It�s been a crappy week all around. My brother�s cat died, Nicole�s boyfriend left the country, and I just talked to another friend who says that there was a problem with her husband�s medicine, and all week, he�s been a total mess. Then, her washing machine died.

I�ve just been tired. It could be the usual clawing at the cosmic-continuum, which is slang for: I feel like crap when other people�s lives suck.

Or, it could be that I�m just tired. I�ve been feeling extra overwhelmed with everything I mentioned before. Even at my best, I have trouble staying balanced.

I�ve been sleeping a lot, this week. I even took a sick day, yesterday.

Since the new year started, I haven�t been keeping up with my self-care, and it�s possible that that�s catching up to me, too.

I have a couple of ideas for posts for the other blog, but I haven�t gotten it together enough to actually write them down.

I�ve been learning more about personality types, and I�m finding it mildly helpful. I actually read through a self-help book that was loaned to me a few years ago called, The Introvert Advantage: Something Something Something.

It was a bit too general, and only mildly helpful. Lots of "introverts are so very, very wonderful and special, really." No actual examples or reasons given to prove her point.

She�ll give examples like� introverts often get so overwhelmed by the external world that they�ll completely shut down and be unable to think.

This is something I identify with, but then she�ll follow it up with some crazy assertion like how the blank-mind, deer in headlights, experience is ok because you�re just so special.

Really? Because when that happens to me, it usually causes a huge misunderstanding or fight because extroverts don�t get that I�m not doing it on purpose. Since I can�t think, I can�t explain that I�m not doing it on purpose, until maybe 3 days later, and by then, I�m ashamed of my idiotic inability to compute a thought, that I don�t want to bring it up. By my definition; not ok.

It�s especially hard if the person knows me, and believes me to be pretty damn smart. So, they think there�s no way in hell that I�m not intentionally withholding an answer or response.

You�d have to be pretty damn special to offset a problem like that. Like, having the ability to fly.

Fortunately, I can deal with the regular world most of the time. While I�m a pretty strong introvert, I�m generally not a shy or self-conscious person. So, I don�t have that added anxiety, which often trips up other introverts.

So, anyway, there was stuff where she cited experiences that resonated with me, and a lot of other general stuff that seemed very fluffy and unhelpful. The few solutions she offered either didn�t apply to me, or were so obvious, I�d started employing them decades ago.

Tonight, I�m going to dinner and watching a movie with some friends. This is to help cheer up Nicole, but also provides me with much needed socialization outside of Adam. It�s easy to forget how important that is, but I try to keep that practice in my regular rotation as part of Operation: Make Amy Sane.

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Friday, Feb. 03, 2012 at 4:27 PM