We are Perfectly, Imperfectly PERFECT!
A little while ago, I contemplated writing a post about love, but I didn't - I wrote about something else. At some point, a little further down the road, I read another post written by somebody else focusing on exactly that. It was a really powerful post. Although it left me feeling a little bit sad that I had discounted what I was drawn to do in the first place, so this is my post - about LOVE and the GREAT NEED for more of it – across the board.
For pretty much my entire life, people have always looked at me like I was a square peg in a round hole - I have NEVER been considered “normal”. I was too loud, too opinionated, I spoke my mind, I wasn’t interested in the things that others were, I broke all the rules, I dressed eccentrically and I bucked conformity on pretty much all fronts. I refused to do things that don’t wash well with me, and therefore did things “my own way” which always ended up with me facing a lot of resistance and scrutiny. - Who cares!
CREDIT
As a tween and teen I was a little bit of a “wild child” (yeah, that is probably the understatement of the year) but I was just never accepted by the “run of the mill” types – hence my eventual solace in those found in night clubs and dark corners. It was throughout these years that I realised just how detrimental the effects of negative social conditioning and lack of emotional support are on people (including myself). Quite a while ago I stumbled across a music video which hit me from the second it started. Ok, yes, it is a “pop” track but if you have a moment - give it the time of day.
It REALLY spoke to me because there is enormous pressure these days to "conform" - to become "this" or "that" - to achieve way beyond our years, to climb insurmountable mountains and it just makes me sick to my stomach! When did we all forget to just live and let live... and more importantly, to LOVE one another. To me, there was a really powerful message in that song and I hope that at least a few people see it. In my opinion it is TERRIFYINGLY accurate in portraying the ridiculous amounts of stress, anxiety, self-loathing and depression that so many people live with in today's society because of the ongoing pressure they are put under.
“have I gone mad? im afraid so, but let me tell you something, the best people usually are.” ― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
I find it really saddening that children and adults are living in a society that has replaced a fundamental necessity – ie. love, affection and genuine engagement with medications and “stuff”. Where love and emotional support are needed, verbal judgements and verdicts accompanied by little tablets of all shapes and sizes are handed out instead – like that is going to solve anything! I mean, who needs that stuff called “LOVE” anyway?! Considering this, it really shouldn’t be surprising at all that a good portion of people live their entire lives thinking and feeling that something is wrong with them… Love is a staple ingredient of life. In fact it IS LIFE! Life without love is a guaranteed train wreck!
CREDIT
We are ALL beautiful, intricate, intrinsic parts of a whole! Every single one of us has a purpose here and a role to play. The fact that you don’t understand or agree with another’s purpose and/or path, does not make it *(or them) “unacceptable” – nor does it make them “not normal”. If there is any REAL “problem” in that sentence, to my mind it would be that there is often no effort made to do exactly that –trying to understand or accept it – who knows… you might actually learn something if you did… So – we are starved of love, emotional support and any real kind of embrace.
We are shoved aside and handed objects to replace the fundamentals, we are repeatedly fed negativity about what and who we are, we are diagnosed with all sorts of ailments and conditions and then after all that, we must still stick a plastic smile on our faces and be what society has deemed normal? Let it be understood, that just because we are all different, does not make any one of us wrong or abnormal! When we encounter people in our day to day activities, we just don’t know how much our kindness, acceptance or gestures of affection might impact that individual positively. So just do it! Look beyond what “society” defines as “acceptable”, see the soul of the individual and then feed it with the fundamentals required for it to thrive - love, respect, compassion and understanding.
CREDIT
Until next time...
Much Love from Cape Town, South Africa xxx
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What I really hate is the word "normal" and the thought of doing what everyone else is doing. Then you get the looks from others as if to say "why don't you just do what everyone else does?"
Why would I want to do that? Does that make everyone happy? I certainly don't see many happy people who have been taken, forced into and shaped by a lifestyle they don't want to live in just because "everyone else is doing it".
It seems the way it goes is that from an early age, we're pushed in to a mindset where we must do what we're told (at school) and we're not trained to think for ourselves. With the advent of technology, love and quality time is replaced by notifications and digital toxins from our devices. The gap between their use and understanding of their psychological effects has grown larger at an accelerating rate. It's only the last 12 months or so that research has started to bring in results on the impact.
Yet here we are, communicating on the devices but in a positive way - balance is the key. I express myself a lot more online than I would do in 3D world because I get lambasted for being too emotional, "man up", no one wants to hear that deep shit.
So tell me how that suppression of emotions is going for you?
When someone achieves something through sheer dedication and hard work, it seems I'm the only one who actually admires the effort and shows respect for that. The norm seems to be to slate them - mirrors. Reflecting years of jealousy where they conformed and their target achieved.
So yes, we need more love in the world and it has to come from within - if you don't love yourself first, how can you expect others to?
Right, back to normal life now 🙂
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The world is changing a lot as we keep moving forward. I'd say that love is quite on the dip right now, and it seems that noone is buying it. Make no mistake I'm not saying this lightly, you just have to turn a T.V. on and behold to see what I'm talking about, still, though underrrated in this day and age, love is the force that will keep us afloat when there's no more shining lights!
I think the biggest problem is "unconditional" love which is a concept people cant their mind around. Having no expectation of others seems to be the hardest ting for all of us to do. Once we mastered that as well as truly loving ourselves, we will able to accept others as they are! "normal or not" .
Loved that video - and also that quote by van Gogh. I'd never seen that one, but so true. If we could channel all the energy spent in trying to conform needlessly and change it to creating and loving who we are - wow, powerful!
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Well, yeah, normal comes from norm and sometimes some people tend to forget that. Means "like most of the rest". And that last quote is quite to point of why we need the out of the norm.
The problem is, educational systems (those I know) try very hard to make you normal.
All just a necessary step, destroying the family unit, in the control systems being implemented upon society.
Many of us know not what love of a family unit is. My mother family of 13, father adopted family of 6. I never knew my own brother growing up whom ran away before I was born. I have always thought something changed in society at about that time shifting strongly into the disrupt of formal family units. Those same units that reinforce all love associated child learning are now all but completely gone.
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great post.
I agree - emotional support is essential to our health. Most of us didn't receive this growing up, or at least, enough of it.
It stems from the problem of us being (for the most part) cut off from our bodies and feelings - too much emphasis on our mind, brain, logic and thinking.
It's an intergenerational pattern - a way of being that gets passed down generation to generation.
There is hope though, as more of us look inward, and integrate the missing pieces of ourselves.
I am not perfectly normal, I am a free man...