The therapeutic idea of normality is one thing, the common idea, found in counselling and every twelve-step meeting in the world, is something else entirely. This is normality as fitting-in, being able to make the right noises and gestures at the right time, feeling part of where you live and work, recovering quickly from life's upsets, and somehow being able to live without any one person's approval and brush of any one person's disapproval, gliding through the world in a haze of well-balanced equanimity. This is the goal of many people who have had chaotic emotional lives that led to substance abuse. I understand why, but it's not something I'd hold up as an ideal. It's a little too Buddhist for me.
Some things about ourselves we can change at any point in our lives – which is why there is almost no excuse for dressing badly, not being able to cook and being badly-groomed after the age of thirty. The only acceptable excuse is that you will be ostracised by the only peer group you have for not wearing a track suit and white trainers.
Other things are a little more difficult. We can learn to change the way we react to events that happen more frequently than events that happen infrequently: commuters eventually don't even notice that the train is ten minutes late – unless they have been standing since entering Zone 6. No-one ever learns to react with resignation or equanimity to being made redundant, and nor should they (though some people are overjoyed because it's what they want). And some things pass straight through some people while upsetting others deeply.
In common with many people from my background, I don't do bonding and I don't do fun. No fancy dress, fairground rides and paper hats at Christmas. No pub crawls, treasure hunts or bungee-jumping. I went paint-balling once and I'd like to give it another go when most of the others aren't all ex-South African Army Rangers (no, I'm not kidding, some of those guys could vanish into the ground right in front of your eyes.) I don't do mentors, father-figures or authority either - I respect your expertise and ability, but not your position. I don't believe in compliments much either: managers use them because they have been told to and women use them because they think it will make up for saying no. I can take collegial comments on my work, but those biannual appraisals? Any criticism of my work or behaviour threatens my very survival. Because you're plotting to sack me and I'll be without an income. Because you're going to pass on the pay rise and I'l be five percent or more less well-off next year than this. Because you've stored this up for five months and not done anything to help, because all you do is look for faults, because you have nothing constructive to say or do.
Get the idea? You may be unfazed by appraisals, being told no, by fake compliments from your manager, and be able to go happily on the company bonding outings while listening to the most crass motivational codswallop. I can't. It hits all sorts of primeval stuff.
Is it “who I am”? No, it's “how I behave when you do stuff that hits my nerve”. My having nerves there may make me a little hard to work or live with, given you think it's acceptable to behave like that. (If you don't think it is, but you do anyway because that's the game, that's what “lacking integrity” means. If you were wondering.) My having nerves there may mean I'm going to have a hard time finding somewhere I can settle, but that doesn't mean I'm “wrong”. If I wanted to stay in the employment environment I'm in, I would have to work on this stuff. I would have to play the game. One of the reasons they play the games is that the work they do is marginal at best and redundant at worst. They could vanish overnight and no-one would notice the difference for months. I'd prefer to do some real work.
We fit into our environments more or less well. We are under no obligation to fit in, but then the environment is under no obligation to support us if we don't. Sometimes the answer is not to change ourselves but to change our environment. Get another job, another partner, another neighbourhood, move your son to another school, change the gym you work out in. Sometimes we can do this, and sometimes the economy sucks and we're stuck for a while. How are we supposed to behave when we are stuck somewhere we really can't function?
I know what you're going to say: grit your teeth, grind it out and stop complaining. How's that working out for you? How much do you drink? How well are you sleeping? How much weight have you put on? How's your libido these days? How did you feel when you saw the office after that holiday? Just how much did your guts twist?
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