I’ve been reading Black Clover lately, and it’s pretty good. Better since the big elf fight. Pretty sexist, but somehow having a few great women. It has me thinking about stories with devils and witches again, a subject I often want to tackle. I think I have a few ideas close to something, but I’m not quite there yet. It’s also bringing back other ideas from other stories in the past. I can’t ever let a story simply sit on hold; everything mixes around and ends up on the table. Hopefully it’ll be something one day soon. What I can say now, though, is that Nacht is hot.
Anyway, this is the last one of these I’m writing in 2023, so I think I’ll talk about what I’ve been thinking about myself lately, and how I can move forward with goals next year. I’ve been pretty conscious lately about the ways I think and act. Like, in a different way than normal, which is part of what I’m thinking about. I would really like to get myself screened for ADHD and autism in the upcoming year, because I’m far too convinced I fall into those camps to not get an official opinion. Like, I’ve started wondering if I want to rock back and forth, and I instead choose to sway side to side because I think that’s somehow less conspicuous. Now that the thought’s in my head, it’s hard to know what I wanted before. Rocking does sound nice, doesn’t it? I haven’t wanted to do it yet, though, so maybe I shouldn’t be caught up on a detail.
Whether or not I get a diagnosis, looking into the possibility does have me thinking about my habits more generally. What I’ve heard about masking autism has me thinking about how I interact with others. I do tend to plan conversations and rehearse thoughts a lot. I don’t like to talk unless I know what I’m going to say. It’s why I’ve always been good at writing first draft essays and have a knack for character dialogue, and why simple ideas get imprinted so deeply in me in such a short amount of time. It got me through school without having to study the notes I didn’t take. It’s also why I have such a good memory for quotes, because it’s a lot easier to talk with other people’s words. When I do talk, if I say something I didn’t put thought into first, it’s probably a joke or a standard polite response, because “joke” and “polite” are the main speech skills I developed. Growing up, people would often tell me I look sad or bored, because that’s just what I look like. I’ve gotten more conscious about looking pleasant and open since then, and I think that’s why I tend to assume people are being performative and aren’t as interested and friendly as they appear.
I realize the term “masking” is used in a specific way in regard to autism, but everyone puts on faces for the world in one sense or another. I find it very tiring. If this is “masking” for any reason, what would “unmasking” look like for me? I get the feeling I’d stutter a lot more. I tend to trip over my words if I haven’t fully assembled the sentence before I say it; if I spoke more off the cuff, I could see a lot more fast, maybe mumbling, and stuttering speaking on my part. More importantly, what would I be saying? Hopefully I’d be sharing my opinions more. I’m not sure beyond that, really. It would be scary for me to let out my feelings with no filter, but then again that could teach me ways to deal with whatever problems I’m afraid that might bring.
Speaking of, I’m also thinking about my interactions with others more, and I’ve come to two main conclusions. The first is that I’m easily convinced of things by others because it takes me a while to come to a final feeling or opinion on a subject, and I live in a world that requires you have those right away. It’s usually easier to adopt someone else’s opinion in the interim, and it sticks for longer than I’d like. I trust quickly when it looks like I’ve found someone with good opinions on a subject, and even after I’ve drifted away from them and that thinking, their ideas stick with me for a while due to the aforementioned thought-drafting drilling them into me. I need to be pretty selective about who I’m surrounding myself with, for that reason. I have gotten much better over time at holding other opinions and thoughts at a proper distance – reminding myself, “This is what this person says,” instead of, “This is the case” – and I want to get better about that. I’d also like to straight up tell people to never ask me if I have questions after a meeting, you know? I don’t have any, I’ll never have any, I haven’t figured it out yet, and when I say “no,” you wrongly assume I’m meek or unthoughtful or something. This all was from hearing someone say autistic people often need more time to process their emotions. I certainly take my time with that.
Second, I think I’m pretty codependent. I adopt “we” speak so easily and get very attached to friends as my only lifeline. I always feel like a bad friend because I want so much from them, especially since I want so much more than I ask for. There’s one person in particular I think of when I remember how I learned how to be restrained, and I feel so bad; it was at a really bad time in their life, too. The level of importance I place in the word “friend” is much higher than others, from what I gather. I feel lost without other people around me, and I really, really need them to want me and to like me and to be with me and come to me and think of me as much as I think of them and reach out to me. I get judgmental when it doesn’t feel like our feelings for each other are symmetrical. I get so jealous knowing my friends are talking to other people, like they don’t need me and I don’t matter to them and why should I talk to them, you know? Why do they need other friends? Why are they dating other people? Was I not an option? Am I less important? Will I not be a part of their life anymore? Does anyone else ever repeat the chorus from Bronze by the Regrettes when they think about their friends? Other people are a barrier to what I want, apparently. It’s not fair to anyone involved, and it’s not something I like about myself. This is a more recent thing for me, so I’m not sure how to move forward. The issue ultimately lies with insecurity somewhere, and that’s always difficult to identify and address. I don’t want to stop having big feelings, I just want to be less needy and more accepting of myself and others.
Oh, that chorus? “She is my best friend, but I’m not hers, cuz she’s got more than she had before.”
That paragraph took a lot out of me. On that note, I had a thought about the spoon metaphor. Since I’m not familiar with how everyone talks about their spoons, I’m not going to assume I’m the first person to describe it this way. I don’t think I have “fewer” spoons than other people, but I also often find it hard to do that many things in a day and take a lot of transition time between activities; it doesn’t occur to me how much mental energy I’m putting into an activity because it’s a seemingly free resource. It could be that I have the same amount of spoons by weight, and mine are bigger than others. It’s not that different a conclusion than simply saying I have fewer spoons, really, but it does put things into perspective for me, personally, to recognize if I’m giving up ladles when others are just dropping a teaspoon or two. Maybe I can learn to adjust that expenditure? Seems doubtful, really. On a related note, I also came up with the image of myself walking through life with a large pack of gear and tech that lets me get by and understand what’s happening, and other people just have a few hand tools because they don’t need hi-spec goggles to see. And today, like always, I’m thinking about how I can build and cram on another machine or two.
Other things I want to mention…I’m always scared to do something until I do it. I should try to carry that into more situations than working on a page of my book. I usually know what I do and don’t want, deep in the bones, and it would do me good to recognize that and act on it more often. It’s fine if I can’t explain to others why I’m making a decision if I also don’t know exactly why right now. I want to learn to let go of my need to intellectualize everything social, because I don’t think I’ll ever learn the secret formulas for identifying potential friends and making friends that I’m convinced everyone else knows. I’m just gonna have to go with whoever I have a warm feeling about and flail at them until something happens. Paired with that is to stop holding so tightly onto the idea of a relationship I think I have or want to have with someone, so I can instead focus on the relationships I actually have. And I want to learn to be more forgiving with myself when I make mistakes. I won’t get anywhere with any of this if I don’t let myself try and mess up.
That’ll close out the year, I suppose. I hope you all have a fruitful year ahead. I’ll take this opportunity to invite you all to check out my comics on this site, as well. I’m writing this blog so I can have regular content so that, hopefully, more people get directed here and can check out my art. I want to make a page for uploading my daily drawings, too. It would probably help to have those as proper posts on Instagram, instead of just stories, right? Somehow I got it in my head that stories are more important on Instagram, but I have no idea how to use that app to begin with. I should probably learn how to build an online following in the new year, as well.
Weekly Thoughts 12/30/23
Life in the Gutters 