The best way for me to learn something has always been to experience it so as to understand how it feels. If I've been behaving in a selfish way, I have to experience the other side of the coin to truly understand the effect my actions have. This has helped me understand why I’m experiencing what I am today, and to accept it, certainly not resist it, just because it isn't easy.
In the past, if the lights were too bright, or the people were too noisy, or the smells they produced were overpowering, I would have to do something about it to make it more tolerable for me. I felt like I had to change things, and would dominate the situation until I did. I wasn't able to play the Asperger card as I didn't know I had one. Perhaps if I had, things may have been different. But without one, it was simply unreasonable to always need things my way; like some obsessive compulsion I was being overwhelmed by. I was able to get away with it because I was in a position of power; and eventually was corrupted by it no matter how benevolent I felt I was otherwise being.
Now, I’m experiencing the opposite. Similar things occur, albeit more intensely, but there is little I do about it other than accept it as best I can. Which is not easy. I seem to be challenging that part of me that wants things my way, and making it have to surrender instead. To let things go if they bother me. Which is the opposite of how I used to be. I'm allowing those around me to create the situation, irrespective of how their choice affects me. They don't know how it affects me because I don't tell them. I just spray a little air freshener, keep my earplugs in, and get on with it.
How I feel about the people I'm with is directly connected to how easy it is for me to tolerate what they do. I don't feel connected to the people I live with. They are not bad people, they just do things differently to me. I keep to myself. We don't interact. We walk past each other without even acknowledging the other's presence. I am affected by a lot of what they do, but I don't allow myself to reveal it, as that would trigger the old me who’d want to change something, rather than use the experience to understand why and change myself. I think this is necessary because it's the only thing that makes any sense.
When I lived with my second wife, she turned out to be the opposite of my first one. Younger than me by 20 years, she was able to control and dominate me, so that I got to experience some of what my first wife must have gone through. Many times I noticed how similar things were, just in reverse. And it is still like this, which makes me think how important it must be for me to experience the other side of the coin. I'm not sure I'd change any other way, certainly not through reflection alone, which would explain why life has been dealing with me the way it has. Some might say this is the true meaning of karma in action.
In the past, if the lights were too bright, or the people were too noisy, or the smells they produced were overpowering, I would have to do something about it to make it more tolerable for me. I felt like I had to change things, and would dominate the situation until I did. I wasn't able to play the Asperger card as I didn't know I had one. Perhaps if I had, things may have been different. But without one, it was simply unreasonable to always need things my way; like some obsessive compulsion I was being overwhelmed by. I was able to get away with it because I was in a position of power; and eventually was corrupted by it no matter how benevolent I felt I was otherwise being.
Now, I’m experiencing the opposite. Similar things occur, albeit more intensely, but there is little I do about it other than accept it as best I can. Which is not easy. I seem to be challenging that part of me that wants things my way, and making it have to surrender instead. To let things go if they bother me. Which is the opposite of how I used to be. I'm allowing those around me to create the situation, irrespective of how their choice affects me. They don't know how it affects me because I don't tell them. I just spray a little air freshener, keep my earplugs in, and get on with it.
How I feel about the people I'm with is directly connected to how easy it is for me to tolerate what they do. I don't feel connected to the people I live with. They are not bad people, they just do things differently to me. I keep to myself. We don't interact. We walk past each other without even acknowledging the other's presence. I am affected by a lot of what they do, but I don't allow myself to reveal it, as that would trigger the old me who’d want to change something, rather than use the experience to understand why and change myself. I think this is necessary because it's the only thing that makes any sense.
When I lived with my second wife, she turned out to be the opposite of my first one. Younger than me by 20 years, she was able to control and dominate me, so that I got to experience some of what my first wife must have gone through. Many times I noticed how similar things were, just in reverse. And it is still like this, which makes me think how important it must be for me to experience the other side of the coin. I'm not sure I'd change any other way, certainly not through reflection alone, which would explain why life has been dealing with me the way it has. Some might say this is the true meaning of karma in action.
