I have a problem.
My problem comes from two parts of my lifestyle which have been with me for about the last ten years.
First, I have leaned pretty hard into the whole “I’m fine on my own” thing. You know, the isolation thing — since long before Covid. I mean, Christ, I am a writer after all, this should be no surprise. I’m your token Peace-and-Quiet guy, and I live life mostly inside of my townhouse.
I’ve always been a very (I might even say extremely) self-sufficient person. I mostly keep my emotions to myself, I mostly find the answers to the things I need in life on my own, and I ask people for help with very little. That’s just the way I’ve always been. And it really doesn’t cause any “problems,” because it’s just efficient and effective. Or, I’ve convinced myself it doesn’t cause any problems. But it do.
The other issue is I have also leaned pretty hard into my ideas of what masculinity is. Stoic, silent, thoughtful, disciplined, et cetera.
I have spent my whole adult life trying to craft and hone my idea of what it means to be a useful adult, and more specifically to be a man. Most men go through this. This makes me perfectly ordinary. I have spent years trying to zero in on what kind of man I want to be, and why, and how I might do that. And in order to make myself into that man, I have been reading and studying and writing and abstaining and trying to cut off the worst parts of me and replace them with better parts.
So for the past decade of my life, I have been both relatively isolated and relatively hard at work.
Taking a step outside myself, I’m seeing that this has led me to be an overly quiet and stiff person. Especially in public.
I’m an open-minded person, but I probably don’t come off that way. I’m a generous person, but people probably don’t see it. I’m extremely kind, but I probably come off as aloof and self-involved. Not because I wear a scowl or anything, but because I’m so lost in my own thoughts and my own concerns that I simply fail to interact with people.
And I’m realizing now… who I want to become is getting directly in the way of who I already am. And they’re a lot closer than I give themselves credit for. I have come a long way — ten years is a long time.
Another problem my cavalier solitude is causing is that I’m not sharing myself with the few people I should be sharing myself with.
I have just a few really solid people in my life I really care about. Family, as it were. And I have had a few more over the last several years who are sadly no longer in my life. And what I’ve learned from these people is that talking is how you keep somebody in your life. I’m so used to relying on myself and only myself, that I don’t even share myself with them.
I’m outstanding at listening, but god-awful at talking.
Those conversations people have where they talk about what’s going on at work, or talk about plans for the next week, or vent about hard situations — I really don’t do any of that. I just listen when others do. I keep all my troubles, all my emotions, all my victories to myself. I just bought a Lexus, and the only family members who found out are the ones who discovered it by chance. I mean really, that’s the kind of thing you should be excited to tell your brothers. Or your mother who still gets a kick out of watching her son grow up and win at things. What the hell is wrong with me?
It’s not that I hide. I never hide. I mean… if my family asks me if I’m feeling down, and I am feeling down, I’m just going to tell them. I have zero problem admitting my struggles or my emotions to others. Not even to strangers.
It’s that I don’t go out of my way to tell the few people who want to know. In other words, I’m not giving them their half of the relationship.
If my family didn’t call me, I’d never talk to them. Even though I’m a “good” brother and son, that kind of makes me an asshole. The women in my life have also asked me why I don’t talk about myself more. And it’s not because they were nagging, it’s because I was so self-reliant that I forgot to invite them into my life by talking to them about it. Family members are like vampires — if you don’t invite them in, they can’t come. And eventually they may stop trying.
The people in your life who care the most about you… they want to hear you talk about yourself. This has been a difficult lesson for me because it requires me to, in some sense, go against my nature. But everybody has to go against their nature, and no exception am I.
I’ve also had these lessons reinforced over and over, a bit more “out loud,” on my work trips to the east coast.
One of my favorite things in life is just having a pleasant conversation with someone in the elevator or at the coffee shop. The unexpected little interactions that come from saying hello, or the comforting nods of fellow men, or the generous smiles of women. Or, better yet, the moments that come from someone doing something silly like pushing the wrong elevator button or spilling a few drops of coffee on their pants. And then you get to enjoy the humor of something, together with a complete stranger. It’s the ultimate human experience: just two people recognizing the humanity in each other. Those are the interactions that build the world.
Obviously I don’t want to bother my co-elevatees or random strangers. Or just turn and scream “HI!” at them for no good reason. But to never say hello to anyone is such a sin. Such a waste.
As I write this, earlier this afternoon I went down to the front desk of my hotel and was asked a question about my floor by the front desk manager. And I answered with a smartass remark. And she laughed, and we carried on a nice little conversation. And as I walked away I thought to myself, “oh yea, people like humor. People like my humor. This is how strangers meet. I could be funny more often. I could be myself more often.”
What an utterly ridiculous thing to have to say to oneself.
I started going to a coffee shop regularly, in the last couple of years. A little local place with a really nice atmosphere, great baristas, and killer coffee. I started doing this, truthfully, as a way to meet people. Rather than just sit at home on weekends, why not go out and read a book in public and just see what happens.
The problem is, I’m still this overly thoughtful, stiff-looking guy who fails to smile enough and fails to say hello enough. So yea I went to the coffee shop, but I didn’t even fucking do it right.
This is also one of numerous reasons I am profoundly against the “work-from-home revolution.” Because it robs us of our most important opportunities to meet people. To build the world together in person, and to meet potential mates by embarrassing ourselves. Frankly, I need to embarrass myself more. And so, likely, do you. Because the internet has stiffened all of us.
I think this is the trap I’ve fallen into: I spend so much time preparing to be the kind of man I want to be, for the woman and children I may eventually have, that I never put it into practice. I read books and I think about them. I absorb wisdom and think about it. But that’s it. I think about it.
Eventually there comes a time to just smile and apply the moves I’ve learned. Like these two.
Friedrich Nietzsche spent his whole life writing that the best thing a human being can do is dance. I don’t think he ever got around to it.
On the other hand you have Post Malone, who gets on stage in front of tens of thousands and lets go like he has nothing to lose. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a human being who so embodies “I don’t care what anybody thinks” as Post Malone. I don’t even like his music, but in my eyes he’s the coolest person alive.
I need someone to teach me how to dance. Because I don’t know how.
But I want to.
—
Spill some water on yourself just so you can laugh about it with a complete stranger.
JDR
“And if you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance.” - Lee Ann Womack
This one really hit home for me. Thank you for putting words to the emotions that I have been struggling with for a long time, particularly in the post Covid world. They say the first step to addressing a problem is to identify the issue. You have done that beautifully and I thank you for it!
Beautiful, honest post. I love this!