PT and everything else

[sathor]

PT was kinda silly. Most of what they showed me exercise wise the orthopedic surgeon could have told me to do in about 5 minutes at home, and I wouldn't be $10 co-paying. But, if I cancel and or refuse to go, the Dr. will probably drop me, and if serious issues eventually develop, it will essentially be my fault. I'm sure insurance has something to do with all of this. It's alright I guess - they told me my hamstrings are incredibly tight which is bad, and I've always kind of known that - hopefully that's what's causing most of the issues in my left knee, and it can be rectified shortly. I hate hamstring stretches, but I can't say I'm against fixing that issue if it's possible. Plus, once I get better, it will help me a lot in my dead lifts and squats to be more flexible below the waistline.

Work has been okay, I guess. Nothing has changed. Everyone is still negative as all hell. Mr. 4th DUI showed up and received his final letter, which he had to sign. If he misses any more work, he will probably be terminated, with or without a doctor's excuse. Like I said...about half of the team called in sick for a week of my vacation. It actually kinda irks me, because I took my vacation - all of it - fair and square. It resulted in me having more work to do when I came back than I should have had, and it's -really- not fair. If I called in for a week straight, I'd be in serious trouble. Mr. 4th DUI has missed about 8 weeks of work, most without Dr. excuses, in the past 10 months. He's basically invincible...I'm not even sure they'd terminate him if he missed more. Such is the unfairness of life. Even people who are untrustworthy and undependable can be kept employed if a company is frightened that it can't find more people who are at least as competent as said person. There's like no real human capital in this area...you'd think that'd make my chances better at finding very lucrative work. Ah well.

The more I read on autism the more I wonder about myself. I know I lack a lot of soft skills, and I definitely suffer from some degree of this whole strange planet syndrome...but on the same token, I'm not really sure I'm all that incapacitated by it. My social issues could even be the result of very high intelligence and a naturally serious demeanor. I'm very business oriented and have a hard time with small talk, have a hard time building meaningful rapport with new people, have a hard time starting conversations (although I don't seem to have much of a problem with some.) That being said I don't generally /try/ to start conversations, either. I have enough going on in my own mental train of thought, and whatever it is I'm trying to accomplish at the moment. With my friends and family, I don't really have any issues. So self-diagnosis is questionable at best - I'm not super attractive, not super popular. I don't get a lot of female attention even with my above average physique. I'm not sure if I'm autistic or not, but I definitely can't seem to get certain things straight in my life...and those things are commonly associated with people who suffer from Aspergers.

I have been told I'm cold and unapproachable, and that is probably true. I don't think a lot of women fall head over heels for guys like that. My last girlfriend actually told me I'm probably in for a long life of loneliness if I don't seek psychological help for my depression and outlook on life. Not that she was free of psychological issues herself - she was a diagnosed narcissist - but I worry that maybe, long term, she's right. Truthfully though, I just -can't- approach new people, small talk, get them to like me, whatever. I'm just terrible at the dating and friend "game." Such is life. Maybe someday I'll luck out and meet a girl who has similar issues...so we can at least understand each other. Sometimes I think that was the biggest problem in my past relationships. They never really understood me...sometimes I wonder if they even tried.

Comments

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Sorry for the long delay in replying; Livejournal has totally screwed up my access with their newest upgrade, and I've only just figured out how to get around it.

Sounds to me like your location is not favorable for meeting the kind of women who would match well with you. Erie is a pretty redneck town, as I recall, and I'm sure it's even redder-necked outside of town (same as here.) While it's not peoples' fault that they don't have wide interests or education when they've been actively discouraged from developing their intellects since infancy, it does make for a huge cultural gap in communication. Doubtless there are a few young women like yourself around, but consider: being girls, they will have been even more weird and outcast than you while growing up, and are even more discouraged about their chances of meeting anyone. Therefore, they're mostly hanging out online while the more neurotypical chicks are at the bar, and f you're ever going to meet them, it's most likely to be online.

With all due respect, I hardly think you're in a position to say what 'women' love or don't love. My men have mostly not been what one would describe as 'warm and approachable', and my daughter doesn't go for that sort either. That whole 'Nice Guy Syndrome' thing is bullshit, and if you've got it, you would do well to kill it with fire.

Working out is an excellent method of building confidence and self-esteem - I think everybody looks and feels better when they're fit, strong and standing tall. Unfortunately, the kind of women who'll date you just because you're ripped are no better than the kind who'll date you just because you have money. but it's still preferable to be ripped and have money, than not. I would say, be particular; don't waste your time with shallow, fatuous, mercenary women, however hot they may look - go for character and intellect; those last long after hotness has faded away.

My Aspie daughter met her shy-but-brilliant young man through OK Cupid. Her profile there opened with the words "Smart is sexy; talk brainy to me." She went out for coffee (the standard first contact) with about a dozen guys, went on dates (second contact) with four or five, before she met her genius boyfriend. I hadn't thought much of the whole online-dating notion, but it's true she had little chance of meeting men she'd be interested in any other way - even living in the middle of Seattle, it's hard to have a social life when one works all the time and can't afford to go clubbing, and the people one meets in clubs are frequently jerks anyway. So think about that option, when you've sorted your other stuff out. it couldn't hurt to give it a shot.

Hang in there! It's hard to lead the Examined Life, not least because it's usually pretty lonely. I am glad to have your input as well, and will be back on Lj more once they fix the glitch - soon, I hope!

[sathor.livejournal.com]

Not sure if the Nice Guy link is more of a joke or what - I think a lot of these traits can be found in a lot of men and women both, to varying degrees. Most people don't rock the boat, and people who do can often create a lot more problems than they resolve. There's a time and place for it, in the right context. I love rocking the boat when it comes to traditions, common sense, politics, religion, whatever. That's the philosopher in me, probably. I don't take offense to beliefs unless they are downright immoral most of the time, so I expect similar treatment. With the society today (maybe it was always) I feel it's pretty hard to say much of anything that you believe in a group of people and not piss someone off or have them disagree with you completely. No one is able to actually debate the issue because it's going to automatically devolve into some kind of "you're a fucking idiot" speech eventually, because nobody wants to address ideas anymore - they just want to discredit the person or attack their ideological affiliation, just like Fox News or other media networks.

The Nice Guy Syndrome always seemed like some kind of rationalization for explaining away men who maybe aren't quite as "lucky" (re: attractive, smooth talking, large social circle, good at meeting completely new people, or even just TRYING to meet/get dates) as other guys, or who aren't really womanizers/sexist and simultaneously in a successful relationship(s) (men who want some kind of blanket answer for why they can simultaneously be a "good person" but not have a partner.) Because I know womanizers, and I know cheaters, and I know sexists, and I know women who stick by them, even when they call their friends crying often. It's a problem not only with the woman, likely being self-loathing and having no self esteem (and not seeking to empower herself to escape a negative relationship), but it's a problem with the man as well. Maybe there is a nice guy that's like the other extreme, but it seems to me (especially based on the second link) that this is more like the desperate guy that borderline stalks women because he expects to get something for being a good person when obviously EVERY other guy is a complete and utter douche bag. Yeah, I think I have kind of been a dick to women who have snubbed me, emotions are irrational like that and it's something I've been working on since I was a teenager...but I've never chased a potential partner down and hounded her hoping she'd finally give in, nor have I kept long-term female friends with the hope they would eventually sleep with me - I've even decided against dates or seeing movies in bedrooms with women because I felt there wasn't a healthy connection and I didn't want it to escalate (and I've had girls escalate things very rapidly with me.) My last girlfriend however seemed to suffer from an inability to say no to men who asked her out, even when she was happy - later rationalizing it as "I wasn't happy" when the original answer was, "I feel like I should give everyone a chance." I feel like maybe she's one of those women who feel obligated and haven't been, well, I guess damaged enough, to hold on to what's loving her correctly now. Of course I guess that's coming from my warped perspective.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Nah, it's not just your warped perspective. It's everybody's warped perspective. Our evolutionary psychology isn't adapted to the conditions of modern society, where we're all constantly bombarded with images of hyper-attractive people and messages that we ought to be attracted to them at all times.

The reason the players get lucky so often is because they've learned how to manipulate women. As you've probably observed, when people are being successfully manipulated, they don't know it, and generally will vigorously deny it. A lot of people - men and women both - keep falling for essentially the same kind of head-game all their lives, even after swearing Never Again every time.

For sure, there's lots of kinds of manipulation, and it's not restricted to one sex. I think you're very wise to not go watching movies in the bedroom with women you don't want to sleep with. I very much doubt that your last girlfriend suffered from an inability to say no to other men - sounds more like you suffered from her unwillingness to say it. This might seem odd, but some people feel no guilt or remorse about cheating on their partners - they don't do it because they're unhappy; they do it because they feel like doing it, and they don't really care that their partner doesn't like it.

It isn't true that getting abused by one man makes a woman more grateful to be with another man who doesn't abuse her. Not getting abused is a right, not a privilege. If you had a friend who punched you in the face, would you feel grateful because another friend never did so?.

I have known a number of Nice Guy Syndrome guys - and it's not all about trying to get with women, either; the traits are still there even when the guy is faithfully married. This book utterly nails the description of how it works - of course, there are also plenty of Nice Girls who do the same sort of stuff, with the same sort of results, but there's different books for them.

[sathor.livejournal.com]

That book is awesome. I've read to Breaking Free Activity #9. Of course i'm not doing the activities (yet) but it's letting me think about things and my self in a completely different way, which is great. That's the kind of thing I live for. It's why I read philosophy, especially classical (because the perspectives they had then were different - but also because much of their insight applies very much so today.) There are things I disagree with, of course (I am very critical of anything I read, especially in self-help - mainly because this is an area which isn't complete empirical science.) For instance, "failing to live up to their full potential" as a trait of Nice Guys is a very interesting claim, mainly because it can't be objectively validated in any case, except by maybe God or Fate. There are geniuses and PHD holders who are homeless, for whatever reasons, there are incredibly talented people who never make a dime off of that talent, and we can't say with certainty that these people failed to live up to their full potential because there are myriad variables involved in the entirety of their lives, many of which, likely a majority, which were completely out of their control (Mark Twain "What Is Man" comes to mind again.) I wouldn't even say that Nice Guyness is a realistic reason for not living up to potentials - I think it's the nature of life in general, and probably could be left out of the list of traits without any real effect on the value of the text. It almost feels like a scare tactic - what do you think?

I often think about how modern society and media influences our psychology - and by no means do I think that our times and experiences are unintended side-effects of the media, either. I think there was intention and deliberate design involved (genetic/class warfare, eugenics, propaganda.) I just pointed out to my mother the other night, some random sitcom - Bad Girls i think? Every teenage girl in the school as they panned through the halls had the perfect body image. Not one was anorexic or even somewhat overweight, acne ridden or without makeup.

I like how you framed my last relationship, I think that's accurate and an important change in description. I also wanted to point out (in response to some of the other comments) that I did actually pop the question to two of my exes. I would count the first as well, but we were very young and I feel like that was more or less late teenage innocence, even if the relationship did last as long as it did. I gave a ring to one of those exes, which I had to get back shortly thereafter (showing up at her place of work because she made it impossible for me to contact her any other way) and with the latter we both agreed we'd wait until she graduated from college. Obviously that didn't quite work out - she didn't want to have kids either, which was a bit of a downer, yes - although I am still not quite sure I'm anywhere close to being ready to handle that.

I'm glad you don't find my writing too self-centered - I've worried about it for a long time, but this is the way my voice has developed. Even in verbal conversation I find I'm constantly checking myself to see if I'm speaking too much about myself (instead of delving for more information from someone who has said or described something, I will often describe a situation or experience of my own that i've deemed similar instead - whether that's normal or not, I don't know, but I do it a -lot-, on the plus side, it keeps my memory sharp because I'm always bringing up past experiences and linking them to presently received knowledge.)

I like you quite a bit, too :) Your dating advice seems right on the money and much more down to earth than anything else I've ever come across. So very refreshing, maybe what I needed. Although I'm not quite sure I'm ready to start looking anyway - I think there's a lot of self discovery I have yet to perform.

Hope your livejournal works right soon, and hope you're having a wonderful week :)

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Yay, I'm glad you're finding the book helpful! All self-help books have to be taken with a grain of salt - each book is just one person's perspective, after all, even if it is a person with experience and expertise in the topic. I find that reading self-help books and employing the practices in them keeps me focused on 'right effort' - if I'm having a hard time dealing with some aspect of my life, instead of fretting about it I can seek insight about what might be causing the problem and what I can do to fix it.

About "living up to one's potential", two converging lines of thought. There's a person in some book, asked if she considers someone a lucky man, who laughs and says "If you live a long time and get most of what you wanted, I'll say you were lucky." So say it's within everyone's potential to be lucky like that; "living up to one's potential" would mean maximizing one's chances of succeeding.

Converging from the other direction: society's idea of what Success means: the job the car the suit the 'look' the babe the house the yacht.... Yeah right. Compare and contrast Richard Cory and the poet in Max Ehrmann's poem A Tradesman and a Poet". On the other hand, Kliban's cartoon Wasted and Useful Lives looks to me like two different kinds of waste.

Therefore, I would say consider 'your potential' to be your capacity to get what you want in life and to leave the world a better place than you found it. Up to you to define what you want, and what comprises 'better'. Up to you to define what living up to that potential would mean, and only you will ever know how much you do it. It's your life.

Heh, yeah, the media's effect was all planned. Vance Packard's books laid it on the line half a century ago, in popular and affordable paperback format. But the physical perfection of the girls in TV shows reflects the actual demographics of Hollywood: the place is swarming with chic little starlets who came there hoping to be Stars. If you ever see a genuine (not staged) crowd in Hollywood, check it out: they really do look like that. The people on sit-coms are those who won the casting-call auditions, so they're the ones who stood out in an already unusually-pretty crowd. Of course they're all made-up; they're TV actors.

So you've had three relationships of sufficient duration to propose, and one actual engagement? That sounds promising; I know guys your age who've never had a relationship last more than six months. But it also doesn't sound like any of them had much potential for a successful marriage, and I'm wondering if, in retrospect, you hung in there too long, settling for less than you really wanted because you thought it was the best you could get?

One of the characteristics common to Aspies is less use of gendered speech patterns. When you do experience-matching, some people probably mistake it for self-referentiality just because you're a man, and thus they don't exoect you to be trying to convey empathy verbally.

*grins* Glad to be helpful! Seems like right now, you're working so hard on your life that dating would only be a distraction, but the day will come.

Hope your week is wonderful too; be well!

[sathor.livejournal.com]

All of this being said, I do feel like guys who get damaged over time, like I have (I have always been broken up with, usually around the two-three year mark) maybe start to feel like there is something fundamentally wrong with them, and maybe Nice Guy Syndrome is a good answer. Maybe it's not. I don't know. I'll be the first to admit I don't know myself that well, but I'll also be the first to say that I don't think you could ever -really- figure out and fix everything that's wrong with you...love and commitment...well, I think they're supposed to help us grow...as well as overlook faults...hopefully you get my meaning, it is hard to put into words.

I guess it goes without saying, I just really hope I'm not a "Nice Guy" who's really an asshole no woman would ever spend a lifetime with. But even outside of that, I really hope I'm not alone for a lifetime, period. I hope that I'm not incredibly flawed, and I hope every day I wake up that I improve a little, that I am a little less broken...although at times it feels like the opposite is occurring.

TBH, I feel like a fish out of water when it comes to human beings...and I think they really don't understand me all that well, either. I tried online dating, never even managed a date - I put people off immediately, at least enough of them to make me feel like it's hopeless - at least I didn't with you, and a few others in my life...or I'd be -really- lonely.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

"I guess it goes without saying, I just really hope I'm not a "Nice Guy" who's really an asshole no woman would ever spend a lifetime with."

No, no. Guys who ARE assholes don't worry about being assholes - hell, they own it with pride! - and you are actively trying not to be one. As for being a Nice Guy - hey, two of my dearest friends have been married over 30 years to Nice Guys, whom they love dearly, even though the passivity does get on their nerves. One can get over being a Nice Guy, and go for being a Good Man instead, which you seem to be doing.

You don't sound 'incredibly flawed' to me. Actually, young man, you sound like rather a catch for a lady who's perceptive enough to see that, but I think you're going to have to see it and believe it yourself first. I also think you've probably been settling for way too little in the girlfriend department, and would do better with a better class of women.

You may have heard it said, that successful writers are those who never give up in the face of rejection slips; who keep writing and submitting manuscripts until they do succeed. The same is true of online dating. It's about the most emotionally risk-free method of meeting people, because everyone on there is looking for someone, and you can get acquainted a little before you meet in person.

Here's the thing about dating: it's only dating. So, you ask every interesting single lady out for coffee - most will say no, but some will say yes. And coffee is only coffee, but it's still a plus to your life, and if it goes well, you can ask them out again. Statistically, the more often you try, the better your odds - and remember they're trying too; they come to that first date hoping you'll be The One. So keep trying; practice makes perfect.

What I told my daughter, I'll tell you too: if what you want is to get married, don't go out with anyone you already know you wouldn't want to marry. Don't keep going out with someone you wouldn't marry. It's far kinder to all concerned to break up sooner and cut your losses than to drag it out when it's never going to work.

It may be that you got broken-up-with at the 2-3 year mark because you didn't ask them to marry you, and they figured that if you hadn't by then, you weren't gonna. Sounds like they were not so much worth marrying anyway, so you lucked out. If you've been going out with someone two or three years, it's time to either pop the question or quit wasting her time; women who want kids can't wait forever to have them.

*hugs* I do like you a lot; please keep writing, and I will keep writing back, as my schedule and Livejournal's rotten glitchy program allow. Hang in there; things will get better this year.

[sathor.livejournal.com]

Two posts, because I hit the comment max character limit. I'm sorry, I could write for hours. Sheesh. And it really is like, the kind of internal monologue kind of shit that most people would probably find really draining. But I guess, it's what my journal is for =\ That, and I think maybe I am too self-centered. Hrm.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

It doesn't read like internal monologue, though; and I write long posts and comments too, so no worries. A lot of the reason I hang out online is because my local social circle is small, widely scattered, not very mobile and not very intellectual. I can drive ten miles to hear all about my nearest friend's family, health problems and recently-viewed movies, or 25 miles in the other direction to hear much the same from some other friends, or I can stay home and have more interesting conversations right here.

Absolutely, it's what your journal is for; write what you feel like writing. I often post stuff that I don't think many other people find too fascinating - all my odd links, articles and videos, that I stash on my Lj just so I can find them again. Most of them get no comments at all, and that's okay; I like comments, but they're not a big deal.

In my experience, the more self-centered a person is, the less likely he or she is to question it.