I’ve always been enormously proud of my ability to handle harsh criticisms.
I can take rejection. I can handle hearing the harsher truths on people’s minds and I can do it without flinching.
But I’m not really sure yet what this ability has done for me. The people more sensitive to criticism seemed to have racked up more accomplishments than I have.
So I’ve started to ask myself why I’m good at handling harsh criticisms.
Probably because as a kid I was shy and timid and I was always getting into trouble I didn’t understand so when people bothered to criticize me it became a relief.
Criticism gave me something to go on, some way of understanding what it was I was doing wrong.
Then I just acclimated.
When I tell people I’m into cold plunging they look at me the same way I used to look at vegans.
Like oh, you’re that type of person.
No I’m not.
I used to hate cold water. And hiking. And hippies. (I still hate hippies. And their city equivalent hipsters. But the hipsters make good coffee. So rather than eradicating them I want them to continue to exists as coffee making slaves)
Becoming obsessed with cold plunging was an accidental rewire.
I was never an outdoor type person. I’d always been a city type person.
I love going to theater. Going out and eating weird fancy food.
I love London and afternoon tea and really good whiskey.
I loved Paris and New York. Going to comedy shows and ballet and then staying up until two in the morning at a speak easy having deep conversations.
But then I spent some time being a very depressed loser. The thing about being a very depressed loser is it does open you up to trying new things.
So last summer I tried something new.
I started swimming in the river.
Getting into cold water was as awful as it had always been but I didn’t get a chance to fully absorb how horrid really cold water is.
Because the water got very deep and the current was very strong. I got swept away.
Floating on a fast moving river when the day is really hot but the water is really brisk have all the ingredients for inducing a pretty incredible kind of euphoria. One so incredible it’s almost a high.
An addictive kind of high.
I began to associate cold water with that high.
Instant rewire.
That is the most dangerous thing about men.
They can rewire just about anything.
If a man I really like is around anything we are doing can become associated with the high of being around that man.
Nothing is safe with men.
I hate Canadians. I could end up loving Canadians if one of them comes around me and is really hot.
A hot enough man could probably even rewire my brain into liking music I hate. Or even films I’ve created an identity around hating.
An incredible man might even get me to like that insufferable film where Kevin Costner turns his corn field into a baseball field so ghost baseball players will play baseball with him. (Is that what happened?)
When I first started attempting to save money it was long after I’d quit porn. (That’s right. I saved no money from porn. None. I don’t even still possess one single thing I bought from doing porn(vacations))
I started saving towards the image I had in my mind of living in Paris.
It was a very grand image. Very hard and nearly impossible to pull off. So I funneled all of my energy into it and I did save a lot of money very quickly.
I really don’t know how. At the time I was still smoking cigarettes. Still going out to eat all the time. Still treating my money like it fell from the sky. So how I managed to save all that money I have no idea.
But at the time I thought Paris was the answer to all my problems and I was wired to it.
What did I like so much about Paris?
It was just the first place I’d ever been where I felt like I could be myself without getting into any trouble.
So my entire being was wired into the idea that I couldn’t be happy until I moved to Paris.
All that money never went to Paris. But it did go somewhere.
I used it all as a down payment on a house.
Buying a house rewired Paris out of me.
Because it provided me a need I’d been neglecting most my life.
As an impulsive personality that has more courage than sense it’s easy to guess what need I’ve most neglected.
Stability.
I’ve moved a lot in my life. Moved impulsively from panic. Or suddenly from lack of choice in the matter. I had no idea how much of my anxiety was being used up on moving around a lot. Until I bought a house.
Paris fell completely out of importance under the incredible relief of feeling the stability of a permanent place to live.
I got to feel ground beneath my feet.
As chaotic person I didn’t feel the ground beneath my feet very often.
I lived in a world without gravity.
Even when there was a ground it has always felt like it was moving and preparing to split open.
Not because of my circumstances. Because I was so impulsive that I’d wired myself for chaos.
When I bought a house I found out I could rewire.
Now I want to sell my house.
Because houses are a lot of work. I’d have to invest even more money which I’m not sure is worth it.
And I’m sane now.
I don’t need a house to feel stable.
I do however still feel like I need a man to feel stable.
It might not be possible for me to achieve full stability without having a man.
Maybe other women are different, but that’s how I feel. And I don’t think it’s just a feeling. There might be some real truth to it.
But.
I am used to insane levels of chaos.
Just the stability I’ve achieved within myself is incredibly nice.
It might not ever reach its full potential without some reliable male energy around.
But people act like everything is meant to reach its full potential.
It’s not.
We’re very lucky when we can get even one thing in our lives to achieve its full potential.
Sometimes people will do something I don’t expect them to do.
Something insanely considerate or attentive. Or they’ll express appreciation or reciprocate the effort I put into them ten fold.
That kind of behavior will penetrate a shield I didn’t know I had.
I’ll realize how wired I am to expect and accept criticism. That I’m sometimes still trying to live in a world without gravity even though I’m standing on solid ground.
Which is awkward.
It makes life very awkward.
It makes interactions very awkward.
I’ve learned I have to start rewiring to accept acceptance instead of still being wired to adjust to criticism.
Jess lanai 