work through the circumstances surrounding the cheating.  She of all people has a background in how to deal with this.

In fact, her own mother managed to have an affair and make it work.  Her parents have one of those toxic "poly" relationships where they only ever do anything *together*.  But her mother started a relationship with a guy without the father, and that counts as "cheating" in their relationship.  Eventually, they hashed it all out, and the Other Man joined the couple in a triad and everyone was happy.

So, I mean, toxic and fucked up, but even they had the tools to deal with it that didn't resort to ending a relationship for a first infraction and without talking about it.

If she didn't want to "lose" him, she could have prevented it.  He never intended to break up with her and regretted (what he remembered of) his night with the other couple.  It was a casual fling borne of high emotions and copious amounts of alcohol.  It was not an action *intended* to end his relationship.  That was not its goal.

She didn't "lose" him.  She rejected him after his infidelity.  Then she deliberately set out on a course of action intended to hurt him with her revenge sex (which he pointed out the difference when she got mad at him for judging her for it - "what I did was a mistake, what you did was on purpose and malicious").

And she's mad at him for it.

No wonder finding him in bed with their friends hurt her - she has no concept of owning her own shit, of accountability, of knowing her own emotional landscape, or of taking responsibility for her actions, let alone how her emotions dictate her actions.

I didn't much like her throughout the show.  Now I hate her.

If she is to be mad, she should totally be mad at the betrayal of their (implicit) agreements and promises to each other.  That's OK to be mad about.  Weird to me, because I don't operate that way, but a broken agreement is worth getting upset about.  But to be mad at him because *she* got so mad that she broke up with him?

That's some impressive mental gymnastics to abdicate any responsibility right there.

Long Distance Love Languages - Cooking

Another #LDR tip:

#LongDistanceRelationships are hard, especially when people's Love Languages are more about close proximity things like Physical Touch or Quality Time.  Those seem to be the hardest to get met when people can't be physically near each other.  Remember, languages have dialects, and so do Love Languages.  In this context, a Love Language dialect is a specific form of expression that falls under a broader category.

I'm working on updating my Love Languages for Polyamory presentation to include a new way of looking at all the Love Languages - basically coming at them from the opposite direction to better help pinpoint which categories people fall under based on the *goals* that the expression, or dialect, reveals.

So, like, your dialect, or the actual expression of your Love Language, is really just a vehicle for a particular *motivation* that each Love Language category serves.  I haven't worked out all the language to best explain it yet, though, so that might have just made things more confusing.  Anyway, knowing what the underlying motivation is can not only help you identify what your Love Language category and dialects are, but can also help you find creative solutions to relationship complications and logistics, like distance.

Someone in a forum recently asked how to manage an LDR when what they really liked to do was cook for someone.  That sounds to me like a dialect made up of a combination of Acts of Service (the act of preparing a meal) and Quality Time (the time spent together enjoying the meal).  I'll be honest, this potential solution never would have occurred to me had I not lived in today's world.  I suggested that the person who enjoyed cooking for people prep a meal with all the non-perishable ingredients already measured out and packaged, and prepare one for themself.

Then ship those ingredients and a list of instructions to the loved one.  The loved one can get the perishable items when they receive the package and, together over Skype or some other video chat, the two of them can prepare their respective meal kits at the same time in their own kitchens, and then take the video chat to the table (or couch, or wherever) and enjoy the meal together.

Other, related options include actually making a food item that travels well that requires no additional cooking or baking on their end and ship that to them.  You can request a phone call or text or video chat when they open it so that you can experience their surprise with them.  2 things gave me this idea.  The first is having services like Blue Apron.  There are now meal prep services that you can pay for that will do this exact same thing - people who know a thing or two about cooking come up with simple, easy-to-follow, yet tasty recipes and pre-package all the non-perishable ingredients already measured out.

You can subscribe to these services and they will send you a meal prep kit that, according to their ad copy, anyone can put together.  It supposedly saves time and food because you don't have to do any shopping or buy large quantities of things, you are sent exactly what the recipe calls for. And, apparently, families can still cook "together" and sit down together to a "home cooked meal" instead of pizza or processed foods.

The other thing is that one of my partners does not know how to cook and this has been a source of frustration for me for our entire relationship.  But, as I did not live with him, I was able to ignore his lack of cooking skills and leave that to be his problem.  But then one day he decided it was time to learn how to be self-sufficient and he started learning how to cook.  A combination of knowing that I supported his growth process and wanted to see him become more self-sufficient and learn some adulting skills, and also me having a really bad time of things over here, led him to send me through the postal service his very first batch of cookies.

This was an incredibly sweet (pun intended) care package and it represented so many things so it meant a lot to me.  He wanted to make me feel better but he couldn't physically be with me during a hard time, and this was a representation of his own personal growth that I have been supporting and championing for years.

Even though I always knew that you could buy food through the mail (my parents even ordered meat and ice cream through a delivery service when I was a kid - it's a thing), it still didn't occur to me that one could send baked goods or prepared food to a loved one at a distance.  And then when all these food kit services started coming out, it reminded me of all those holiday gifts where you prepare a cookie or brownie mix in a mason jar and give that as gifts that the recipient is supposed to make themselves but you've already measured and mixed the hard stuff for them.

And then, also, there's the Netflix Party plugin that I've talked about before that allows people to watch the same Netflix movie at the same time across multiple devices and locations.  So, when this person asked the question of how to connect with an LD partner when what they really want to do is cook for them, suddenly everything gelled into this suggestion:

Cook or bake something that can be shipped and send it to them, requesting that they open it with you "present" in the form of text, voice, or video connection; Prepare a meal kit of pre-measured ingredients that can be shipped and send it to them, prepare a duplicate kit for yourself, and then make and eat the meals "together" via video chat.

If the Quality Time aspect is not the important part for you, just make the food or kits and ship them.

Happy cooking!

P.S. - this works for metamours too! And bio-family! And friends!

You Do Not Have To Be Hit To Experience Domestic Violence

I wish this was taught alongside the messages not to allow someone to hit you.

When I was a kid, I was bullied.  I had no lessons in how to deal with strong emotions.  So my emotions exploded outwards in fits of physical rage.  I broke a lot of shit.  My parents would get mad at me for being so destructive, of course, but there were no resources for telling me how *not* to be destructive when my feelings were just too big for my body.

I learned to swallow my rage at being bullied and it turned inward instead, towards self-harm, depression, anorexia, and suicidal thoughts.  As an adult, I continue to battle explosive rage and depression.  The physical violence, however, seems to have been pretty well taken care of with the suicidal depression and the apathy that it manifests as, which I haven't been able to shake in the last 5 years.

I'm basically now that lab rat who is so used to a horrible existence that I have no motivation to change it even when given opportunity, because I don't believe it will really change.

When I was a teen, I was engaged to someone who damaged property every time he got jealous.  I was absolutely confident he would never hit *me*, and, to be fair, I still am.  But this was not a healthy dynamic whether he ever hit me or not.

So when I got engaged a second time a few years later to someone who threatened to break my collectible figurines if I dared to sleep on the couch after arguing all night about him sexually assaulting me while I was trying to sleep, it took longer than it should have for me to figure out this was abusive.

As in, I eventually managed to leave him (with most of my possessions intact), leave the state, and grow into middle age before I learned that this also counted as "abuse".  I left him because I thought he was a jerk, not because I recognized what he was doing as abuse.

Abuse, according to all the after-school specials, was someone hitting me. I have never been hit by anyone other than my parents, and even then it was rarely and always followed by extreme remorse.  Breaking objects was just what people did when they got mad.  We even have pop songs about it.  Some people enshrine it in their ethnicity's culture.  It's normalized.

My rage as a kid was the result of long-term abuse from my peers.  I had no other way to process it because I was not given the tools necessary to either empower myself to escape the bullying nor to manage my emotions.  It was never about showing my power over someone else, it was about being *powerless*.  I expressed my property destruction in private, usually on my own things.  My rage was not intimidating, it was impotent.

And when I realized it was hurting my family to see me be so destructive (even if it was my own possessions I was breaking) as well as hurting me because it was my own stuff I was destroying, I turned that rage inward so that my family would suffer even fewer effects of my rage and I'd stop losing possessions.  As an adult, I express my rage with hurtful words on the internet.  But the closer a person is to me, emotionally, the less hurtful my methods of dealing with them are.  I save my rage for the relative safety of the internet.

But an abuser saves his rage for only those *closest* to them.  While most people abuse because they feel fear and insecurity, their abuse is intended to *take back* the control that they feel they are owed.  It is not an expression, a venting, of an already-lost control, the way my rage is.  Their rage is *the tool* they use to gain control back.

They might genuinely be hurting, as I was, but their hurt comes from the loss (or fear of the loss) of control over you, whereas mine comes from the loss of control over myself to someone else.

I rage because I keep having my autonomy taken from me.  Abusers rage because they keep having their toys taken away from them.  Neither are healthy, but only one is abuse.

When people rage, they want you to see how much they are feeling.  When someone's rage is to show you that they have the potential and the desire to hurt you because you are not allowing them to control you, that's abuse.  That's violence.

I wish I had known the different kinds of rage, the different expressions of fear and pain, and the different ways that control is exerted when I was younger.  I would have made different choices.  I also wish there had been resources for managing emotions.  It would have helped both with the crushing pain of being bullied AND with the crushing anger that leads to bullying, which later leads to misogyny and racism and acts of terror and abuse.

Everyone wants to feel sympathetic towards the stories of mass shooters who were supposedly bullied as kids, as if being bullied turns us into sociopathic killers.  It doesn't.  But emotions that are too big to handle on our own does turn us into a wide variety of monsters, depending on what those emotions are and where they come from.

Since we don't have those resources, the best we can do is recognize that these emotions (and their expressions) in particular are violent, abusive, toxic, and learn how to avoid and escape from them.  When someone breaks your stuff and slams doors and furniture, it's a message to you of their anger and of how much they want to hurt you.  It's meant to show you how bad things *could be* if you don't manage their emotions for them right now.

I scream at people to leave me alone.  Abusers intimidate people into staying put.  It's not enough to just not allow someone to hit you.  They have to not intimidate you by violence *near* you too.  Because violence *near* you, in your direction, is still violence *at* you.

I Work And I Know Things

So ... apparently some people either don't know or have forgotten.  So, my CV in summary:

I have been working in entertainment since 1989.  I have a background in theater lighting and set design and construction.  I moved into broadcast video in 1999 and that's where I got my degree.  I've had 3 different but related majors because I've been back to school a couple of different times and each time the school didn't have the exact same major so I had to switch.  In addition to broadcast media, I've also majored in film lighting and in stage lighting and set design.

I have worked in theater, in television, in event photography and videography, in wedding videography, in stock photography, in portrait photography, in animal photography (wild and domestic), in concert lighting and camera operation, and in corporate events on the exhibit floor, in meeting rooms, and in general sessions.

Back in my first time through college I even specialized in music videos and I spent my internship in a public access TV studio and got my first paid camera job op-ing for a megachurch.  For a while after that, I was known for excelling in the hardest spotlight positions there are - ice shows and magic shows.  When I started working in the industry, we were still splicing celluloid together with scotch tape and jogging beta decks frame-by-frame to sync up with a separate audio track.

I've done everything from stagehand and truck loader all the way up to Master Electrician and LD in electrics and from grip to V1 in video.  I have also done some odds and ends of related positions like fly rail, concert, & ballroom rigging, and getting certified to drive heavy equipment like forklifts and high reach boomlifts.  Some of those positions I might be better at than others, but I have at least tried my hand at them all.

I've seen the industry evolve over nearly 30 years.  I've seen the death of analog and the birth of the digital age.  I may be only a jack of all trades instead of a master of any of them, but when I talk about my industry, I kinda know a little something about what I'm talking about.  When I don't know something, there will usually be a question mark somewhere to indicate that I'm interested in learning something I don't already know.  Seeing as how I continue to take training courses as new equipment develops, rest assured that I do, indeed, continue to learn.

But when I make a statement, particularly an opinion statement, it's probably a fairly informed one.