Still Dealing with a Fear of Judgement

[FoxLovinPat]

So I think I already mentioned this before in an earlier thread but I have a fear of being judged that I'm still trying to deal with and make better.
The reason for this is because of my father, as it was a trend of his while he was raising me to repeatedly tell me that people will judge me for various things so I should not do those things, or do those things respectively if I don't want to be judged by people. Despite knowing now that I don't have to worry about what others think of me as much as my father told me to, I still have the worry that people will judge me and/or that people are judging me. I don't know if I'll always have this fear and worry or if I'll be able overcome it, but I know it has gotten in the way of my life both in the past and the present.

In the past it got in the way of me being social and making friends, as because of my fear that people would judge me I didn't open myself up to those avenues because I was afraid that if I did then my newfound friends would turn on me and judge me whenever they learn about certain aspects of myself. Aspects such as me having autism, or me not being like the other boys due to not having an interest in the stereotypical "boy things", because I was told that I'd be judged for those things. It's also one of the reasons, other than not really having an interest in it due to being demisexual, that I didn't really try to find a girlfriend, because I thought it wouldn't last because she'd find out that I'm autistic and not like that, or find out that I don't fit the norm of masculinity and not like that. Heck I used to think I'd remain single forever because I did not fit into what I was told was desirable to women. And yeah despite being, what I now realize as demisexual, I did use to want a girlfriend, if only because that's the norm and I kept being pressured to get one by both my father and my peers even if I didn't really have feelings of attraction to the opposite sex.

As for the present, it's currently holding me back from being more openly me, but then again perhaps that's also for the best given where I live and how things currently but I digress. The most recent thing that came up that I realized is holding me back that I don't know how to overcome is that I am terrified of going to the gym, and have actually never gone to one outside of PE or my parents taking me to one for various reasons. Why? Because I'm afraid I'll be judged by the other people there if I go there since again I don't fit the typical masculine man mold, I don't care for sports and I don't really care about strength, toughness, and being muscular. If I went to the gym it'd just be to lose weight and not to gain muscle, but I fear that I'd be looked down on for that want because the others there might expect me to want to get muscular and not understand why I don't want that and be judgmental as a result. Also since I've never really been to a gym and wouldn't exactly know what I'm doing I might be judged for that too because they might expect me to already know all that stuff because of my gender, when I don't and be surprised and judgmental of me when I say "I have actually never been to a gym and don't know what to do here.". I could get a trainer I guess but then they might be judgmental because I would just want to lose weight and that's it and that's not typical of men.

I guess some context is in order for why I worry about that sorta thing so heavily.. It's because of how hard my father pushed that particular stereotypical mold of masculinity on me, and how often he told me that "If you're not like that then you're not a "real man" and all the "real men" will step on you and walk all over you!". Unfortunately I didn't really have any examples of masculinity outside of what my father told me men need to be like, and it seemed that society was backing up my father, or at least that's how I felt anyways. Because I'd see my peers in school acting and being like how my father said men should be, and in my eyes PE was also trying to push me into that mold as well. An example of this was my male classmates talking about how they hit the gym regularly and bragging about how much weight they can deadlift and/or bench-press and comparing their gym stats with the other male classmates and discussing their gym goals, or flexing to show off their muscles to the other guys or even the girls, or engaging in arm wrestling to compete over who has the stronger arm muscles.. though maybe with that last one it wasn't expressly stated that was what they were doing but I felt that's what the goal was.
I however never, ever, felt the desire to want to be the way my father said men should be, the way society seemed to suggest men should be though I felt the pressure and pull to be that way I never really fell into like and let the pressure pull me into that sort of way of thinking/doing.
And yes I'm well aware now that my father was wrong and that being that way is not the only way to be a man, the only true way to be masculine, but despite that I guess there's still the remnants of those teachings, swirling around inside my brain and making me worry that I'd be judged because I don't fit that mold. I guess despite what I know now, there's still a traumatized part of me that keeps repeating those stereotypes and my father's words, telling me that since I don't fit them I'll be judged, even though I know that's not necessarily true. I'm not sure how to go about silencing that voice so I don't worry so much about not fitting that toxic stereotype.

To close that out, I have realized that I am non-binary due to the above and a few other reasons and I've accepted myself as such. However I know the general public won't accept me as such and to them I'm still a man, and so thusly the societal expectations of masculinity will still be applied to me regardless of how I feel internally which is why I still worry about such perceptions/judgments.

 

[Xinyta]

I'd like to address a few things.

1. DO NOT CONFORM to the expectations of others. You are your own person and deserve your own happiness. If other people do not like it, that's their problem. Not your's.

2. Doubts about yourself and beliefs people will judge you for all you do and how you look, is a false narrative. No one gives two sticks what you are doing or if your look masculine or not. Those that do, are shallow human beings themselves.

3. You are an adult. You have the right to do things you want to do for yourself and the right to defend yourself. Don't let people's opinions of how you should handle yourself, rule how you dictate anything you do. Hear it, make a choice for yourself and decide to do what you feel is right. You know you better than anyone else. Especially more so than a stranger.

This is something that'll be hard. But you are capable of doing anything you put your mind to. Don't let others, who only down you, control how you do anything. It doesn't matter who it is. Parents, friends, strangers. You have the right to not only cut them off physically. But also mentality and emotionally.

Keep in mind. People can be judgemental. It's part of human nature unfortunately. But good people will judge you on your character as a person. Not your looks, your schedule, or how you chose to handle things. As long as you are being yourself, you'll find people who actually care for you and want to be around you.

Nothing is as bad as we make in our head.

Can things go wrong? Sure. But a lot can go right too, when we allow ourselves the chance to step outside our comfort zone and try.

 

[Aspychata]

First off, not everybody wants a masculine man. I actually prefer a more feminine male. Sensitive and caring, and able to open up about their feelings. But men like this do suffer in general. I think it's gotten better. Now, when l look back at my male friends, this describes all of them. They were successful. However, they were effeminate, and l was simply enthralled because of this. Sorry that your father gender-shamed you.

 

[Mary Terry]

First off, not everybody wants a masculine man. I actually prefer a more feminine male. Sensitive and caring, and able to open up about their feelings. But men like this do suffer in general. I think it's gotten better. Now, when l look back at my male friends, this describes all of them. They were successful. However, they were effeminate, and l was simply enthralled because of this. Sorry that your father gender-shamed you.

I've never been turned on by macho men. Especially the ones who are so hairy that they have a pelt on their chest and back. I've generally found that "type" to be as dumb as a sack of hammers.

 

[FoxLovinPat]

1. DO NOT CONFORM to the expectations of others. You are your own person and deserve your own happiness. If other people do not like it, that's their problem. Not your's.

I don't intend to, at least not anymore.
...except when it comes to my father, as I feel like I still have to "keep up appearances" around him ik order to "keep the peace".
Though that's more me masking/hiding a lot of things from him because I feel of I don't then he'll go ballistic on me and not be very happy with the choices I've made, and the fact I'm now in opposition to him in a lot of different ways.

2. Doubts about yourself and beliefs people will judge you for all you do and how you look, is a false narrative. No one gives two sticks what you are doing or if your look masculine or not. Those that do, are shallow human beings themselves.

That's now the impression I got from my father, as stated in my op. In addition that's not how my father operates, he's shown time and time again that he does care about how other people are as he'll be openly judgmental of them. Which I guess is another reason why I got such a fear of judgment because he'd judge me, other family members, and random people he doesn't know.
The trouble if I know he's not entirely wrong and that there are judgmental people in this world, he's one of them and I know he's not alone and there's others like him out there.

3. You are an adult. You have the right to do things you want to do for yourself and the right to defend yourself. Don't let people's opinions of how you should handle yourself, rule how you dictate anything you do. Hear it, make a choice for yourself and decide to do what you feel is right. You know you better than anyone else. Especially more so than a stranger.

I know, but it's hard to allow myself to follow through and it's hard to not care about other's potential opinions of me.

Keep in mind. People can be judgemental. It's part of human nature unfortunately. But good people will judge you on your character as a person. Not your looks, your schedule, or how you chose to handle things. As long as you are being yourself, you'll find people who actually care for you and want to be around you.

Like I touched on above, I know this all too well. That's what gives me such pause because I know there are people that will judge me for those things and that often paralyzes me from doing ot attempting to do things that could cause these kinds of people to judge me. When my fear of judgment gets particularly bad I look around at everyone around me and worry that they would be judging me in that very moment, just silently in their heads. Particularly when I am doing things that I was told or have heard that people judge other people for.

To go back to the gym example.. I get myself worked up just thinking of being in a gym just trying to do my own thing and that the random people there might be looking over at me judging me because I'm struggling to do the exercises and use the equipment because it's new to me.
Essentially I feel like it'd be a repeat of PE... nobody judged me openly but I was constantly aware that I wasn't measuring up to everyone else and they I was behind everyone else and that I was struggling with things nobody else seemed to be and so I thought they my classmates might be judging me. The PE teacher definitely did because I consistently had the worst grade possible in PE, it was only when our PE was briefly health class that my grade wasn't the worst. I still don't understand why PE had to be graded as it was definitely problematic for me and just made me feel worse, especially because my father would be like "How do you have the worst possible grade in PE?! That should be an easy A!" and probably would've been harder on me if the PE grade actually mattered.

Nothing is as bad as we make in our head.

Yeah I've been told that by my best friend and my therapist, doesn't make it any easier to dismiss the fears and worries.

 

[Aspychata]

@Xinyta , excellent advice, thank you.

 

[Ronald Zeeman]

I do not buy into the new narrative that guys should not act in a manner that is natural for guys, I do or did not get into fights when younger but did pose a lot which is natural among all mammals to show dominance why I did not get bullied. I even refused to take self defence courses seemed stupid when brains bear brawn.

 

[Au Naturel]

People will judge you. That is a fundamental truth. It is why people flock together in social bubbles and then conform to the common denominator. It is why people follow social influencers slavishly, and a monoculture of thinking and behavior arises. People want to belong to their tribe, and being judged and found acceptable is how that happens today. All personal judgment is comparison, either to another person or an arbitrary standard.

When I was a kid, people were judged harshly based on whether they went to church or not, whether they were liberal or conservative, and whether they had long or short hair. If you showed signs of being "effeminate," you might end up in a pool of blood.

When I visited my adoptive family in Michigan, I could feel the judgment radiating like heat. My oldest cousin was fine, but the rest of the family resented me for being rich (!!!) and living in California, where everyone was communist and queer. I'm none of those (by California standards, I'm barely in the middle class), but that doesn't stop the judgment. Since I don't like being judged negatively, I rarely visit my adoptive family.

I don't have a good solution except to avoid highly judgmental people. They are on a power trip that uses judgment as punishment and a way to control you. Bullies, Puritans, and narcissists are extremely judgmental. US culture, at least, is in a hyper-judgmental phase. Find your own group of people who are more mellow and laissez-faire in their social interactions.

It is easy to say not to allow other people's judgment to affect you, but it is insanely hard to do in practice.

Do not be judgmental yourself.

OTOH, do not let your fear of judgment lead you to imagine judgment that has not actually happened. We are often more critical of ourselves than anyone else. We are also vulnerable to the Spotlight effect.

https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-spotlight-effect-3024470

 

[FoxLovinPat]

First off, not everybody wants a masculine man. I actually prefer a more feminine male. Sensitive and caring, and able to open up about their feelings. But men like this do suffer in general. I think it's gotten better. Now, when l look back at my male friends, this describes all of them. They were successful. However, they were effeminate, and l was simply enthralled because of this. Sorry that your father gender-shamed you.

I've never been turned on by macho men. Especially the ones who are so hairy that they have a pelt on their chest and back. I've generally found that "type" to be as dumb as a sack of hammers.

I know that now, but back then I was led to believe otherwise. That women love and prefer the macho muscular men, and don't go for the "weak ***** men" as much.

My father would frequently say that if I get muscles then the ladies will be all over me, that they'll be like "Oh Pat you're so strong and muscular! Flex for us! Let us feel your miracles! Oooooh!~" which always made me feel icky and repulsed me actually as that didn't sound appealing me me whatsoever. That's an exact quote btw, he did actually say that on quite a few occasions, ofc substitute Pat for my actual birth name but other than that yep it's exact.
He'd say it in other ways too than just that, like he's say that all the hard work he forced me to do for him will build my muscle up and "the ladies will love that!", which in hindsight might've contributed to me not really enjoying doing said hard work.

Like I said in my op I used to think that because I wasn't strong and muscular, that the ladies would reject me as soon as they found out that I wasn't like that.

Oh and @Aspychata to address what you said about the more effeminate men you know being successful..
That's great that they are, and I've learned about that in recent years too from other sources.
But growing up I was led to believe that those kind of men can't be successful because the "real men" will push them down and step on them, so the only way to be successful in life as a man was to be the strong, tough, macho type or rise you were doomed to be stepped on and walked on by the "real men".
Which ofc didn't help me when I was younger because I felt like I had to be this strong, tough, macho type to be successful in life but I didn't want to be that way, but I also didn't want to be stepped on and walked upon so I was at an impasse.

 

[Judge]

And now a word from our sponsors...

"1978".....Uh-huh. Luckily things have changed...though some still want to roll the clock back.

 

[FoxLovinPat]

When I was a kid, people were judged harshly based on whether they went to church or not, whether they were liberal or conservative, and whether they had long or short hair. If you showed signs of being "effeminate," you might end up in a pool of blood.

When I visited my adoptive family in Michigan, I could feel the judgment radiating like heat. My oldest cousin was fine, but the rest of the family resented me for being rich (!!!) and living in California, where everyone was communist and queer. I'm none of those (by California standards, I'm barely in the middle class), but that doesn't stop the judgment. Since I don't like being judged negatively, I rarely visit my adoptive family.

Oh so that's where my father got it all from, he must've grown up on roughly the same era as you and wheras you seem to have moved away from such judgmental ways of thinking he fully embraced it and never changed his mind on any of it.
Because yeah, unfortunately most of what you just said there mirrors the kinds of ways my father judges others.
Whether one goes to church or not? Check. One's political party/beliefs? Check. Whether someone is "effeminate"? Check. Disliking California and moaning about it being liberal/communist, and queer? Check.

He thankfully doesn't seem to care about guys having long hair though as I decided to grow mine out in recent years and to my surprise he didn't say anything bad about it, he actually complimented me on it. If I were to turn my hair up on the other hand..

I don't have a good solution except to avoid highly judgmental people. They are on a power trip that uses judgment as punishment and a way to control you. Bullies, Puritans, and narcissists are extremely judgmental. US culture, at least, is in a hyper-judgmental phase. Find your own group of people who are more mellow and laissez-faire in their social interactions.

That's easier said than done when the highly judgmental person in your life is your own father. x.x
I have been considering cutting him off though, but that won't be easy and for now I've just keeping the peace but I might just have to do that soon.

Also I do have a small group of friends now, including my partner, who are all great supportive non judgmental people and are rather like minded to myself, though naturally not fully.

Do not be judgmental yourself.

Way ahead of you there, I've definitely "broken the cycle" and I generally live by the rule of not judging others even if I don't understand them, heck I've been that way for a long while actually. I guess I'm not entirely all high and mighty though as I have made judgements of people, but I generally try not to and unlike some will correct myself and learn to be better if I do.

OTOH, do not let your fear of judgment lead you to imagine judgment that has not actually happened. We are often more critical of ourselves than anyone else. We are also vulnerable to the Spotlight effect.

Yeah I let that happen all to often unfortunately, and I definitely need to work on not doing that.. I just dunno how.
Examples being what I mentioned in the OP about my fears of going to the gym, and another example that I forgot to mention in the OP but intended to..

Before I decided to let my hair fully grow out of often start panicking internally about my hair potentially looking "too messy" when it's get ok the longer side of the short end of the spectrum of hair. This was due to the fact that at that length it was harder to tame so more oftentimes then not there'd be hairs out of place and so when I'd see that in the mirror I'd freak out and think "Oh no my hair looks messy! What will people think?! Will they think I'm an unkept slob?!". Which in turn was due to the fact my father would be judgmental if my hair at times telling me that it looked messy and I needed to fix it it else people will think I'm a slob/bum, in hindsight I dunno what he was seeing that made him say that as my hair rarely got to the longer side of the short hair spectrum so he'd typically say that when my hair was shorter and much more tameable.
Oh yeah that reminds me that he also told me about the hair parting thing.. I can't remember the exact details but he claimed if a man parts his hair one way it's a sign that he's gay, so he'd tell me not to part my hair that way because "You don't want people to think you're gay do you?". He said a similar thing about rings when I got my class ring in Highschool, he told me not to put it on a specific finger because "A ring on that finger means you're gay!", and of course said the more typical and normal "That finger is reserved for wedding and engagement bands, so don't wear a ring other than those two on that finger."

 

[FoxLovinPat]

And now a word from our sponsors...

"1978".....Uh-huh. Luckily things have changed...though some still want to roll the clock back.

I actually tend to change the lyrics of that song when I hear it, which is fairly often as it's one of the songs in rotation on the radio at work, to "I don't want to be a macho man!", or the more humorous "Nacho, Nacho man! I want to be, a nacho man!" which is dependant on my mood really as the former tends to be when I'm feeling down about the gender norms expected of me.

 

[FoxLovinPat]

Oh yeah I realized I forgot to mention another recent example of me not doing something because of fear of judgment.
Halfway through last year I decided to try painting my nails to see if I liked it, and I found out that I did and persisted with it, when my nails were okay to do so, until December where I stopped due to Christmas being around the corner.
I meant to start doing it again after the Winter holidays but haven't been able to because I kept getting caught up in worry about what others might think of me, despite already knowing that it's fine from my previous experience. Really the only person I have to worry about on that front is my father, who has been known to state that "Men shouldn't paint their fingernails! That's feminine and gay!", so most likely I'd hear that and he told to take it off and never wear it again if I wore fingernail polish around him.
Which was actually one of my reasons behind not reapplying the nail polish because "Oh well <insert holiday or special event here> is coming up so I better not since I'll have to see my family for that and my father would be judgmental of it."

I currently plan on putting nail polish on soon, either before or after my birthday later this month. Since I have been procrastinating due to fear, and other than family birthdays later this month and next month there's no holidays coming up until Halloween, which I don't have to visit my family for anyways, and I kinda want to do my orange and black nails again for October, which yes I did last year because I thought it'd be fun.

Another frequent paralyzing dear regarding that was "What if my coworkers or the customers we serve judge me for it.", but last time I did it they didn't really say much about it. Heck two of my coworkers actually complimented me on them. I guess it's maybe because done coworkers have come and go since then so I guess it's concern that newer coworkers could judge me for them.

In a semi relected note, a few of my coworkers have commented on my hair being long but I dunno if their talk of "when are you going to get a haircut?" is just done in jest or if they're being genuine and believe I shouldn't have long hair. Maybe the former as I more often hear coworkers comment that it'd be weird to see me with shorter hair since they're used to seeing me with long hair.
Admittedly sarcasm/joking jabs are often lost on me, most likely because I'm on the spectrum.

 

[Roisin]

Is it all judgement that you have a fear of? Are there grades of judgement that you are less fearful of?

Everyone everywhere is judgemental, its a survival instinct, how people then respond to their assessment will demonstrate their biases and self awareness.

Trying to control this response in others is imo fruitless, they will ultimately judge you regardless of what you say or do.

They will respond based on their life experiences, which you can't predict, or influence.

Imagine living your life trying as if by magic to control how other people respond, how limited would that version of living be, what would it achieve.

Autistic social energy is finite and for me it is too precious to waste on fruitless endeavours.

It reads like you have already made good progress in identifying where these feelings come from and having others in your life who are more like you.

 

[Au Naturel]

Oh yeah I realized I forgot to mention another recent example of me not doing something because of fear of judgment.
Halfway through last year I decided to try painting my nails to see if I liked it, and I found out that I did and persisted with it, when my nails were okay to do so, until December where I stopped due to Christmas being around the corner.
I meant to start doing it again after the Winter holidays but haven't been able to because I kept getting caught up in worry about what others might think of me, despite already knowing that it's fine from my previous experience. Really the only person I have to worry about on that front is my father, who has been known to state that "Men shouldn't paint their fingernails! That's feminine and gay!", so most likely I'd hear that and he told to take it off and never wear it again if I wore fingernail polish around him.
Which was actually one of my reasons behind not reapplying the nail polish because "Oh well <insert holiday or special event here> is coming up so I better not since I'll have to see my family for that and my father would be judgmental of it."

I currently plan on putting nail polish on soon, either before or after my birthday later this month. Since I have been procrastinating due to fear, and other than family birthdays later this month and next month there's no holidays coming up until Halloween, which I don't have to visit my family for anyways, and I kinda want to do my orange and black nails again for October, which yes I did last year because I thought it'd be fun.

Another frequent paralyzing dear regarding that was "What if my coworkers or the customers we serve judge me for it.", but last time I did it they didn't really say much about it. Heck two of my coworkers actually complimented me on them. I guess it's maybe because done coworkers have come and go since then so I guess it's concern that newer coworkers could judge me for them.

In a semi relected note, a few of my coworkers have commented on my hair being long but I dunno if their talk of "when are you going to get a haircut?" is just done in jest or if they're being genuine and believe I shouldn't have long hair. Maybe the former as I more often hear coworkers comment that it'd be weird to see me with shorter hair since they're used to seeing me with long hair.
Admittedly sarcasm/joking jabs are often lost on me, most likely because I'm on the spectrum.

If you were in West LA, or SF or Seattle, nobody would notice your painted nails or your long hair or how it is parted. Nobody would assume you are gay. There are parts of the country that are liberal about such things and others that are not. Even very conservative states often have liberal enclaves. Florida and Texas come to mind. College towns are less judgmental than farming communities.

I'm sure your father would be miserable in those areas. The social conservatives have all moved to the exurbs or out of state because they cannot tolerate not fitting in with liberal urban culture. That's one way to separate from him without formally separating, I suppose. Move somewhere he'd never want to go.

I lived in rural northern Michigan until adulthood. Finally got the chance to move to California when I was 22. (I was having an affair with a 37-year-old woman who also could not wait to get out of Michigan. ) Hit the west coast in 1978 and never looked back. Believe it or not, LA was more socially liberal back then, still reverberating from the flower child ethos of the 60s, and life in the city was still laid back. Now the liberalism is ideological, and there is nothing laid back in LA anymore, not even our recently acquired large homeless population.

 

[Xinyta]

@FoxLovinPat

Let's put semantics, reasons, and excuses aside for a moment.

You are in fear of judgement of others, and seek to appease people to quell those potential judgements.

You say you see it, but not much changes.

There is a big difference in knowing what needs to be done, and ACTAULLY putting the conserted effort into doing it.

If I can call a spade a spade for a second. Your fear of judgement, is really a fear of being yourself. You can blame everyone else for why you can't... or I should say, WON'T. But your only real enemy is yourself.

The moment you can face that. You can truly start being who you really are and grow.

This doesn't dismiss your father's blatant disfunction and personal problems. But you cannot exclude yourself from the fact that you are playing a part in your own torment.

A second thing to note, which spurred my first post here, is that you make your father an exception to the rule. He isn't. I said what I said for a reason. You cannot let your fear and emotions control your capability to funtion. Your emotions are standing in the way of reasonable logic. Second guessing yourself is setting you up for socail suicide, when it comes to setting boundaries and standing up for yourself.

Yeah I've been told that by my best friend and my therapist, doesn't make it any easier to dismiss the fears and worries.

It's not being said to blow smoke up your butt. NOTHING IS EASY. But life can be easier when you allow yourself the chance to ACTUALLY try doing things, in spite of fear.

To do something in spite of fear, isn't weakness. It's the bravest thing you can do. It's true strength in yourself.

 

[FoxLovinPat]

Is it all judgement that you have a fear of? Are there grades of judgement that you are less fearful of?

I've actually never really thought about it.
I guess once I took a moment to think of it, the answer to that seems to primarily be things that my father told me I needed to worry about others judging me for. Which I guess I've already realized he was wrong and also that not everyone things like he does. So I guess I need to try and stop thinking that anyone and everyone is as judgmental as my father, and judges people for the same things that he does.

Outside of that though I'd say general homophobic and transphobic judgments that those types of people make on LGBT individuals such as myself.

Imagine living your life trying as if by magic to control how other people respond, how limited would that version of living be, what would it achieve.

I don't have to as I already kinda did used to live that life, it was a lonely existence as I had no friends or relationships because I was too afraid that I'd be judged by potential friends or partners.
I missed out on a lot of experiences growing up, or so I've been told, because of that fear, because I never made friends to spend time with. But I did also feel like I was different and an outcast, like I didn't truly belong both due to being neurodivergent and non-binary so there was that too.

 

[Aspychata]

I grew up in Cali, and l am a very open person. Right now, l live in the South, and l am taken back at how close-minded the south feels. The attitudes around you do affect you @FoxLovinPat , whether it's your father, your neighbors, your co-workers. I get where you are coming from.

 

[FoxLovinPat]

@FoxLovinPat

Let's put semantics, reasons, and excuses aside for a moment.

You are in fear of judgement of others, and seek to appease people to quell those potential judgements.

You say you see it, but not much changes.

There is a big difference in knowing what needs to be done, and ACTAULLY putting the conserted effort into doing it.

If I can call a spade a spade for a second. Your fear of judgement, is really a fear of being yourself. You can blame everyone else for why you can't... or I should say, WON'T. But your only real enemy is yourself.

The moment you can face that. You can truly start being who you really are and grow.

This doesn't dismiss your father's blatant disfunction and personal problems. But you cannot exclude yourself from the fact that you are playing a part in your own torment.

I feel you're right, it's just.. I've been living in fear for so long that it's hard to break that cycle, to tear down this wall I've built around myself to protect myself from the scary outside world, to take off the mask I hide my true face behind for fear that the world will think I'm hideous.

Though I suppose in recent years I've started doing just that and nothing too bad has happened just yet, so maybe I should trust myself and continue on this path, to fully break down the barriers that are in my way. Just some seem rather insurmountable, such as general homophobia and transphobia.. some of the fear is genuine as there are people who want people like me to be forced back into their closets by society, and to make new rules to keep us in them or worse just eliminate us entirely. Makes me feel like in that regard maybe I'm safer keeping that part if me hidden still so as not to paint a target on my back.
Yet at the same time I don't want to hide anymore I do want to be more free, and I hate that during the time I want to be more myself there's a big push by the hateful bigoted people to undo the progress that's been made by our peers. But I digress.

A second thing to note, which spurred my first post here, is that you make your father an exception to the rule. He isn't. I said what I said for a reason. You cannot let your fear and emotions control your capability to function. Your emotions are standing in the way of reasonable logic. Second guessing yourself is setting you up for social suicide, when it comes to setting boundaries and standing up for yourself.

Well I guess it's because he's been a steady supply of judgment in my life, and I know in this moment in time at least he's not as judgmental as he's been in the past.. at least towards me, he's still just as judgmental as ever, if not more so, of others. But I know it's not going to last and at some point the truth will have to come out, and I suppose I'm ready for what my father will throw at me and I'm also ready to push him aside if it's as bad as I suspect it'll be. Despite that it's still scary as there won't be any going back from this, unless I conform to my father's wishes. That I'll unleash a torrent of judgment from him upon myself but I guess I am prepared for it, I have a good idea of what that judgment will be and how it'll be relayed so that'll take some of the sting out of it but not all of it.

I dunno if I'm making any sense at all here, but I hope my meanings come through.

 

[Xinyta]

I feel you're right, it's just.. I've been living in fear for so long that it's hard to break that cycle, to tear down this wall I've built around myself to protect myself from the scary outside world, to take off the mask I hide my true face behind for fear that the world will think I'm hideous.

Though I suppose in recent years I've started doing just that and nothing too bad has happened just yet, so maybe I should trust myself and continue on this path, to fully break down the barriers that are in my way. Just some seem rather insurmountable, such as general homophobia and transphobia.. some of the fear is genuine as there are people who want people like me to be forced back into their closets by society, and to make new rules to keep us in them or worse just eliminate us entirely. Makes me feel like in that regard maybe I'm safer keeping that part if me hidden still so as not to paint a target on my back.
Yet at the same time I don't want to hide anymore I do want to be more free, and I hate that during the time I want to be more myself there's a big push by the hateful bigoted people to undo the progress that's been made by our peers. But I digress.

I know that feeling. Thinking the world is against you. Thinking you will never do anything right. Displease everyone. Be a worthless burden.

The reality is better than the alternative, really. There is strife in the world. People with no business having power, having power. And peppered all over the world. People who judge, hate, discriminate. But these people are a loud minority. Feeling bigger than they truly are.

Take some time to watch people. Watch the world move around you. You'll find things are not as bad as you thought, or that a certain fear, or fears, are completely unfounded.

Truthfully. I can understand coming out gay or trans can be rather scary. There are always going to people that have something about that. In truth, I still kinda am floundering myself on the sexual orientation thing.

Well I guess it's because he's been a steady supply of judgment in my life, and I know in this moment in time at least he's not as judgmental as he's been in the past.. at least towards me, he's still just as judgmental as ever, if not more so, of others. But I know it's not going to last and at some point the truth will have to come out, and I suppose I'm ready for what my father will throw at me and I'm also ready to push him aside if it's as bad as I suspect it'll be. Despite that it's still scary as there won't be any going back from this, unless I conform to my father's wishes. That I'll unleash a torrent of judgment from him upon myself but I guess I am prepared for it, I have a good idea of what that judgment will be and how it'll be relayed so that'll take some of the sting out of it but not all of it.

In truth. As scary as it is. Nothing will hurt more than not allowing yourself a chance to be free of him and the nightmare you hold within you.

If I cannot be free. If I do not fight for the self. I am truly dead to all who see me.