Triple standards

I get criticized for things that others are praised for. It saddens me to realize it’s often just a simple matter of very large biases.

Having learned about life in blocks of time, the truth has built on recent experiences. The boxes I tick are too many to list off and as the year comes to a close I don’t do reflections or a year in review. My life is a constant settlement into memories. I’ve been very successful at reducing my tendency to ruminate unendingly, but total elimination seems unlikely.

My mind is filled with instances of moments in time when

– a decision made by others, or

– an unfounded judgment by an authority figure, or

– a great act of neglect within an adjustment system

demolished my path…

For me, it’s not about the absence of choice or a need for control or a desire for power…It is about what was consciously taken by a deliberately harmful course of action that I can neither protect myself from nor help others to prepare for nor impact community level change. If not me then who, if not now then when, if not my why then for what reason?

Nothing has come of it in any meaningful way

– I genuinely pause.

– I’ve been at pause for 3 years.

– I am uncertain of it all

to explain any of this…

Misfortune attacks me in 3s, as do the double standards. Without a guide, without a map, without a plan….I am not just lost. Do you find that you’re constantly asking yourself: what? where? who? But no answer whispers to you in the wind? It is therefore unlikely that the clarity I need will be handed to me so that I can move through the molasses of my path.

I am at pause. I dislike this. This feeling isn’t just

– helplessness,

– hopelessness

– joylessness.

what I worry it is…

Perhaps I am apprehensive to acknowledge this reality. The absence of fearlessness. I used to be fearless. It is not that I was blind to the dangers all around me. Life is a dangerous thing. Bravery is an essential part of moving forward, so is a bit of ignorance. How else would we enter any unknown armed only with a “hope for the best” speech in our heads as we move on to adulthood? In our youth, before reality sets in, one needs to be fearless. With that, I could see a clear path and make my way through any jungle. Now, having seen the face of these “new” dangers, I pause.