I'm done with trying to convince the world I'm a good person.

I've frequently mentioned that I was involved in a very unfortunate trauma situation at work about six months ago and had to make a very controversial judgement call in regard to a blood bank emergency issue that we had no defined protocol for. Laboratory leadership came looking for my head and executed a very thorough assassination of my character with anecdotal evidence provided by my peers. Now I'm not saying that my character is without flaws, that I am not capable of admitting when I have made a mistake, or that things didn't occur as smoothly as they should have that night, none of that is in question. Bad things happened that night, I made a decision that looked very callous to those not privy to the intricacies of blood bank medicine and I reacted very poorly when my actions were called into question. None of that is in question, nor is that event the subject of this post. The aftermath of all of that is of great significance to me though. I take an extreme amount of pride and responsibility in my career, it's a very big part of my personality and identity. My career is what separates me from being a somewhat functional member of society or being like my mother and sister, individuals who were defined solely by their mental illness. I may have my flaws and difficulties, but my intentions are ALWAYS good and honorable, especially when it comes to patient care and safety. During my disciplinary meeting, the lab manager so thoroughly assassinated my character that I left the room feeling like everyone I work with thinks I'm an awful, awful person. It was plainly clear that the lab manager had solicited anecdotal evidence from my coworkers, cherry picked what she wanted, and then strung me up for all to see. It was extremely hard on me, to say the least. I went home absolutely dejected and came to work the next completely despondent. All I could think was that everyone thinks I'm a bad person and I obsessed over it for weeks. In my mind, I had completely failed as a human being......as I defined it then.

During this time of severe depression and shame I had an epiphany, I realized that I've spent the vast majority of my life trying to convince the world and more importantly, myself, that I am a good and decent person. I've been obsessed with proving it without knowing it even since I can remember, possibly. This is the byproduct of emotional and physical abuse from numerous sources from a very young age until early adulthood and then some sporadic events during adulthood. Every single day when faced with decisions, I would ask myself, "What would a good and decent person do in this situation?", and then I would do my best to follow that course of action in hopes of convincing people that I'm a good and moral person. This means that I spend a LOT of time obsessing about what other people think of me and this is a very unhealthy practice. Because of the abuse I suffered growing up, I inately believe that I am a bad person and that I HAVE to somehow make up for that by proving to the world that I am capable of being a good person. That never happens though. Just what is the definintion of a good person? There isn't an answer to that question. Worse yet, it's very subjective from one person to the next. I can list qualities that I think are those posessed by good people, but that would be pages long and no one really is interested in that. The real problem exists with the fact that I don't believe that I'm a good person unless people around me think I'm a good person. Therefore, my life depends on what other people think of me.

Now, flash back to my situation at work. Here we have a setting that is very important to my self esteem and I suddenly find myself in a world where I see that my coworkers and administration think I'm a bad employee, which equates to being a bad person in my mind. To make matter worse, with two exceptions, I no longer trust ANYONE I work with......at all. I'm scared, I'm paranoid, I'm afraid I'm going to lose my job, I'm absolutely convinced that I am a bad person and that I'm never going to convince anyone otherwise. To be honest, I should have fallen flat on my face and I'm lucky I didn't make a very serious attempt on my life. That didn't happen though. I didn't redouble my efforts to convince anyone that I really am a good person either. I was angry, very angry. I don't think I've been that angry since being a teenager. Something changed. I was angry at being betrayed by people I thought were my friends. I was angry that all of that time and work I had devoted to convincing people that I was a good person turned out to be for nothing. I was mad that I did my best to help save someone's life that night, but was hung out to dry (again) for my efforts.I was tired of feeling like I was less of a person. I was tired of being judged by people who couldn't possibly understand the kind of obstacles that face me every single day. I was tired of hating myself. I was tired of constantly wondering what people were thinking about me. One day a woke up and a question came across my mind: "WHO FUCKING CARES WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK ABOUT ME? DOES IT EVEN REALLY MATTER?"

About three years ago someone told me something that I didn't put much stock in until that very moment in time. A mental health professional told me, "What anyone else thinks of you is none of your business." To be honest, I thought this was the biggest load of crap that I had ever heard. That's to be expected from someone with no sense of self worth and who is constantly obsessed with how other people observe him. My mind wasn't ready to take that step. Well, I think my mind finally did take that step about four months ago. I stopped caring what about what my coworkers thought about me entirely almost overnight. I realized that if I was going to continue at the hospital I work at and maintain any kind of mental health, I needed to take a BIG step back and figure where my priorities should be. I realized that my mental health must always be priority number one, no matter what. Then I evaluated other aspects of my life and placed my career a few notches lower than it had previously been. I realized I could still be a great clinical laboratory scientist without sacrificing my mental health at the same time. In short, I dropped a lot of problems that are beyond my control and responsibility to preserve my sanity. I realized that one of coworkers, who is now retired, had done this very thing many years ago to save her own sanity. Most importantly, I resolved to continue to be the best laboratorian I can be, BUT I am no longer going to give ANY care to what my coworkers think of me. It's none of my business and it's not worth my time. I've chronicled my new work attitude HERE and so far it seems to be working. I can tell you I'm not very popular with some elements of the lab, but I seriously don't care anymore.

This attitude of not caring as to whether people think I'm a good person or trying to prove so has transferred into my personal life too. I no longer care at all what anyone thinks about me. I don't care if people outside of work think I'm a good person or not and I have no intention of ever going out of my way to prove it to anyone either. I'm probably never going to be convinced that I'm a good person.....and that's okay. I know that concepts like understanding, compassion, and kindness are very important to me. I'm also a huge bleeding heart, idealistic, liberal. Even further beyond that, I'm an atheist and I have more than a few socialist tendencies. Those last few ideals definitely put me at odds with a great deal of the population of this nation, if not the world and there are those who are going to judge me as a bad person as a result.....which is their prerogative. I can be very blunt and controversial at times. I have opinions about everything and have little inhibition about sharing them. This can make me difficult to get along with at times, but that is almost never my intent. As long as I'm not harming anyone else, I'm going to go my own way and pursue my ideals and lifestyle. I don't have to prove anything to anyone, including myself. I've survived far too much to second guess myself all of the time anymore. Spending all of my time trying to convince everyone I'm a nice/good person has really gotten me nowhere, I'm really just ready to be a person, my own person. I've seen and met plenty of people who I thought weren't the nicest people, yet they seemed to get on just fine. In fact, most of those people I met had or have a lot people in their lives than I do. Even further than that, they seem to be at peace with themselves.....something which I have never been able to attain. In the end, does it really matter if the world think you are a good person or not? A person's actions define who they are. Like I said above, I'm very much about kindness, understanding, and compassion. I like doing kind things for people, I just prefer to do them behind the scenes. I also care about people, I just don't emote it or go out of my way to show it. When the chips are down, I'll always be there to offer my hand in help, or shoulder to lean on. It will always be in private or behind the scenes though and will ALWAYS be sincere. I never want anything in return, nor do I seek recognition. In fact, I don't really want recognition beyond a thanks. I consider being kind to be every human being's responsibility. I help hundreds of people every year behind the scenes through my job, I don't seek thanks or recognition for those efforts from those people and I feel the same way about acts of kindness in the real world.

 I recently sold my mother's condo to a married couple who were friends or hers that lost their home in a fire. I didn't just sell them the condo, I told them they could have any and all of the furniture in the condo as well, since they lost most of their possessions to smoke damage.  I could have sold the condo for a fair amount more money, but I knew it would place it out of their price range. Mom left me enough inheritance that I can pay off my debts, buy a new car, and buy my own home with ease. There is nothing more that I could possibly need and I really have no desire for anything else. What is squeezing every last cent out of my mother's home and possessions going to gain for me? Nothing meaningful, to be certain. In the end, I'm selling someone's else's life and memories. Why not just give away most of it to someone in need? Money buys comfort, not happiness. With my debts paid off, my career is more than capable of supporting a comfortable lifestyle for me and The Dingoes. I was presented with a chance for me honor my mother by doing a very kind thing for some people she knew. I'm not writing this for any recognition, nor did I do this for them to prove anything to the world. I did this thing for them because I thought it was the morale, compassionate, and right thing to do. I would like to think that anyone placed in that situation would have done the same thing for them.

The problem lies with the fact that mom's friends are beyond appreciative of the gesture. So much so that it makes me REALLY uncomfortable. They have placed me on a very pedestal and continue to shower me with praise and love. They hardly know me though. I'm a VERY complicated man and my relationship with my mother was not a very good one. The praise I'm getting from mom's friends is almost unbearable for me. I received an email from the woman earlier this week informing me that they really want me to meet their grandchildren and whatnot. PLEASE NO! First off, the family is pretty religious and I'm about as atheist as they come, something I've been concealing from them since the day I met them. I never speak of the subject unless asked, but I find that just answering that I'm atheist is enough to offend many conservative elements. Second, I'm the very model of a middle aged, single, eccentric man. I can't possibly live up to the portrait that they've painted of me. Thirdly, they haven't seen me since I started covering my arms in tattoos. I'm not ashamed of myself or what I've done, I just don't want to make their heads explode. I am very much a model Missoula resident: weird as hell. All of this, "You are such a nice man and such a blessing!", stuff only scares the hell out of me.  I just want to be a guy, that's all. I was very, very, happy to be able to help them in their time of need and it honestly helped me gain some peace and closure over my issues with my mother. I am not that man that they think I am, I don't want to have to try to live up to man's legacy. He's not me, I'm not him. How do you get that point across to them? A situation presented itself where I could make a difference in some people's lives. I've been without a home, without any possessions save my car and my canine best friend. I know what that's like and I couldn't stand there and let someone else go through that without lending a hand. The last thing in the world I want ANYONE in this world to know is to how it feels to be me or have been me. It touched a nerve, a very raw nerve. I HAD TO DO SOMETHING. This doesn't make me a saint, I don't want to be a saint. I just don't to watch people suffer. Ever.  I'm just a guy, a guy with a very serious mental illness, and two dogs that he loves more than the world itself. I just want to be me, I want to find my own answers in my own fashion. I don't want to have to live up to anything other than being a good doggie dad.

Am I a good person? I don't know. Does it even really matter? Not really. What about what other people think about me? That's none of my business and it really shouldn't matter to me. Do I need to go out of my way to be a good person? No. I'm naturally kind, understanding, and compassionate, that's enough. Do I need to convince anyone that I'm a good person? Fuck no......and I have no intention of wasting any more time trying.

Being single at 41......and not giving a shit.

Being a single, 41 year old man is an interesting position to be in. My last relationship ended in spectacular fashion approximately three years ago, which was shortly before I turned 40 years old. I went through a period of abject terror of the idea of being single in my 40's. Here I am three years later and I honestly couldn't care less about the fact that I'm single. If there is anything that I've learned in the intervening years, it's that society's expectation that everyone is supposed to have a significant other at every point in time in their adult lives is just about the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life.

I recently posted an expose on the merits and difficulties of going your own way in today's world and I would place being a middle aged single man in that category. Being single as an adult in our society is not the norm and in many respects has negative connotations associated with it. I had a lot of anxiety over this until as recently as last year, but I managed to shrug all of that off about the same time that I stopped caring about what other people think about me. A lot of that has to do with the realization that I would rather be alone than in a bad, unhappy, or unhealthy relationship. My marriage didn't exactly end in the fashion I would have liked it to, but it was doomed from the get go. I harbor no resentments toward my ex-wife though I suspect the sentiment is not mutual.....and that's okay. She's now happily married to someone who was in our bridal party.....which sounds like something straight out of a soap opera, I admit. Like I said above, I have harbor resentments toward her and actually am very good humored about the situation. My next relationship proved to be very, very unhealthy and extremely abusive in nature. The specifics are complex and quite absurd. Too absurd even for soap operas. Fortunately things didn't progress into marriage and I pity the man she pitted me against and eventually went on to marry, he's now married to a very, very, mentally ill woman who could very well could clinically be labeled as a psychopath (not that I don't have significant mental health problems). It's easy to see what happened in hindsight, she came into my life when I was probably the most vulnerable that I had ever been. The rest is history. I still wear the scars from that experience, but I survived and I've learned an incredible amount about myself in the aftermath. The worst part is that I was very deeply in love with her and part of me always will be. Such a beautiful and ill woman. I wish her well and hope she some day will be able to see beyond the walls of her personality disorder and I hope she can come to terms with the things she has done to people along the way.

The aftermath of that four year mess has been one of loneliness, discovery, and acceptance. Oh how I hated being alone those first few years. Though I bordered on being desperate for companionship, I kept enough of my wits about me to know that I didn't want to stumble into anything bad again, but I felt like a failure because I was alone.  One sad thing that I've discovered is that there are plenty of single people out there who are indeed desperate enough to do anything to have someone in their lives if they find themselves to be single after a divorce or end of a long term relationship. I nearly stumbled into a few of those situations in the last few years, only to come to the terrifying realization of things before anything could happen. It scares the shit out of me, to say the least. I won't be manipulated ever again. I won't give ANYONE power over me again either.  I would rather die completely alone than fall under someone's influence or manipulations again. I don't need anyone who would do things like that in my life again, I've suffered far too much abuse to suffer any more.  I don't need to be in a relationship just to be validated, I have two Dingoes for that. I'm perfectly happy by myself, which is something a lot of people I know would never be able to accomplish. I don't need anyone. My happiness will never be dependent upon someone else nor will I ever be in a relationship just to be in a relationship. I am truly free in that regard.

All that being said, it would be very nice to have someone to share myself with. I've experienced a lot of things in life, beautiful things and things that would have completely destroyed a lot of people. I lived in Hawaii for two years with my oldest Dingo and we had many, many adventures together. It has been years since I've actually talked to anyone about my time on the island, yet it was such a transformative period in my life. I'm a very deep, complicated, and layered human being. I'm also very soft and compassionate on the inside, once you past my numerous defensive barriers. I'm passionate about many, many things and I can appreciate beauty in the most unlikely places. I also happen to be a romantic at heart, which is a part of my personality that never gets used these days.

My life is far from empty without an intimate partner, but it would be nice to have someone with me.  

........and with all of that being said, I'm SO complicated though. I walk well beyond the periphery of mainstream society and seem to only stray farther and farther from it as time goes on. I have no intention whatsoever of being "normal". I question everything I carry a lot of scars and pain with me, my demons haunt me every night in my sleep. There are times in my life when it's all I can do get out of bed and feed myself. I'm a huge fatalist and I'm completely convinced that I will die by my own hand some time in the future. I'm obsessed with dark philosophy. I'm an atheist and about as secular as you can get. There is little about me that isn't complicated nor am I easy to understand. One of the reasons why I'm so comfortable being alone is because I honestly don't see that I'm ever going to find anyone who is going to patient or deep enough to handle me. I can't even keep any long term close friends, let alone maintain an intimate relationship. So to be honest, I've given up on the idea of finding anyone.........and that's okay. I spend a LOT of time sitting in my coffee shop in downtown Missoula watching people come and go. I wonder what it's like to be normal, what it's like to be able to make friends easily, and what it's like to have intimate relationships with the opposite sex. I'm not going to sugar coat it though, I'm quite certain the majority of couples I see are in relationships that are not healthy. I've watched too many of my friends' relationships fall apart or watched them stay within an unhappy relationship because they weren't strong enough to go their own way. I've seen too many friends choose the wrong people or keep going back to the wrong person time and time again. As with everything in life, I'm really cynical about love, marriage, and relationships.......but I also UNDERSTAND how they are supposed to work very well......well enough to know that I'm probably not capable of being a healthy partner to anyone......and that's okay. There is nothing anywhere that says life has to be fair, you have try to make the best that you can with the cards that you are dealt. I have two Dingoes in my life that I love very dearly and I think it's a very beautiful love, one that brings so much joy to my life. I may not have anyone in my life as far an intimate relationship goes, but there is plenty of love in my life. Being alone is okay and I'm okay with being alone.

Hiding in plain sight.

A great deal of my life is devoted to hiding and/or giving people a false sense of who I am. I've discovered over time that I'm a far too deep and sensitive person to even come close to wearing my heart on my sleeve. I admit that I take a certain measure of pride in being mysterious to people that I interact with on a daily basis. I find I'm far more open on Facebook and this blog because I know that only people who are genuinely interested are going to take the time to read anything that I write. My work place is probably the setting where I hide the most and employ the most amount of subterfuge to keep people from getting to close to me. When you have the level of trust issues that I do, keeping secrets becomes an obsession of sorts. People who know me well enough that they can tell me anything in confidence and that it will stay that way, but I am not one to divulge any of my own secrets because they are mine alone to keep.

All of this behavior is designed to minimize any rejection, abuse, and/or abandonment that may occur when people get too close to me and gaze into the abyss of my mind. I live in a pretty deep, complex, and extremely dark world and I've found most people are not capable handling any sort of intimate knowledge of the inner workings of my mind. Notice I say most people, I know there has to be other people out the who are similar to me and this is where the "hiding in plain sight" part comes in. Though I really do prefer to wrap myself in mystery and subterfuge, I do leave very subtle clues for the very perceptive to find if they should happen along and are looking for other people like themselves.

We'll start with the music I listen to. Though I do listen to a fair amount of music for more superficial reasons, the artists that I am very passionate about usually write their own songs and frequently write about darker subject matters. Favorite songs of mine almost always resonate with me personally from a lyrical standpoint. Only one person in my life figured that I frequently express myself inner self in secret through the music I listen to and she turned out to be a bit of a scorpion. The clues are there though, it takes an intimate knowledge of a song's subject to tease out how it resonates with me. Most people aren't passionate enough about music to spend their time trying to disseminate what an artist is trying to convey in their music and not every music artist is actually trying to convey any sort of actual emotional meaning or message. Like I said above, not all of the music I listen to is deep, but traditionally my favorite artists tend to fall into the deep side of things.

I leave other subtle clues for people to pick up on if they are clever enough and paying attention. I've wanted to get a lot of ink over the last few years, but financial constraints and an aversion to the process of getting tattooed itself we significant hurdles to that endeavor. Not so anymore. It may seem that a lot of my ink is random and very nerdy in nature, but I assure you that every piece that I have has very deep and significant meaning to me on many different levels beyond being forms of art. I will say there is an overarching theme that ties a lot of my tattoos together, but that's as far as I'm going to go with any sort of explanation. Let's just say it's very complicated and personal in nature. The types of visual media that I watch usually also have overarching and deep undertones with me as well. They also tend to be pretty dark in nature. My favorite books are very complicated and layered works by one of the grand masters of science fiction. The very foundation of more than one of my core beliefs lie within the the six original books of Frank Herbert's "Dune" series. Once again, the clues are there, but you have to look VERY hard to see them, let alone understand their significance.

It's hard being a deep, layered, mentally ill, and flawed individual in today's world. I'm extremely introspective and spend a great deal of time writing or in deep thought. I constantly observing the world around me to try to understand it and try to figure out where my place in it is supposed to be. I tend to be very suspicious of anything trendy or very popular within popular culture. I'm very solitary in nature, mostly because I've discovered that people really can't handle the real me or have less than honorable intentions in their interactions with me. I'm absolutely bound and determined to go my own way and refuse to be influenced by or rely on anyone other than myself. I refuse to be defined or confined to any sort of category. I also absolutely refuse to be told or influenced by anyone when it comes to how I should think, what I should like, or how I should act. I'm really not fit for public consumption because of my flaws, fears, and complexities. People have a really difficult time understanding me......and that's okay. Most people are too wrapped up in their own worlds to look beyond those walls.....and that's okay too. Like I've said numerous times in this post, I leave subtle hints about the true nature of myself out there in the world for the right people to see and interpret. I like being a mystery and probably always will. This has the unfortunate side effect of being a lonely existence though. I used to worry about this a lot in the past few years, but I seem to have overcome my fear of being alone. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing, all I know is that I'm comfortable with it. In the meantime, life goes on and I go on.....as best I can and in the fashion as I see fit.....leaving clues along the way. Hiding in plain sight is fun.