Now that I have expertly masterminded the diminishing of my own public presence – an 18 month process of careful non-action, locked accounts, moved blogs, paused podcasts and private conversations – I feel once again able to relax into a non-aggressive, celebratory mode of being, which I recognise as much truer to myself.<\/p>\n
![\"leonardo_da_vinci_helicopter_and_lifting_wing_thumb1\"](\"http:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/09\/leonardo_da_vinci_helicopter_and_lifting_wing_thumb1.jpg\" "\\"leonardo_da_vinci_helicopter_and_lifting_wing_thumb1\\"")
It has been a strange and sometimes tortuous process, like the shedding of a skin. I didn’t know what I would be left with, and in fact, I’m still not quite sure. Sometimes I have felt more exposed than ever, but I simply had to answer the call of my inner self and let go of it all. <\/p>\n
At some point, a moment of clarity showed me that the oppression I was experiencing was causing me to become cynical and unforgiving, and this manifested in occasionally amusing but foulmouthed outbursts, mostly to nobody in particular but sometimes to real people, which to me is regrettable, even though lesser mortals would probably just let rip to shore up their wounded ego, gaining comfort from friends, and then drowning their sorrows, self-righteously repeating the mantra: “they deserved every word because they are [insert disparaging epithet here]” – whether that was entirely true or not. <\/p>\n
Like Job, I was cursing God for putting me here, complaining about the problems of being alive, but unlike Job, I have the benefit of modern psychology and I know that whatever curses I heap upon other people are actually a clear and definite signal that these are in fact aspects of myself which I am judging.<\/p>\n
So, after waiting for 40 minutes for the bus last week to take me to Highgate, when the bus driver went straight past the mandatory stop despite my obvious and clear visibility, spurring the fastest and most determined sprint which I have achieved in over a decade to the next bus stop, where aided and abetted by two Somali mothers with prams who held up the bus just long enough for me to catch it, when I stepped onto the bus, swiping my Oyster card and then articulately berating the bus driver long and loud, shaming him in front of his passengers, a part of me knew that the words I used referred to myself.<\/p>\n
Yes, he was lazy, he wasn’t doing his job properly, he was abusing his position, he was stupid and part of him was indeed an arsehole, but my dislike of these aspects of myself are the reasons I picked those particular words. <\/p>\n
When he told me to get off the bus, I ignored him, and continued to heap scorn on him, all the way up the stairs. He didn’t have the moral energy or aggression to confront me further. I glowered until I saw him get off as the bus changed drivers – just as well as I was already composing my parting shot which happily I did not deliver.<\/p>\n
Curses can be a healthy outlet, sure, but more often than not they are simply a barometer of oneself. Thankfully I didn’t call him a middle-aged blogger with a tendency to insult people based on his own negative feelings, periods of depression, an adamant refusal to be bullied, and arrogant presumptions of his own elevated intelligence, but I might do next time such a situation arises. <\/p>\n
“WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, YOU GENIUS – LEONARDO DA FUCKING VINCI??!!”<\/p>\n
Wouldn’t that be much more fun?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Now that I have expertly masterminded the diminishing of my own public presence – an 18 month process of careful non-action, locked accounts, moved blogs, paused podcasts and private conversations – I feel once again able to relax into a non-aggressive, celebratory mode of being, which I recognise as much truer to myself. It has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":126,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[276],"tags":[391,118],"class_list":["post-1729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-flip-side","tag-curses","tag-psychology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/126"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1729"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1734,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1729\/revisions\/1734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theothersideofeverything.com\/flip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}