When I was in my teens and twenties, I remember saying that I had this ever-open "critical eye" that held me back, that kept me from enjoying myself or from ever really completing anything artistic because that eye told me nothing was ever "good enough" (which was contrary to what some of my favorite teachers told me and also contrary to what real friends might have said). I ignored positive remarks and praise, dismissing it as fatuous.
I thought I'd blinded that eye in my thirties----I finally believed that I was in control of it----but its influence continued in more subtle ways, instead becoming a censor more than a critic, one composed of so-called "friends and coworkers," who were better known as acquaintences, and who had a similar affect on my life. These, too, were watchers, and though they may not have expressed their criticism in words, I could see it in their eyes (I'm not blind) and feel it in their (usually) more subtle words or body language. Yes, I'm "too sensitive," a phrase used against me since childhood.
But it isn't my sensitivity I must give up, it's caring what such people think that I must give up.
Of course I've told myself that I didn't care what they thought, for decades. Yet my feelings and my responses said otherwise. I felt mostly sad, asking variations of "Why do people have to be so mean-spirited, so small-minded?" over and over, knowing the answers, yet still unable to accept them and wishing for it to be otherwise. My disappointed WISHES have caused me more pain than anyone can know. And what a waste!
Finally I am breathing deeply, feeling who I am, and attempting to act upon that. How freeing. . . .
What took me so long? What hideous tentacles of this culture were able to have such a strong hold on me? I can't blame stupidity----I read, I think, I'm not overly impressed by the credentials of our society and recognize the difference between them and being truly intelligent----or insensitivity, though I have been taking antidepressants off and on since my early twenties, and mostly on since my mid-thirties, to be able to cope. (And, by the way, I'm mostly off of them now, and will be entirely off by April. We shall see whether it's my body chemistry that's screwy or not sometime after that. The truth isn't so clear in these matters.)
Was it merely a fear of being judged that hurt me so much? I'm not sure.
