I’m insecure. Less than I used to be, more than I want to be…but still, I’m insecure. The littlest recognition and I’m flying. Which is great. But, the littlest perceived slight and I’m falling. Not so great. You know who I hate (read: envy like crazy)? Even keel people. People whose mood and worth aren’t based on others. What others think. What others feel. What others do. What others say.
I want everyone to like me, and it’s so easy for me to think no one does. Especially since not only do I want everyone to like me, I want everyone to like me best. I want to be the favorite. I want to win.
And what if I don’t win? I punish myself. I pretend that it’s other people punishing me. Or that I’m punishing them. Really, the only one inflicting and suffering is me.
So, I need to continue to shift my need for bestowed worth (which can disappear so easily) to self-worth (which I can dole out whenever levels wane). However, this will only help if I’m not stingy with myself. Gotta leave being Scrooge to Dickens and ducks.
celebrate the (blank) yet to come 
I know what you mean about small slights sending one to the depths and modest praise sending one soaring. I assume this is normal and that we’re not both bi-polar or something.
I think everyone’s outlook is based, to some degree at least on others. The even keel is a myth. People who constantly get beaten down are eventually broken by the experience. People who are always told they’re wonderful wind up acting like jerks-see Hollywood for examples.
It is true that there are people who are grounded, who have certain things in their life which give them an easier time of it I think. Things like family, children, work they find rewarding, faith, and engagement in their community. These things not only give one a sense of purpose, they act as insulation against our highs and lows…against the social dysfunction we all possess. One of the perils of modern living is that we’ve devalued nearly all of these things and instead told people meaningless things like “follow your dreams”.
Without getting too political here, the one thing that did think the Occupy Wall Street was right about was that they had more or less done the things that they were told would lead to a happy middle/upper middle class life. They studied hard (well mostly-I went to collage too), stayed in school, and got the best degree they could. Now they’re SHOCKED to discover that a degree in Queer Studies with a minor in Medieval Poetry, while no doubt enlightening, doesn’t make them marketable and certainly isn’t worth $100,000 of debt. I always thought though that they were venting their anger at the wrong people-it’s not Wall Street’s fault they did this to themselves. If they wanted to occupy something it should be the offices of high school guidance counselors and university administrators.
I think one of the great mistakes of our age is the devaluing of “physical” work in favor of “brain” work. I remember in high school being told that the kids taking shop class were going nowhere while I was “college bound” and going to amount to something. Today many of those kids are electricians and plumbers who make double what I do. They are more active, and and do more brain work than I do as well. I move paper from one side of my desk to another. They figure out how to put a sewer line through a load bearing wall with out compromising the structure. Advantage plumbers.
The truth I suppose is that I was always going to be the sort of fellow who reads Nietzsche rather than the sort who builds a cabin in Wisconsin with his bare hands. But I think I would have been a better, happier person if I had been encouraged to be able to do both.
Well, I am bipolar, so you’ll have to speak for yourself. Of course people who are constantly beaten down probably won’t stay even keel, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I know many people who don’t react as strongly as we do.
My dad was the kind of person who read AND built a house in Wisconsin with his bare hands, he was happy when he was doing either, but not a happy person (or one with self-worth) in general. I think happiness and worth are things any of us can create within…we just need to keep working on it.
(We won’t get into OWS’s real concerns.)
Bipolar? That explains the Tiger Blood.
I think there are people who look like they’re on an even keel but are just faking it. (I think a lot of life is just faking it.)
This is true.
“Fake it ’til you make it.”
I thought that phrase was about pretending to be interested in her stories until you score.