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I could tag this goal all day.

I’m sick of feeling misunderstood.

A big (enormous, gargantuan, colossal) part of it is the people-pleasing/passive bit, which I suspect many women are subject to. We’re all trained to be nice - by parents, teachers, bosses, PSAs - and it’s nice to be nice. Makes you feel really decent.

I recently realized how this can lead not only to the burning frustration of martyrdom, but to other people reading you as insincere.

(This unintentional insincerity has gotten me into trouble with certain guys, who can’t tell the difference between being civil and being interested. Have also gotten in over my head with clingy, needy people for the same reason.)

Thanks to an online personality test (?!), I finally got that part of it is because I pay way more attention to nonverbal cues than to verbal ones, and presume that others can “read” and “send” non-verbal signals equally well, when it’s not always the case.

The test suggested that I pay extra attention to verbal content and double-check that I’ve been understood, i.e., do a lot of talk about talk. Which I’ve found to be time-consuming and a pain in the butt, but worthwhile, I guess, insofar as I feel understood.

(Though obviously you can’t get into all that with everyone. I have no idea how to do this in brief interactions.)

The talk about talk thing has been working for me when the talk is about non-personal things; I have a much, much harder time talking about emotions, especially as I feel them. (I clam up when I’m angry or confronted, for example.) Any ideas about how to speak honestly and clearly when you’re hot under the collar?

and regular sunlight, but it’s pretty good. I’d turned to working evening and night shifts because I just couldn’t handle getting up in the morning, and feeling like a morally bankrupt person for being that way.

I genuinely like being up at night, and have been a night person all my life… As a baby and kid, I was just too jacked up and sensitive (both) to relax and sleep, and as a teen and early 20-something, I used this time for creative activities. (But I also spent a lot of those hours being anxious and depressed, I’ve got to say.)

It’s just not healthy. It ages and drains you (certain hormones are only produced during sleep, and only between certain hours); it can turn into isolation (as opposed to pleasant solitude); and obviously the greater part of social life and exchange happens during the day.

(Plus, if like me you want to get into doing physical activities, hiking and the like are probably more comfortably done in sunlight…)

I do miss the stillness, the opportunity for reflection. But joining the world is worth it. My mornings continue to be difficult, but at least they’re not happening at 5 pm.

For now, just tiring myself out seems to be working (in support of behaviourist psychological therapies ;) ). Other things that I believe have helped:

- my bedroom getting direct sunlight in the morning, and leaving my window open so I hear the morning rush of traffic.

- walking a lot during the day. (I now live in a European city, where the city infrastructure itself facilitates movement and energy expenditure.)

I am learning relaxation and self-soothing techniques (e.g., breathing, meditation) to handle those days when I haven’t knocked myself out by sheer activity.

Good luck to everyone!

Yup. Prof said (last year???) he’d still take it. I plan to deliver, hopefully this decade.