Now, Gino.....if you're going to hide under my bed and write so accurately and concisely about every aspect of my life, we really have to talk about this and come to some sort of agreement.
I mean, really now.
(Sigh. Easier for me to joke about this than to talk about my red eyes and wet cheeks after reading this.)
Signed,
The guy who desperately wants to socialize, but stays in my safe cocoon
I promise I’m not under the bed, although at this point I probably owe you rent. 😀
I know that cocoon very well myself, which is partly why I wrote this. Wanting people and still feeling safer without them can be a lonely tension to carry. Thank you for trusting me with the red eyes and wet cheeks. That means a lot.
A mentor of mine once told me that if I wanted to have relationships with people, I needed to do four things:
1. Show up.
2. Be on time.
3. Pay attention.
4. Don't be tied to the outcome.
I've been sharing this with my clients for years, and #4 is still the most challenging, for them and for me. Learning how to form and have relationships really has been a lifelong marathon-- but I'm finding the payoff to be well worth it as i age.
That fourth one is the hard bit, isn’t it. Letting go of what we hope someone will give us back is harder in practice. I like that you call it a lifelong marathon. I think many of us keep learning how to do relationships long after we thought we'd figured them out.
These men enter adulthood having already mastered how they present themselves to others, hyper-alert to threat, all to avoid the challenges they learned early on. Unless they examine these difficulties, their view of the world remains unchanged.
This paragraph resonated with me, I am hyper-alert, people have said I am conscientious or aware what’s going on…I want to be with people more and I feel fortunate to have the drive and spaces to do that. I spend way too much time alone, maybe only having a real conversation with somebody every other day on the phone. So I think a lot to myself and I’ve had this phrase kicking around in my head for the past month: “I prefer my own council” which is kind of BS. It’s good to talk things over with people but historically those you can trust are few and far between.
“I prefer my own counsel” is a great example of how a coping strategy can start to sound like a personality trait. I know that one. And being hyper-aware can look like conscientiousness from the outside while costing quite a lot internally. The fact that you still want more contact with people matters. That desire hasn’t disappeared.
Someone who is hyper-alert to others can look conscientious from the outside because they notice mood changes, remember details, anticipate problems, read the room well, and are careful about how they affect others.
The internal cost is the constant monitoring behind it. You may be scanning faces, tone, pauses and reactions, wondering whether something has shifted or whether you have done something wrong. What looks like social awareness can sometimes involve a lot of vigilance and mental effort.
I do like that idea. There’s definitely a distinction between “gay” and “queer,” both historically and in how people use and experience those words today. I’d be happy to write a piece exploring that. ☺️
Gino, that last bit got me. Is this actually the life I want, or is some sixteen-year-old version of me still running the place? And I liked that you didn’t make being alone the villain either. Sometimes alone is lovely. Sometimes it’s armour. Annoyingly, we’re the ones who have to work out which is which.
Yes, exactly. I think that’s the hard part, because being alone can genuinely feel good and safe. The question is whether it still feels like a choice. And yes, annoyingly, nobody else can answer it for us.
I do way too much alone. My best friends are far away and I treasure the times we spend. We have fun. But locally? I'm not so good. I once bought two tickets for a concert at the Met Philadelphia for an event a year in advance. Thought I could ask someone, right? Went by myself. (Maybe for the best. The headliner was way too loud and used annoying lighting effects. I left very early!)
I know that feeling. Having people you love at a distance can make local life feel strangely empty, even when you’re not actually alone in the larger sense. And the concert story made me smile. Maybe that empty second ticket saved someone from an evening of deafening lights and regret.
I ate lunch alone in high school a lot. I was part of the high school acting troop and I would just go backstage to have my lunch.
My therapist and I have talked about isolation not only coming from safety, but from the "tax on capacity. "
In short, not fitting into a community the demands, not asks, demands behaviors, characteristics, attitudes… that you simply don't share or like. And knowing that a lot of of the people in our community have different values and they are not going to understand mine.
Why would I wanna be part of a community that is so overrun with shaming each other?
Being kind, being generous, being real, being thoughtful, these things take a backseat to body identity and performative behaviors in our community.
I am a very gregarious person by nature, but I'm also a very genuine person, WYSIWYG, and I just can't fake it to make it.
I don't have very many gay friends because of the real epidemic in our community, lack of authenticity.
I also related to just the general sense of what you were talking about -- safety first. I no longer lead with it, but it's a tool in the toolbox, for sure.
That “tax on capacity” is a brilliant way to frame it because it's also true. There’s a difference between avoiding people because closeness feels unsafe and stepping back because belonging feels like too much performance. I also understand the exhaustion of feeling that certain gay spaces reward presentation over sincerity. I'm glad safety no longer "drives the car".
From the outside it looks that I have rich social life: I don't spend much time at home, I have close friends, I regularly visit gay sauna. But I absolutely cannot connect with wast-wast majority of other gay men, because it is tiring and boring for me to chat with them: we almost don't have anything in common. I have autism and my close friends are all kinda weird and not very socially successful, just like me. I really want to connect with other gays not just physically, I am dreaming of a relationship. But it just so difficult to force myself to "properly socialize" with people I don't have much in common.
This text resonates with me heavily, despite my situation being very different.
Now, Gino.....if you're going to hide under my bed and write so accurately and concisely about every aspect of my life, we really have to talk about this and come to some sort of agreement.
I mean, really now.
(Sigh. Easier for me to joke about this than to talk about my red eyes and wet cheeks after reading this.)
Signed,
The guy who desperately wants to socialize, but stays in my safe cocoon
I promise I’m not under the bed, although at this point I probably owe you rent. 😀
I know that cocoon very well myself, which is partly why I wrote this. Wanting people and still feeling safer without them can be a lonely tension to carry. Thank you for trusting me with the red eyes and wet cheeks. That means a lot.
A mentor of mine once told me that if I wanted to have relationships with people, I needed to do four things:
1. Show up.
2. Be on time.
3. Pay attention.
4. Don't be tied to the outcome.
I've been sharing this with my clients for years, and #4 is still the most challenging, for them and for me. Learning how to form and have relationships really has been a lifelong marathon-- but I'm finding the payoff to be well worth it as i age.
That fourth one is the hard bit, isn’t it. Letting go of what we hope someone will give us back is harder in practice. I like that you call it a lifelong marathon. I think many of us keep learning how to do relationships long after we thought we'd figured them out.
These men enter adulthood having already mastered how they present themselves to others, hyper-alert to threat, all to avoid the challenges they learned early on. Unless they examine these difficulties, their view of the world remains unchanged.
This paragraph resonated with me, I am hyper-alert, people have said I am conscientious or aware what’s going on…I want to be with people more and I feel fortunate to have the drive and spaces to do that. I spend way too much time alone, maybe only having a real conversation with somebody every other day on the phone. So I think a lot to myself and I’ve had this phrase kicking around in my head for the past month: “I prefer my own council” which is kind of BS. It’s good to talk things over with people but historically those you can trust are few and far between.
“I prefer my own counsel” is a great example of how a coping strategy can start to sound like a personality trait. I know that one. And being hyper-aware can look like conscientiousness from the outside while costing quite a lot internally. The fact that you still want more contact with people matters. That desire hasn’t disappeared.
How does consciousness from the outside from the outside costs quite a lot internally? I know you’ve probably written a ton about this. Thanks. :)
I meant conscientiousness, not consciousness. ☺️
Someone who is hyper-alert to others can look conscientious from the outside because they notice mood changes, remember details, anticipate problems, read the room well, and are careful about how they affect others.
The internal cost is the constant monitoring behind it. You may be scanning faces, tone, pauses and reactions, wondering whether something has shifted or whether you have done something wrong. What looks like social awareness can sometimes involve a lot of vigilance and mental effort.
I believe these two paragraphs are true and thanks for expanding on my question. I did make a typo when I wrote “consciousness.”
No one ever told me there was a difference between gay and queer. Can you do a piece on this?
I do like that idea. There’s definitely a distinction between “gay” and “queer,” both historically and in how people use and experience those words today. I’d be happy to write a piece exploring that. ☺️
Gino, that last bit got me. Is this actually the life I want, or is some sixteen-year-old version of me still running the place? And I liked that you didn’t make being alone the villain either. Sometimes alone is lovely. Sometimes it’s armour. Annoyingly, we’re the ones who have to work out which is which.
Yes, exactly. I think that’s the hard part, because being alone can genuinely feel good and safe. The question is whether it still feels like a choice. And yes, annoyingly, nobody else can answer it for us.
I do way too much alone. My best friends are far away and I treasure the times we spend. We have fun. But locally? I'm not so good. I once bought two tickets for a concert at the Met Philadelphia for an event a year in advance. Thought I could ask someone, right? Went by myself. (Maybe for the best. The headliner was way too loud and used annoying lighting effects. I left very early!)
I know that feeling. Having people you love at a distance can make local life feel strangely empty, even when you’re not actually alone in the larger sense. And the concert story made me smile. Maybe that empty second ticket saved someone from an evening of deafening lights and regret.
I ate lunch alone in high school a lot. I was part of the high school acting troop and I would just go backstage to have my lunch.
My therapist and I have talked about isolation not only coming from safety, but from the "tax on capacity. "
In short, not fitting into a community the demands, not asks, demands behaviors, characteristics, attitudes… that you simply don't share or like. And knowing that a lot of of the people in our community have different values and they are not going to understand mine.
Why would I wanna be part of a community that is so overrun with shaming each other?
Being kind, being generous, being real, being thoughtful, these things take a backseat to body identity and performative behaviors in our community.
I am a very gregarious person by nature, but I'm also a very genuine person, WYSIWYG, and I just can't fake it to make it.
I don't have very many gay friends because of the real epidemic in our community, lack of authenticity.
I also related to just the general sense of what you were talking about -- safety first. I no longer lead with it, but it's a tool in the toolbox, for sure.
That “tax on capacity” is a brilliant way to frame it because it's also true. There’s a difference between avoiding people because closeness feels unsafe and stepping back because belonging feels like too much performance. I also understand the exhaustion of feeling that certain gay spaces reward presentation over sincerity. I'm glad safety no longer "drives the car".
Yeah. It's more of an emergency air-bag now. lol
From the outside it looks that I have rich social life: I don't spend much time at home, I have close friends, I regularly visit gay sauna. But I absolutely cannot connect with wast-wast majority of other gay men, because it is tiring and boring for me to chat with them: we almost don't have anything in common. I have autism and my close friends are all kinda weird and not very socially successful, just like me. I really want to connect with other gays not just physically, I am dreaming of a relationship. But it just so difficult to force myself to "properly socialize" with people I don't have much in common.
This text resonates with me heavily, despite my situation being very different.