Why it’s so hard to say what you mean
ammarmian.substack.com
ammarmian.substack.com
That's ok. Life is not an exam and you're not being graded. Not unless you consent to be, and certainly not against other people's criteria, figure out your own. When you say "performative" and "vicarious", sounds like you're afraid to articulate what you think might interest you. Douglas Adams, Mike Rowe, Sean Aiken ("The One-Week Job Project: One Man, One Year, 52 Jobs") etc. tried out a ton of stuff before they eventually found their calling.
For example, recast "II. my experiment with TFA" to "what I expected about the job, career, teaching, my aptitude, my motivations" vs "what I learned about each of those". If you want to update that section, I think people would be interested in rereading the details. Looking forward, how can you now apply what you've learned about all of that? Let your glass be half-full on that. Each of us has had experiences we were unsuited for, that's part of life, just don't become paralysed with analysis, too much analysis is as bad as none at all. (TFA famously has low retention rate, for multiple reasons, btw.)
Also excellent: 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear [0] ("four laws of habit change: make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying"). Convert vague intents ("I will find my dream job") into a set of actions ("I will try out/interview people who do N jobs in the next week, then evaluate what I think the pros and cons of each are").
But, start right now with some action, no matter how tiny and inconsequential. Do not spin your wheels.
Chris Williamson also emphasizes how crucial exercise and nutrition are as foundation to anything else.
Striving for continuous improvement can be a horrible treadmill that just keeps you sad because you are never good enough. It's a repackaging of your own awful stubbornness sold back to you. Inevitably you will have to stop self-flagellating and ruminating endlessly or you'll never be able to enjoy your life.
Mistakes are not proof that you need to improve or evidence of what you do or don't know. They're just proof that you're human and aren't foolishly consistent. You can't create much without some enjoyment. If your ego still wants you to be the greatest that ever lived, that's ok go for it, but what it takes doesn't seem to be what many think. It's not how much effort you put into your work, but the thoughtfulness that comes from a state of flow that you can't will into existence consciously.
Examples are everywhere. Every celebrity, all star athlete, politician, genius, etc. all have flaws and they wildly succeeded despite that. Many of them are obviously bigger pieces of shit than you, or you wouldn't be obsessed with what the media says about them, right? So? Live life and get away from the messages sold to you.
Everyone who succeeded did so in spite of their flaws, yes, but that’s because their strengths were significant enough and well-placed.
Getting good at your job or hobbies are also a great way to boost self esteem and there's for sure philosophies in their ways that translate to some personal growth, but overall I meant mental health, relationships, emotional intelligence, etc. which don't really fit the "skill" abstraction because they're not a means to an end.
It does a good job of getting rid of the last vestiges of TFA’s I-V, too.
Of course, it can also be scary, but the rewards are tremendous.
- No More Mr Nice Guy by Robert Glover
- I Used to Be a Miserable F*ck by John Kim
At first, it was just for the fun, it’s an amazing feeling, but over time it became more about the collaboration and trust with my scene partners, regardless of the role: the more you open up to each other, the better the result.
It's just hard to understand what all those allistic people mean. Why do they say false things all the time and why is that socially normal? How is falsehood the acceptable norm but not truth?
Things like this article try to construct frameworks for the falsehoods.
Boo! Boo!
/self throws rotten tomatoes
Boo!
>For those unfamiliar, “allistic” refers to people who are not on the autism spectrum, and has become an increasingly popular term to help distinguish people from their autistic peers without using judgmental terms like “normal” in contrast to “autistic”.
The social games that make insincerity natural come more intuitively to neurotypicals, so they don't notice they're playing them. When they do, and try to analyse themselves, I don't think they get it right often, because they don't have to build up an understanding of said games from the ground up like we do.
This article isn't based on anything really, it's some rules conjured out of nowhere to explain some anecdotes. Like you said, a framework for the falsehoods more than a tool to be more sincere.
slightly contrived example: if I ask someone if they would like to go to the beach they'll probably assume I want to go to the beach. As opposed to what I meant to say and actually said. I mean sure, fine, fair enough, if that question is code for "I would like to go to the beach" then I can deal with that. But how am I then supposed to ask if you would like to go? maybe I'm ambivalent but would be okay with going if you would like to.
Now the above example is fairly harmless, but add in a lot of bullshit around people trying to parse emotions from sentences and you can see how this gives autistic people a lot of trouble.
My partner does this exact same thing. I'm never able to find out what she wants to do, because any such question becomes reinterpreted by her as a "he must want to do this, so I must say what I think he expects me to say" game.
They assume you are not setting up the following conversation:
- Would you like to go to beach? - Yes, I would love to! - I am really opposed to the idea!
So - “I just want to stay here and chill - how about you, do you want to go to the beach?”
Or - “I’m starving, are you hungry? Should we get food?”
I've learned how to deal with this sort of thing well enough to the point where most people that know me wouldn't guess I'm autistic, but it sure as heck would be nice if we all didn't invent weird-ass mind games for no benefit all the time.
That sounds like a mental disorder
Also what does ‘normal’ mean? If you use ‘allistic’ then you make it explicit that you’re addressing something opposed to ‘autistic.’
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markedness
Terms like ‘allistic’ counteract the unmarked norm - we have a special word for ‘autistic’ but we don’t say anything about ‘not autistic’ because it’s ‘normal’ - see how that has a judgmental angle?
It’s hard to examine a thing critically when it’s just called ‘normal,’ if it’s called anything at all. It’s much better to be precise in your speech when you’re addressing such deeply entrenched social practices.
It’s far too easy to slip into the “but this is just normal, why do we even need to think about it, let alone make up a word for it” trap and become complacent.
The idea that we should warp minds to appease someone's feelings is fashionable today, but it's wrong. Feelings and emotions are servants of the mind, and the mind should be a servant of truth.
I am not a normal person in a number of ways. That’s okay with me. A reasonable abnormal person is not offended by that. I am normal in other ways, though.
Look, we have to get along with each other in this human world. Universalizing marginalization through obsessively specific labeling is a failing strategy, because the majority isn’t fooled for long. Normal knows what is normal.