While reading Self-Care for Adult Children... (etc.), there was an entry that focused on parents watching their children grow / how if their child is not like other children, the parent is likely to panic/see this as a negative. And how sometimes that's a good tool to define overlying issues and sometimes it's just that child evolving past their peers.
How the hell are you supposed to tell the difference?
I understand not everything is black and white - I used to live in mostly gray areas even as a child (this is mostly why I got in trouble when I was younger. Surrounded by philistines, unable to grasp nuance: I became fed up). But when should we, as adults, check/look into something?
When is your OCD and/or inner monologue getting the best of you? When are you focusing too much on yourself/not enough? When are you a hypochondriac and when is there something actually wrong? Furthermore: when are you not being a hypo, there is nothing wrong AND you actually have just evolved a bit? A bit past your peers? Past the neighborhood, past the fishbowl?
Made even more difficult by these people who agree with you fervently - who "OH, YEAH ME TOO IDOTHATTOO" in response to the sharings of your innermost self. All the while - "oh no, them not" because in reality: they are fooling themselves. They have put in the work to convince themselves - encased in a thick, jelly-like lie they created. They are the reason people like myself have imposter syndrome. (If only they had put as much effort into actually becoming the self they pretend to be.)
With so many pretenders - outnumbering and far more audible than the "real ones" - how does one know when one is legitimately socially contrary because of a bit of lovely evolution, as opposed to disorder?
All of this reminds me: recently had a thought about authentic people. A friend told me "social anxiety fears you" after I walked up to a pair of strangers to ask a question. It never really hit me that this might be unusual, just one of those things: the thing must be done, you know it, it's no one's job in particular, but it's between you and your buddy: you do it. It's efficient and logical (the opposite of me when left to my own devices on a lazy Sunday with a pizza).
Also: getting the experience of living in a brand new place (NY) / starting fresh / no preconceived notions about who I was, just made friends organically... and then returning to a mostly new crew back home: I have noticed how clearly odd I am. I really am the little creature I have always hoped to be. Sure, there are still plenty of people who see me in a light I no longer prefer to be in, but their opinions of me are none of my business. Anyway! I noticed how odd I was and it really made me wonder: am I actually "socially contrary"? And if so: is it in the way of the evolution, after all these years of earnest work on myself? Or that of disorder?
(...Could be both... I'd be cool with that, I suppose.)
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