tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post7000909298338154764..comments2024-03-29T15:43:54.557+08:00Comments on Tony White - Graffiti: Life script analysis - Part 3Tony Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07034697658099080220noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post-27131452808781145582009-08-22T22:38:32.195+08:002009-08-22T22:38:32.195+08:00Self-soothing? I've heard this term a lot and ...Self-soothing? I've heard this term a lot and I'm not sure what it means. As a kid, I had one main escape - after this shit I'd just sometimes go into my room, maybe cry or whatever for a little, but mostly read. I spent most of my childhood reading. Or daydreaming, elaborate fantasies of how this wasn't really my father, or of a different life. When I google, it seems like they are talking about these really concrete things like taking baths and so forth.<br /><br />I don't think that's what you mean, I mean, I think real self-soothing is something more on a basic emotional level. Mostly when I'm upset I go read (still) or if it is an active angry emotion, I might go run. I'm not sure what self-soothing exactly means on a more basic level, or quite what lack of it means either. I am, for whatever reason (born temperament, learned behavior) more easily moved to any kind of emotion than a lot of people, but I know that, and try to just deal with it as best I can...and try most of the time not to blame myself for being that way (though when I'm depressed I often feel guilty that I can't just feel better or feel less). Explain what self-soothing is, please.<br /><br /><br />When I flip through Google about that, looks like they place the angry child and vulnerable child as opposites but part of the same scale. I think probably the anger dominates over a hidden vulnerable for me. There's definitely some truth to the opposition/defiance statement...a continuing problem for me, especially in such a hierarchical field as I work in. Men in authority both scare me and provoke defiance.<br /><br />About depression - I'm definitely a little bit there now, and I tried to put myself in the mindset I was in at the time of the incident, when I probably was too.<br /><br />About humor...hmmm...I am trying to think. I guess I do get "in trouble" for using humor or finding something very funny and pointing it out when someone is trying to be very impressive, or angry, or dominant. It does pop up during very bad times and probably seems inappropriate often. I joke around a lot, probably one of the main things close friends would use to describe me (though I know it doesn't show on the blog you are familiar with). Probably some inappropriate timing of humor too...maybe I'll have to think about watching the jokes that make people uncomfortable during rough times.<br /><br />Hope you enjoyed doing this. It was fun for me...and I do want to hear what self-soothing means not as a bunch of activities, but on a more basic level.mysadalteregohttp://myalterego.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post-42862944677829275502009-08-22T22:37:40.387+08:002009-08-22T22:37:40.387+08:00Crap, won't let me put it all in one commment,...Crap, won't let me put it all in one commment, too long or something. So here's the next:<br /><br />I'll disclose a maybe relevant story to the issues of "someone be the adult": when I was 17, I left home for good and got on a plane and went to work in public health in a developing country. I remember stepping off the plane and not knowing where I was to sleep that night, having only a marginal understanding of the language, and I remember it as being one of the most relief-filled moments of my life. I just breathed easier than I ever had before. <br /><br />The reasons were something like this: now I was in the real adult role, not trying to do it from a child's powerless spot. I realized that I could just *handle things* as they came up, that very few things had to be the crises and end of the world drama that they were at home. That I'd just find somewhere to go, to sleep. Or I wouldn't, and I'd work it out the next day. That I could just deal with life, without having to deal with all the crazy and panic and drama around it. That a pipe can break and you can just clean it up. I remember feeling a million tons lighter, or like I was being born. An overwhelming sense of doom just lifted. Not everything had to be so scary or violent or a cause for great emotional turmoil. I did not have to continue like that. That people could be scared or sad or whatever without it having to mean the end of the world, that I could have a negative emotion or event and just function during it. Being upset didn't have to mean "STOP THE WORLD TURNING EVERYONE DEAL WITH ME!" like it seemed to at home.<br /><br />As a kid or teen I remember always being frustrated that I was expected to be the adult, but also not allowed the means (authority, financial, whatever) to do so. It was this tremendous mixed message: take care of everything, but obey and you're just the kid and don't you dare try to tell us what to do. This was the source of a lot of rage. I'd take care of the bills or whatever, and then some whim would come down onto my father and he'd start trying to put me in a child's place and that pissed me off.<br /><br />The message that everything is scary sure was there, I hope I have been able to attenuate it over the years. I'm probably still more skittish about some things than most people...but fortunately my saving grace has been curiosity and a sense of adventure that pull me to do things even if I'm terrified. I don't want to miss out on something just because it scares me. I can do something while being scared. I won't die from it. I may do it with my heart in my mouth, but at least I do it. <br /><br />It would be nice NOT to be scared like that or to react on a gut level like that, but I do for the most part understand that it is not rational and that I shouldn't guide my life by those feelings.<br /><br />What else? <br /><br />The feet - most interesting is that my mother has none, if we use the "power/virility" interpretation. Accurate.mysadalteregohttp://myalterego.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post-90302762209678367232009-08-22T22:35:57.327+08:002009-08-22T22:35:57.327+08:00I'm sorta interested in what all of this is ba...I'm sorta interested in what all of this is based on. The diagrams of space on a page and so on.<br /><br />My father is facing us. He was the first thing I drew, the most dominant (or obviously dominant) thing in the scene, looming large, and I think he's in those hard lines because he always seemed stormy and unpredictible. He did feel very terminator-like.<br /><br />The layout of the room seemed to me more practical than anything else - that is how the kitchen was laid out and that is where we really were standing. <br /><br />I did wonder about many of your posts about reasons/thought processes of suicide, because I never did notice one of the reasons you listed as "ringing true" to me - maybe the closest was "If it gets too bad I can always kill myself." All of the passive examples you listed now sound closer to what I've felt. <br /><br />And any of them only appear during bad depressions. Once I come out of them, I'm always sort of bewildered at how I actually thought/considered that. A little horrified too.<br /><br /> Sometimes when really depressed that's sort of a coping mechanism - it reminds you that you have choice, even if a bad one, and you're choosing to stay in. Restores a feeling of some kind of control. <br /><br />About the gender stuff, you're right - and I think that's from a very young age. I was always a tomboy and envied the privilege men have. Most of my life I got ahead in school and so on by working to be better than any male competitor, and even today I work in a male-dominated field. I do feel very competitive with males about professional stuff. That said, I'm probably not too different from the super-macho-latently-gay type, hiding something underneath it. Though I do think boats and tools are cool. :)<br /><br /><br />In personal relationships also, somewhat. My partner is certainly more dependent, and I definitely "wear the pants." But it suits us both (complementary pathology?) so it's ok with us. He is in a lot of ways similar to my mother.mysadalteregohttp://myalterego.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post-74219040061929392802009-08-20T15:32:36.294+08:002009-08-20T15:32:36.294+08:00Of course, that's why I sent it.Of course, that's why I sent it.mysadalteregohttp://myalterego.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289688322615470169.post-9893463838140959072009-08-20T13:52:22.236+08:002009-08-20T13:52:22.236+08:00Sara,
please confirm that I can make a response to...Sara,<br />please confirm that I can make a response to your comments and drawingTony Whitehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07034697658099080220noreply@blogger.com