Me, Myself And Our Explanation To the World

[sisabet]

I got my new cell phone today *and* I now have a song that is all about Stargate Atlantis (hopelessly hopeless - isn't that a cool turn of words?) in my head, so much of the antsyness I was experiencing yesterday has past.

A lot hasn't, but I feel relaxed so there is always that. At least I'm not climbing the walls like I was yesterday.

I also keep needing to explain that this - fandom - is an outlet. I *am* a very interior person. I connect deeply with stories that are told in a serial format. This is just how I am and this is how I have always been. So - the fact that I connect deeply with these stories and have this constant internal monologue and an extremely rich fantasy life - this is not something that I just happened upon one day.

I've always been like this.

To find out that there are other people like me - that do this exact same thing - well it is very exciting. To find out that you can create something that other people will enjoy... also exciting.

Hell, just thinking and then finding out that other people are interested in what you think? Unless you have lived a portion of your life censoring yourself and how you interact with the world... and how do I demonstrate this so it is understandable?

Okay - an example.

You are 13 years old. You are sitting at a lunch room table with your friends and the most primary feeling you have is one of relief in that you have found some friends and you have them to sit with. I think this is universal, regardless of popularity or any outside factors, when you are a teen. You need a social group - even if you have nothing in common with them. You can just make it up, after all. You're good at making up stuff.

So - you have your group and your friends and your long term goal is to remain a member of the group. You do that in the short-term by assimilating with the groups stated interests and beliefs. You ensure it in the long-term by using your inherent fantasy-based ideas to further the groups common interest.

So, there you sit at the table and you are avidly involved in discussing whatever it is your group cares about; beit whether or not if you hit pause just right, you can see Patrick Swayze's privates in "Dirty Dancing" or who is dating who or plans to have a party in the near future or is WHAM! really breaking up?

But the entire time this is going on - in the back part of your mind, the place you really and truly feel like yourself - the place where you never make concessions to fit in with the group or to gain acceptance, because that place is your place. There you are thinking about Charles Wallace and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and you know there was an adventure between "A Wind In the Door" and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and so you are telling it to yourself.

Because you learned early on that most people don't do this. You thought they did - but they don't. It still shocks you, even at 13, to realize that most people are actually thinking about what they are socially engaging in. For them it is enough. For you, it barely tips the iceberg.



So to find out other people, people you are NOT related to do this as well... It is a wonderful thing.


And so we get to the wasted energy portion of my explanation. Part of me just wants to not even do this post. I've nothing to explain and I believe that. Another part of me wants to explain because on my best days I believe that we need to understand one another as people and be tolerant and everyone deserves music and we can hold hands and sing and get along and you go your way and I'll go mine.

I believe this is true. On my best days.

On my worst days, I despair of any of it ever working. No. Actually, no. On my worst days I believe that everyone *does not* deserve music or respect and on those days I quit listening and trying to understand and I just become part of the problem. I become one with the giant morass of hopeless humanity on my worst days.

On my worst days, I will dismiss something that someone else does as stupid and a waste of time, without ever attempting to think outside my own head or walk in someone else's shoes.

And not to get all religious on anyone, but a major tenant of my belief system is to not pass judgment and to always try to see another person's point of view (the ol' "walk in my shoes") and to treat other's as I want to be treated, and I fail all the time. Every day I fail, but that really isn't the point. The point is to try.

So here is me explaining myself:

Yes. I spend a lot of time watching TV and reading comic books. I also like novels and movies but not as much as TV or comics because I like stories told in a serial format. We've already covered this.

I spend a lot of time thinking about these stories, as well. I spend a lot of time talking about this with other people who also spend a lot of time thinking about it. We actually get a lot out of it. We are able to take a text and analyze it and tear it apart and apply it to something. We are able to take a fictional character and think about the situations this character has faced and we can then speculate on how this character would react in another situation. We can wonder what this means for us as people and how this affects our own outlook on the world. We can look to the fake person that someone else created and find something of value in our own lives.

People are not shitting when they say Buffy taught them how to be strong.

We can do all of this - AND - we can do it in space. Or in the Ice Age. Or in another galaxy or with superpowers.

None of this is new. Humans are kind of built to respond to stories and fiction. It just pings more in some people than in others.


As far as me wasting my time...no, I don't think so. I'm interacting (and not just online) with other people, I am thinking and I am more spiritually at peace now than ever. I feel involved.


And really - I don't know what I could be doing to serve society any more than I already do. I suppose I could volunteer more - but we can *all* say this and I was saying this before I ever knew what fandom was. I am not going to cure cancer or write a symphony or even ever be published - so what else can I do?

I work. I spend time with my family. I spend time with my friends. I don't really like going to bars anymore (boring) but if you want to see a movie or go out to eat or need someone to go shopping with or want to come with me to the dog park - I'm always up for these things.

I like to be at home. I'm not into going out and partying until 2 am. I have done that. I still like to do it occasionally - but I am at a point in my life where that is just not fulfilling. It isn't fun. And yet, when I do feel pressure in real life? When I do feel like I have people breathing down my neck about "You never go out, you are a hermit, you are just shutting yourself off" it is because I don't feel up to going and sitting in a noisy bar and drinking a beer and not being able to hear anything anyone says and totally feeling shut out of conversations because of this and just sitting and being bored. I've done this - I'm over it - life is too short.

It'd be different if I could smoke in the bars here - give me a cigarette and I can amuse myself for at least a good seven minutes. Cigarettes are fun. God, I miss it. What was I saying?

Oh yeah - I will never change the world, I am just not that kind of person. I do think I can change my own small section and I am working on it. I think I can change me and that is my favorite project. I want to be totally the me-ist that I can be: the best Me.

I don't think that is a waste of time.

Comments

[renenet.livejournal.com]

I think I can change me and that is my favorite project. I want to be totally the me-ist that I can be: the best Me.

::loves::

[cheesygirl.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes, yes! This is me! I like going out sometimes, I like being with people sometimes, but most of the time I like being at home on my own or connecting with my fellow fangirls, immersing myself in these stories and characters that have brought us such joy and insight. I love this kind of stuff and it makes me happy. I wouldn't spend so much time on it if I didn't.

Now if only I could make my therapist understand this and stop hounding me to "get out more".

[falzalot.livejournal.com]

Hey - if you wanna try walking in my shoes, I've been wearing the lands end mocs lately. They're really comfy, last forever, and are a breeze to slip off when you go through airport security. :->

[laurashapiro.livejournal.com]

Dang, why the hell did I ditch my Zen Fen icon, anyway?

You're damned right it's not a waste of time. And BTW, I understand why you had to post this -- I can't handle being misunderstood or mocked without trying to explain, either.

::gloms you::

[stars91.livejournal.com]

That was very well written/explained, very moving, and hits home with me! Thanks for putting your thoughts out there for a lot of us to relate to! Suddenly I don't feel quite so alone!

[vagabondage.livejournal.com]

I want to be totally the me-ist that I can be: the best Me.

That's what this life stuff is all about, yeah? That, and having as much fun as possible, IMO.

Fandom is both a sanctuary and an asylum in a lot of ways, I think. We do both incredible good for each other, and incredible harm, but all that aside, it's someplace we fit. We bond, we revel, we learn, we teach, and on and on. Nothing in my life has ever fed me on so many levels. I'd be an insecure wreck where ever I decided to nest, but here in fandom even that is accepted and understood on levels the outside world has never come close to. Except Joe, but he's my best friend.

Just my two cents of a babble. FWIW, I think you're groovy as hell.

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

Because you learned early on that most people don't do this. You thought they did - but they don't. It still shocks you, even at 13, to realize that most people are actually thinking about what they are socially engaging in. For them it is enough. For you, it barely tips the iceberg.

Yes!

Thank you.

[beloved4always.livejournal.com]

I can only echo what folks have said before me.

I'm a big believer in people's right to find happiness in whatever way works for them. If it makes me happy to spend lots of time within myself and it makes someone else happy to always be on the go, always with others and almost never going within or any permutation in between. SO BE IT! It's certainly fine with me.

IDIC is not just a simple acronym to me. It's a way of life!!

[vampslayer04.livejournal.com]

*applauds*

I've always been the "hermit" type- no one except my roommate can understand why I (usually) don't want to go out anywhere. I mostly get told that I have a bad attitude or I get asked if I'm in a bad mood, which I'm not. I just don't see the attraction to a lot of places that people I know enjoy.

[minim_calibre]

I want to embroider this post and frame it somewhere with a little brass plate reading, "What She Said."

[lumenara.livejournal.com]

Total agreement. It's so nice amazing to find people who think you're cool even when you turn off all your filters. That you can say the kinds of things that will make other people look at you funny, and they will not only be right there with you, but often think you're even cooler or, freakishly* enough, *respect* you for it.

It's awesome to me, in the literal sense. It's awe-inspiring.

And my shoes are black Sketchers sneakers, size eight and a half, if that's relevant at all. *g*


*In the sense of never-happening outside this group, not in the sense of being freaks. Which I am neither denying we are nor accusing anyone of being, just so we're covered. ;-)

[sisabet.livejournal.com]

My shoes are blue and pink slip on Sketchers that I liberated from Cappy years ago - size eight. We are Sketcher Twins!

::activates power::

[lumenara.livejournal.com]

Activate! *the 'S' starts to glow*

(Heee!)

[elke-tanzer.livejournal.com]

Thank you for posting this.

There you are thinking about Charles Wallace and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and you know there was an adventure between "A Wind In the Door" and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and so you are telling it to yourself.

Because you learned early on that most people don't do this. You thought they did - but they don't. It still shocks you, even at 13, to realize that most people are actually thinking about what they are socially engaging in. For them it is enough. For you, it barely tips the iceberg.

I love you.

[absolutedestiny.livejournal.com]

At what point in your life did you work it all out? When did you become "sorted" and comfortable with who you are and what you do?

[sisabet.livejournal.com]

I have no idea. I think it is just a process? I can tell you that I know me better and I like myself more now than at any other point in my life. Which is cool as hell.

I think the older I do get - the more I realize that even the silly, messed up parts of me are pretty intensely human and since I've learned to value the bad parts in others (mainly through externalizing it into fictional characters and then translating that to just regular people), I give myself much more leeway than I ever did before.

I sometimes suck and am a terrible person - this just makes me a person. Vidding actually helps me learn these things - or at least gives me a safe platform to mull over Big Scary Mortal Thoughts until I can understand them enough to process them.

[kadymae.livejournal.com]

But the entire time this is going on - in the back part of your mind, the place you really and truly feel like yourself - the place where you never make concessions to fit in with the group or to gain acceptance, because that place is your place. There you are thinking about Charles Wallace and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and you know there was an adventure between "A Wind In the Door" and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and so you are telling it to yourself.

And fandom is where I first found the other people who did this.

That, and RPGs, but fandom is where I ended up.

[kadymae.livejournal.com]

Oh and in my case it was The Earthsea Trilogy.

[gobi-rex.livejournal.com]

I've been ruminating on the very same subject for the last several weeks. Only you say it better. Word.

Can I save it in memories?

[piper47.livejournal.com]

I will never change the world, I am just not that kind of person. I do think I can change my own small section and I am working on it.

You don't need to work on it. You just did.

The best thing about fandom... is that we aren't alone and you just reminded me of that. It might be weird to the outside world, but on the inside at least we know there are people just like us, who are going to relate to the same things we do. It's refreshing... because this... this fannish thing we do, means so much to all of us for different reasons. It's what got us through rough times, it's something you can hold onto and call your own, it's a safe place. And no one but us is going to understand it, no matter if you want them to or not. It's just nice to know that we're all here, in this same place together.

[fiona64.livejournal.com]

It's refreshing... because this... this fannish thing we do, means so much to all of us for different reasons. It's what got us through rough times, it's something you can hold onto and call your own, it's a safe place. And no one but us is going to understand it, no matter if you want them to or not. It's just nice to know that we're all here, in this same place together.
------------------------------------------------------------------------



I came here via Metafandom and have really enjoyed reading the OP and the comments.

The quote above really resonated for me, particularly in light of the book I'm currently reading. Viktor Frankl, in "Man's Search for Meaning," talks about how important it is to have a safe place to go mentally during times of fear/horror/whathaveyou (he is a concentration camp survivor) ... and how laughter and beauty helped so many people live through unspeakable horror.

I'm not saying that any of us has something in our lives that can compare directly to Frankl's experience ... but all of us have clearly experienced some things that made us obviously "separate" from our peers. It is a wonderful thing to find a community that truly understands that separate-ness, as ironic as it may sound.

My applause for an excellently written essay that so clearly spells out what it feels like on the inside.

[anatari.livejournal.com]

Very few people can fit in my shoes, be they physical or metaphorical. ^_~

Beautiful post, not much else to say about it.

*adds to memories*

(sorry about that--right character, wrong icon. ^_^;;)

[darthrami.livejournal.com]

I don't know you at all, but I came here from elke_tanzer, and this just-

Yes. Thank you for saying this.

Oh yeah - I will never change the world, I am just not that kind of person. I do think I can change my own small section and I am working on it. I think I can change me and that is my favorite project. I want to be totally the me-ist that I can be: the best Me.

I don't think that is a waste of time.

I don't think it is, either, and I feel so... I don't know. Relieved, I suppose to see somebody else having put this into words. Thank you.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

Rock on. That's lovely.

I feel very lucky, suddenly, that I never had to explain this to anyone. There was a time, in junior high, when I had practically no friends at all, but before and since most of my friends have lived the life fantastic with me, to one extent or another.

[revdorothyl.livejournal.com]

"I spend a lot of time thinking about these stories, as well. I spend a lot of time talking about this with other people who also spend a lot of time thinking about it. We actually get a lot out of it. We are able to take a text and analyze it and tear it apart and apply it to something. We are able to take a fictional character and think about the situations this character has faced and we can then speculate on how this character would react in another situation. We can wonder what this means for us as people and how this affects our own outlook on the world. We can look to the fake person that someone else created and find something of value in our own lives. . . .

None of this is new. Humans are kind of built to respond to stories and fiction. It just pings more in some people than in others.

As far as me wasting my time...no, I don't think so. I'm interacting (and not just online) with other people, I am thinking and I am more spiritually at peace now than ever. I feel involved."

Exactly! Just about every religion in the world at least started out in the way you've described above, and for all of Freud's talk about The Future of an Illusion, etc., and how religion would soon go the way of the dodo, most people in the world today would hesitate to say (out loud) that anyone else's religion is a selfish waste of time, or not worth talking about -- especially on one's own LJ and among one's own interest group.

I know most of us make some distinction between our fandoms and our religious beliefs (if any), but when you're dealing with a "text" as rich and deep and mythological as the Buffyverse, I think the distinction becomes a lot harder to define.

Making meaning for oneself and one's community, talking about the stories that mirror our lives or fears or hopes and trying to find the Truth that underlies all good fiction . . . this is never a waste of time.

In my humble and very individual opinion.

[cereta.livejournal.com]

God, what you said. Everything you just said. If I thought you even remotely wanted wider exposure, I'd be begging you to let me put this on the Symposium, because yes. Exactly.

[dualbunny.livejournal.com]

I like this. You make good words come out of your head. :)

[kita0610.livejournal.com]

You iz so smart.

Don't change a thing. Ever.

[hologrammatical.livejournal.com]

Dude, reading this post and your post about being an unashamed Buffy fan the other day...it just makes me want to cry, in that happy "Yes! I understand exactly!" type of way. ^o^

People are not shitting when they say Buffy taught them how to be strong.
We can do all of this - AND - we can do it in space. Or in the Ice Age. Or in another galaxy or with superpowers.
None of this is new. Humans are kind of built to respond to stories and fiction. It just pings more in some people than in others.

This was beautiful to read, and I just wanted to say I relate, because I'm also one of those kids who was there mentally quoting the ending "Can stand up, will stand up" monologue from Chosen on days when I thought I couldn't make it in high school...and hell, it still has that same effect quoting it now. ^^

It saddens me when people automatically write off television as something cheap and illigitimate...Television...and comics, and book series...they do something unmatched in both theater and movies, because they introduce us to a group of characters and truly allow us to become emotionally invested in their lives, since we can enter into their world every week. We follow their journeys, we see how they change, we grow up with them...I don't think that's something to be scoffed at.

So thank you so much for posting this (and your Buffy post as well)...And maybe someday we will have another show that can move us and inspire us ans fill us with the happy show luff, like Buffy and Angel did! *fangirls youuuuu*

[linzeestyle.livejournal.com]

But the entire time this is going on - in the back part of your mind, the place you really and truly feel like yourself - the place where you never make concessions to fit in with the group or to gain acceptance, because that place is your place. There you are thinking about Charles Wallace and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and you know there was an adventure between "A Wind In the Door" and "A Swiftly Tilting Planet" and so you are telling it to yourself.

Because you learned early on that most people don't do this. You thought they did - but they don't. It still shocks you, even at 13, to realize that most people are actually thinking about what they are socially engaging in. For them it is enough. For you, it barely tips the iceberg.

*Yes.*

When I was in elementary/middle school, I was sent into counseling three different times - they thought there was something wrong with me because I was not part of a "clique" and was quiet and alone all the time. I was sent to be tested for epileptic fits in the third grade because I would stare quietly into space while the other kids talked. Reason for this? I lived in my head. Always have.

I found fandom, and tons of people who *also* lived like this...and well, silly as it sounds it really has been the best thing to happen to me.

Thank you for posting this. *loves you like woah*

Linzee

[ranalore.livejournal.com]

This is one of the most brilliant things I have ever read in my entire life. Period.

[rubywisp.livejournal.com]

I felt the need to share parts of your post with the Wisplet. She felt the need to respond to it. Here you go:

I am almost 13, and what you said is so true. It's going on with me right now. I didn't know there were so many people like me. Sometimes, you want to feel like you belong, but sometimes you just can't. The people around you don't get what you feel like, and the only people who do, are the people who know the real you.

[ladycat777.livejournal.com]

Seriously, I'm printing this out and handing it to friends. They share some interests with me, sure, but the fundamentals that you describe so well ... they don't get it. And this was just incredible. Thank you.

[darlulu.livejournal.com]

I always love reading your posts because it's like I'm reading my own thoughts, and that notion's comforting 'cause then it's like I'm not alone even inside my own head. And again, I know it's unhealthy to be obsessed with not being alone, to depend on others to make you whole or whatever, but imo, everyone's broken, and if they're lucky enough, they find parts of themselves in others' broken bits.

I guess that's why fandom feels like home to me...at the heart of it is this collective imagination that becomes richer and richer with every new imaginative freak who joins up, and the puzzle pieces of each life snap into place within the greater whole and we can all then just *fit.*

[nyx2nemesis.livejournal.com]

Wow. I'm just floored by these thoughts. It's like taking a page out of my head. While I adore my friends they really don't get me, even the Joss fans. Not that they don't still love me...but they just don't understand me. One of the things I've found since finding lj is that there are others who feel the same way I do...think the same way. And it's comforting.

Oh...ps. I was having massive flashbacks when you mentioned "A Swiftly Tilting Planet". I used to spend days trying to work all of those books out. Sorting through the puzzle. And still, to this day, whenever I read them I still find something new and exciting.

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

Is this because of that anonymous idiot in your earlier post?

At any rate, this is wonderful, and like everyone else here, that's me.

[profshallowness.livejournal.com]

I love this - fandom has definitely been a case for me of finding out that other people are icebergs too. A lot of interesting people.

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

I came by here via four_lobsters, and I just wanted to say this:

I will never change the world, I am just not that kind of person.

You never know. Just by writing this, you may have utterly changed someone's life, and what else is changing the world?

Even if you didn't, you certainly heartened a great many of us. Thank you for this.

[jack-pride.livejournal.com]

Here, here!

[jack-pride.livejournal.com]

Hear, hear?

... I have never seen this expression written. Huh. Let's go with this version.