Being my true colorful self 本当のカラフルな自分でいる

Depression is the belief that the life you desire is out of your reach. Sometimes it can be the inability to even define the life you want because there are things you don’t feel comfortable or safe exploring.

In my case, I realized that no one around me was living the life I wanted live, and that ideas like mine were not welcome by the masses, that sometimes they were even actively attacked.

I didn’t have the courage to live life in a way that I know would make me vulnerable to persecution, and more importantly I didn’t want to be expelled from my whole support network.

The fact is, my support network never really supported my dreams, but they did support my wellbeing, so long as I complied with them to a certain degree.

That was a very scary thing to put at risk.

Now that I look back at my conviction when I tell people “I have no reason to go back to the US”, I realize it’s because I left in order to try and survive without my support network, namely my parents, and without faling under their influence because they were too far to even know what I was up to.

I tested my boundaries to see if I could live without any gauranteed support and wandered the streets. I worked jobs they wouldn’t approve of and lived at a living standard that would have made them ashamed, but I didn’t feel ashamed by it because it was a path to liberation and living life by my own ideals, rather than ones imposed on me.

I made my own support networks of friends and communities and tried never to rely too deeply on them, only to be a mutual safety net for each other.

Some people will criticize you for caring about what others think, but this fear isn’t a shallow need to fit in, it’s a survival mechanism.

You don’t break through it by forcing rugged individualism or by shaming the behavior, you break through it by getting out of your comfort zone and exploring further and further from your support base.

There are people who might try to stop you from exploring and pretend to have your best interests in mind when really they are just afraid of losing you.

In that situation, I’ve always believed that I should reassure them as much as possible, stay calm and make an effort to connect and if they still try to reatrain or pressure me, they don’t deserve my support. Rather than end these relationships with a bang, I find they usually fizzle out naturally once I start living how I should live.

Rather than a support network that simply wants me to thrive, I am working on building one that wants me to thrive the way I want to thrive, and won’t let their own beliefs about what is possible cause them to want to work against me like my family always did.

This is not to say I have cut my ties with family and old friends. My relationship with my parents and a few old friends with diffwrent ideals is stronger than ever, and it’s stronger because I am no longer afraid to lose them. I’ve had to make a few ultimatums with them

I have made clear that if they try to infect me with their own fears and reaervations I will make more distance with them and even ignore their calls, and it’s not because I don’t care about them. It’s becauee if they want me to be happy they’ll learn when to shut up, and if it’s not about my happiness and self realization, I don’t need or want it, because that is all I want for them.

When I say happiness and self realization, I mean a feeling of living the life you are meant to live, happiness and fulfillment which comes from inside and not from anyone else.

I want bigger things than my parents and most of the people I grew up with, not necessarily in terms of money or fame, but in terms of the quality of my relationships and in terms of what I deem realistic or possible.

I’ve finally reached a point where I am just starting to feel shameless about this, even if people call me too idealistic and even if they try to stop me.

I recently made my first Japanese vlog (English subtitles). Check it out here:
日本に住むの一番慣れないところ The hardest thing to get used to in Japan

今回は英語で書き自動翻訳をしましたから通じるかどうかわからないので、変なところあればごめんなさい:

うつ病は、自分が望む人生が手に入らないという信念です。時には、探求することに快適さや安全を感じないために、自分が望む人生を定義することさえできないことがあります。

私の場合、周りの誰も私が望むような人生を送っていないことに気づきましたし、私のような考えが大多数から歓迎されず、時には積極的に攻撃されることもありました。

迫害に晒される可能性のある方法で生活する勇気が私にはなく、もっと重要なことに、私は自分の全ての支援ネットワークから追放されたくありませんでした。

事実、私の支援ネットワークは私の夢を本当に支えてはくれませんでしたが、ある程度彼らに従う限り、私の福祉を支えました。

それは非常に危険なリスクでした。

今振り返ってみると、「アメリカに戻る理由がない」と人々に言うときの私の確信は、支援ネットワーク、特に親から離れ、彼らの影響を受けずに生き延びるために出発したからだと気づきます。

私は保証された支援なしで生きられるか試し、街をさまよいました。彼らが認めないような仕事をし、彼らが恥じるであろう生活水準で生活しましたが、それは自由への道であり、私自身の理想に基づいて生きることだったので、恥じることはありませんでした。

私は自分の友人やコミュニティの新しい支援ネットワークを築き、それに深く依存することなく、お互いに安全網となるよう努めました。

他人の意見を気にすることを批判する人もいますが、この恐怖は適応に入るための浅いニーズではなく、生存メカニズムです。

それを打破するには、個人主義を強制することやその行動を恥じることではなく、快適ゾーンから出て支援基盤からさらに遠くへと探求することで成し遂げます。

探索を止めようとする人がいるかもしれませんが、彼らはあなたの最善を考えているふりをして、実際にはあなたを失うことを恐れているだけです。

そのような状況では、私は彼らをできるだけ安心させ、冷静に接続を試みるべきだと常に信じています。それでも彼らが私を制約しようとしたり、圧力をかけようとするなら、彼らは私の支援に値しません。これらの関係を劇的に終わらせるのではなく、私が本来生きるべき方法で生活し始めると、自然に消えていくことが多いです。

単に私が繁栄することを望む支援ネットワークではなく、私が繁栄する方法を望み、自身の信念が私に対して作用することを許さないようなネットワークを築いています。これは私が家族や古い友人との縁を切ったというわけではありません。私の両親やいくつかの異なる理想を持つ古い友人との関係は以前よりも強固で、彼らを失うことを恐れなくなったからです。私は彼らにいくつかの最終通告を行いました。

彼らが自分の恐れや予約を私に押し付けようとするなら、私は彼らとの距離を取り、電話を無視することもあります。それは彼らを気にかけていないからではありません。彼らが私の幸せを望むなら、いつ口を閉じるべきかを学ぶべきですし、それが私の幸福や自己実現に関わらないなら、私には必要ないし望んでもいません。それが私が彼らに望む全てです。

幸福と自己実現と言うとき、それは他人からではなく内側から来る幸福と達成感、つまり本来の自分が生きるべき人生を生きる感覚を意味します。

私は両親や育った環境の人々よりも大きなものを望んでいます。それは必ずしもお金や名声の面でではなく、関係の質や私が現実的だと考えることの面でです。

私は両親や一緒に育ったほとんどの人たちよりも大きなものを求めています。それは必ずしもお金や名声という点ではなく、人間関係の質や、私が現実的だと思えること、可能だと思えることの点です。

ついに、人々が私を理想主義的すぎると言っても、私を止めようとしても、このことに対して恥じらいを感じなくなる地点に達しました。

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So relatable. I want to ask you how long it took you to learn Japanese and how did you deal with that during the first years? I'm not having it easy with Portuguese even though it has many similarities with Spanish, but still makes me feel quite isolated despite being surrounded by people. I imagine your transition was way tougher and I wonder what you did to deal with it

I started about 3 years before I came to Japan. When I got to Japan though I hardly felt like I could speak and it took me another 2 years before I was comfortable.

I think how I learned Mandarin was muuuuuch more effective. I felt comfortable after weeks. Basically I chose a grammar pattern and just used it to have playful ridiculous conversation with everyone I met. “I am…”. “I want…” “I have to…”. Every day I’d choose a phrase or two and just practice the hell out of them with a dictionary.

I would always keep a notebook with me with all the sentences I wanted to use with people, including questions I had no reason to ask but thought would be either useful or fun.

Maybe @vincentnijman has some tips, although I feel like he was born with 6 languages installed

Maybe @vincentnijman has some tips, although I feel like he was born with 6 languages installed

Haha! It definitely did not come this easilyy to me
but I had two parents who also spoke a handful of languages, I guess that helped
and I had 6 languages in high school ( if I count two years of Latin and 5 years of Ancient Greek ).

I would lie if I said that I speak 6 languages fluently because I don't but if I had to, I could make myself understood in Dutch, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese and French.

Be honest Vincent, you came on your ship with all languages coded into your DNA and now we're just waiting to see how your aliens agendas unfold

I might have. The thing is they (have tried to ) erase(d) my memories prior to 1981.

Ok, I'll give it a try to picking phrases and practicing the shit out of em, thanks for the advice!

It's also been effective to translate any thoughts I have any situations I experience. Instead of just thinking that I would have liked to say something, I go and look up how it's said

Sigh!
For me, I get to distance myself from a lot of 'caring' relatives to avoid those concerned, deep questions such as, when wre you doing this and that!, you're supposed to have this by now...

I felt this pressure from my parents too. They didn’t say it so directly but they used other tactics, guilt and unwarranted advice. My Chinese friends and Jewish friends and Indian friends all seem to have their own version of it.

I believe that it holds us back more than anything. I should have focused all my energy on being an artist, if I had I would have accomplished all my dreams already. But they convinced me to be scared of my dreams because the risk was higher. Now they regret it and admit that I was right but they think I should cut my losses and give up on the dream. I’ve put my foot down this time and said no way.

Trying not to resent them because they were only trying to protect me the way they thought was best. But it’s my life and I am making that very clear now.

Your comment made me think of this song:

You said it all. They were doing all that with the simple mindset of protection and meaning well for you, but life has its style for different individuals.

Nice song with deep lyrics 👍

Well, let me put it this way. Let’s just assume that you are not with the right people at the right time. It may be funny how you think you’re the only one who thinks or reason this way but there are lots of you like this…

That's what I found. There are actually many people who see things like me all over the world. Some have support and some do not. Some places it's easier to find and some it is not.

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Today we all are in depression because there are so many problems going on in life that we don't understand anything. If we want to get out of depression, we have to do physical activities and like listening to our favorite music. After that he spends some time of peace.