For most of my life, I have been focused on all my flaws. I could barely see any of my positives and I was unhappy with myself in general. The psychologist Carl Jung talks about the shadow as the dark, negative side of a person that they either are unaware exists or actively try to… Continue Reading
I am different than most people, and I’m fine with it. I don’t like what other people like for the most part, and I do not participate in discussions about those things because there really is no purpose to it. It’s interesting. There’s a letter at Ask A Manager from a person who is an… Continue Reading
When I first woke up from being unconscious for a week, I counted in days. The first day I was awake, the second day, etc. I talked to both Ian and K the second day I was awake, and I remember both of the conversations. Or monologues, to be more accurate. I just babbled at… Continue Reading
In the RKG Discord someone asked what people did to get past their lowest time. I wrote out this whole answer that included my life-threatening medical trauma–then I deleted it because it’s not really helpful. “Go almost die and then you’re life will be changed.” Not only isn’t it replicable, it’s not even true for… Continue Reading
When I w as a kid, I had no idea what was normal and what wasn’t. No, that’s not right. I knew that my family was not like others, but I didn’t know why. It’s easy to see in retrospect that it’s cultural, but how was I to know that at the time? When you’re… Continue Reading
For the first fifty years of my life (everything other than this year, in other words), I was an anxious person. Taiji helped mitigate it somewhat, but it was still always there. I come by it honestly. My mom is a highly-anxious person, and when I try to address it with her, she has a… Continue Reading
I’m a mass of contradictions. I’m a creative person who is mostly emotional, rather than rational. At least when I first think about things. I’m a right-brain person through and through. However, when I actually think about a situation that needs a solution, I can do that as well. I don’t like to think logically,… Continue Reading
I have had a terribly low self-esteem all my life. I come by it honestly as I’m from a culture that eschews saying anything positive about yourself or loved ones. It’s partly to ward off bad spirits, but it’s mostly just being assholes. That’s not true or fair, but it’s how I felt at the… Continue Reading
I know that I’m charismatic and that people are drawn to me. Not everyone. I’m not for people who are pragmatic and non-emotional. Except my brother, and that’s partly because I can explain people to him. But for others who have no need of this, I can probably appear to be pure emotions. That must… Continue Reading
I’m weird. I have known this since I was a young kid, but back then, I thought there was something wrong with me. Why couldn’t I just be like everyone else? It wasn’t just a little bit different or in a few ways–it was in nearly every way. I read all the time, which many… Continue Reading