After a little bit of premature emailation from a leader, my morning started very early putting out a few fires caused by releasing a training course 24 hours too early. Not the end of the world as it was an internal release, but people tend to take these things seriously. A couple hours before the email went out early, I had been designated the person responsible for the course while my supervisor went on holiday. My fault or not, that is what people will remember.
Great.
Oh well.
What I did get to have today is a great conversation with a colleague I don't talk to often, but find very interesting, as they are incredibly intelligent and knowledgeable in their area, yet at the same time, have many eccentricities. I figure that while there is a clinical diagnosis point somewhere, we are all on the spectrum of everything, and depending on circumstances, our quirks are muted or enhanced.
But it is not about their personality per se that was interesting about the conversation, it was that they recently went through a health scare, where after a concussion, they thought they were going to be permanently mentally impaired.
This is something I do know about.
While they are fine now, this isn't the interesting part of the conversation either, it is just the catalyst for their realization of something that I have been talking about for a long time, and people think I am crazy. Now, this person is a young millennial around thirty years of age, and the last time we had spoken, they were happy with the way they were living their life, unattached to a committed relationship, low-obligation, free to do as they please.
Living their best life.
But the interesting thing about whether people enjoy that life or not, depends on whether it is going well or not. However, when they were injured, they weren't able to do anything much for a few weeks, including watching screens. And then what they noticed is that for the maybe the first time in their life, they were able to hear the voices in their head, they were able to have the space to think.
And it got dark.
For some background information, one of the scariest things for a person is losing that sense of self, that identity. This is especially true today where people have been conditioned to be hypersensitive to who they are, and can even choose who they are, just by saying it aloud that they are that thing. And, while a person can be severely hurt if they were to lose a limb, our sense of self is held in our thoughts, and a brain injury changes the way we think, meaning that "who I remember being" doesn't recognize "who I am now". This is amplified even further when a person relies on their brain for their purpose, their income, their sense of skill.
So, when they were sitting in their apartment alone, they started to spiral. They considered what the injury will mean if they don't recover, they worried about their job capabilities and security, they wondered how it would impact on their lifestyle, and after a few other painful events over the last three years, it just mounted up and the feeling of "why bother" set up shop.
Why do anything if it is all going to go to shit anyway?
And while this is interesting too, this is not what interested me in the conversation. What was interesting was that while they were sitting in that space alone with their thoughts, they realized that they were lonely. There was no one to help them deal with the physical incapacity, there was no one to sit with them and listen, and there was no one to say, "snap out of it".
There was no social network.
I mentioned to them that I see that life goes in waves of ups and downs, and while "bad things happen in threes" might be more a wives' tale, life works in patterns. When one piece breaks, it has a knock-on effect upon other parts, and they are likely to break too. Then, the more pressure that is applied, the more parts get pressured and there are more breaks, setting up for a chain reaction of breakage. This can work in the upward direction also.
But, this spiral is made more difficult when there is no social network to spread some of the load, whether physically, cognitively or emotionally. And, as I mentioned, I think that this is part of the reason we are seeing so much mental health problems in society now, as people have become isolated, which means that while they focus on pleasing themselves for higher highs, they also have deeper dips, with no one to lend a hand to help them out - yet they expect to be helped.
Feel they are entitled to be saved.
What this person realized while the funk was clearing from their brain, was that they have aimed to have a good life for themselves, but that is only possible when things are good, which will inevitably not always be the case. So, when things are grim, they want to be able to have people around, but of course, quality relationships don't work that way, you can't have that selfish up time, and then after ignoring those people, demand support in the down times.
So many are sunny weather people, but are still expecting to be looked after when the rains come, but it is a two way street, it requires work on both sides, and the willingness to support others when they are in a dip too. It means building a social network for reality, not a social network to share fantasies.
As said, it was an interesting conversation, because this person had to hit a pretty rough patch to reach their understanding, and still, they are only just scratching the surface and beginning to contemplate what this means going forward. The earlier we realize that we need others, the greater the chance we have to build a community of value. Everyone is looking for a place to belong - few are willing to build a home.
Quirks.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]