To make a long story short, I’d have to say that my life could be summed up in one word—Chaotic. There is just no other word that fits, and every other key word I might use stems from this one. Inside of me there has always been a battle trying to organize the chaos.
Most of the time it was chaos that was beyond my control, not from within, but the result was the same in many ways. The chaos without created the compulsion to sort it out within. And, so when I succeeded in managing the chaos of my life, I was at peace. But, when I failed, and that was more often than I like to admit, the chaos dragged me into survival mode, and I’m not sure I ever really escaped it.
I’m sure to the on-looker I appeared quite the genius, although prone to instability. From my POV, it was just a picture of me winning the battle or losing very badly.
It never occurred to me that sorting out the chaos in the lives of others wasn’t my job, and I haven’t got many clues regarding why I felt it was my job. But, I did feel it was my job, no, not just my job, my only purpose in life.
If I didn’t solve the puzzle of the chaos, I was useless and would be discarded and abandoned.
Basically, I have always been a loner. I just prefer to be alone. I’m sure that the tragic events in my life pushed me even further into isolation, but truth be told, I would have been a recluse regardless of life events. That’s the part that is so difficult for others who know me to fathom. I usually just hear about how I need to heal so I can finally enjoy my life and find happiness. There is a consensus that if I like to be alone, there must be something wrong with me. And people are not shy about telling me I need help to ‘get over’ the ‘running away from life’ that they see as my problem.
But, I do not have a problem. I am fine with me. I am an introvert, and I enjoy my own company. I am quite content, even happy in my isolation. I love my own thoughts, and how I reflect on them. I love reading and understanding world events and history. I have no desire to go out into the world any longer. There is absolutely nothing I need to see other than friends and family.
I love to write, and I can and do write about almost anything. Hence my desire to do this project. I suppose I still want, no need, to be understood. I have never felt seen or understood by anyone, and I want to leave something behind that is 100% me with all my flaws and scars. I’d also like my talents to be seen, and writing has always been my gift from God.
In my life, people have become angry with me at times. It took me forever to see and understand that people misunderstood me regardless of how I tried to explain myself. I did not see that I was outside the norm in my ways.
I had a dear friend, Darlene, who passed away years ago, open ‘my eyes’ in this regard. We had a dinner date and she picked me up right on time. She was so punctual. A quality I so admired in her. In any event, I began talking about ‘power dynamics’ in all relationships, and for about a hour I thought I was being quite clear in my thinking. Finally, she almost yelled at me to stop.
She said, “The only person that could possibly understand what you are talking about is probably the Dali Lama. You should go sit on a mountain top and talk with him. I just cannot follow you and I have no idea what you are talking about.”
I think normally I would have been so offended; I mean I thought I was being clear, but this time I got it. She simply could not follow me, and I knew in an instant that so many had never been able to follow me, and they became just as angry and frustrated as my friend. I just never saw it before. She was such a good friend to tell me the truth, perhaps the best friend ever.
I just live in a place that is so very different from the reality of most people. Oh, I can be social. I do prefer smaller groups of people, but I can be sociable. But, not for long periods of time. I just need to be alone to rest and rejuvenate in ways I cannot really explain. I need to think, reflect, and understand. I need time alone to do that.
Otherwise, I become anxious and even afraid at times. They say this is common for an INFJ, but I prefer not to label myself or others. I am not rare, or even special. I am just me, and even though I have tried to open up and let people know me, they have found it difficult to understand me. And, so, I have become even more introverted. That is not my problem however. It is not a problem at all.. for anyone.
I am just different. I see things differently. I react differently. I think differently. But I am not abnormal. I do not need fixing. I am fine. If my introversion bothers you, then I prefer people just leave me alone. I’m fine in my own aloneness.
I’m writing this page after I’ve written many of the stories and I noticed a trend. I was going to delete much of it, except, it’s all true and a reflection of me. I noticed it is full of sadness. So, I’ll admit it here before you read any further, it was a sad life. I’m not sure I always felt sad. There were many happy and fulfilling moments in my life. I loved deeply and passionately, and I found a way to be creative that I love still. So, the sadness isn’t something that consumed me in a depressive manner. But it found a way to creep into my outlook on life quite a bit.
I remember my 18th birthday. It was nothing special, but then my birthdays weren’t anything special in my family. I don’t remember ever having a birthday party as a child, although I must have. Don’t all children have a party to celebrate their very existence?
My mother came home from work, and I remember I was sitting in the dining room just reading the paper. She came in tired and frustrated, which was her normal condition when she came home from work. She looked at me and gave me a birthday card, and said to me, “Happy Birthday”. I remember I was surprised she remembered because she usually forgot it until my brother’s birthday in August. There was a “half dollar” coin in the card, and that was the entire celebration.
She went on about her business as if I weren’t even there. I remember not being surprised at her, or the way my day had unfolded. I had absolutely no expectations at all of a celebration of any sort.
That evening, I remember walking down to the local park, and even though it was dark and a dangerous even then, I got on the swings and began to swing. I climbed higher and higher, and felt in one moment that I could fly, and in the next, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was going to be alone in my life. It was an odd premonition to have under those circumstances, but it turned out to be true. I have lived a life mostly alone, and what I hope you will come to understand—I prefer it that way.
The sadness and chaos did not destroy me, but it did make the introvert I was naturally, a recluse. I had a therapist tell me once that I was a true INFJ, and I do fit all the characteristics. I believe that life pushed me in directions I would have traveled anyway due to my nature, but the excess and extremes were a product of the sadness.
I believe this is true for most people. Trauma and chaos in a life will push a person to places they should not go, but it will always be in the direction that they were always prone to travel. Trauma does not change us, but it amplifies who we are already. I was a child already prone to reading alone, and writing my thoughts down, and so, trauma accentuated those qualities, and they went to an extreme. But, they were already so familiar to me, I didn’t notice how reclusive I became, and once I did, I was more upset about the fact that I wasn’t upset. I should have felt this was something to correct. Everyone who knew me thought it was. But I was not worried at all, and that worried me sometimes.
The daily, monthly, and yearly details of my life aren’t important, although it produced some nice written pieces in my opinion. The details are interesting, but don’t reflect me. They only tell the tale of the chaos, and how I handled it. Each story here is full of my angst and chaos, but I hope it is also a reflection of how I confronted the chaos and learned to live with it. And, that is really my story. In all the chaos and sadness, I tried to have the courage to confront it and my fears, and learn from it all.
And, since I am here, writing it all down, and living in my own peaceful home, I guess in the end, I won the battle.
